A Talk On Gratitude: What It Is & How To Cultivate It

Hi friends.

I had to give a talk recently on gratitude for a class that I'm in and I just thought that I would record it and share it on my podcast just in case it can serve you or maybe it's something that you're interested in right now.

So in this short talk,

Together we'll explore the power of living with gratitude,

What can get in the way of feeling gratitude,

And how we can intentionally nurture it in our lives.

And we'll then close with a short reflective meditation that will help you get in touch with your own grateful heart.

So I want to begin with a story.

When I was quite a bit younger,

I took my dad out to dinner one year for Father's Day at a diner-styled restaurant.

And after dinner,

We ordered some milkshakes for dessert and as we were sipping on them,

I had this inner desire rise to tell my dad how much I appreciated him.

And honestly,

A part of me felt a little nervous and even a little uncomfortable for such a tender thing.

But my dad and I have always had a close relationship and so I felt invited to share this with him.

So while I made direct eye contact with him,

I just shared how grateful I was to have him as my father and how grateful I was to share such a meaningful relationship with him.

And saying these words aloud to him while looking into his eyes filled me with an overwhelming feeling of gratitude and love that my eyes welled with tears and his did too.

The feeling was so strong that I almost wanted to pull away from it.

I don't know if you've ever felt that too,

But it's as though the vulnerability and tenderness of it is just too much.

But I stayed and my body filled with a sense of openness and warmth and I felt my heart literally opening up.

And I remember my experience of that moment to this day because it was just so powerful and genuine.

So this is gratitude.

It's a feeling or expression of appreciation for what we have been given and it opens the heart and connects us to others and to the world.

Brene Brown says,

I don't have to chase extraordinary moments to find happiness.

It's right in front of me if I'm paying attention and practicing gratitude.

I know that we've all experienced moments of gratitude before.

So whether that's in smaller ways that bring about a pleasant sense of lightness in the body or maybe in larger ways that open the heart and can feel emotionally overwhelming like the experience that I had with my dad.

Gratitude naturally arises in our lives in moments when someone does something kind and unexpected for us or when we catch that short window of time in the morning when a beautiful sunrise fills the sky or when we are in the company of a dear friend.

It arises naturally a lot of times but it's also something that we can intentionally cultivate in our lives and I'll talk about that more here in a couple minutes.

But the truth is that there's no shortage of reasons to be grateful in our lives.

So just to name a few,

The breath in our lungs,

The food that we have access to that keeps us going,

The leaves of trees that convert carbon dioxide into oxygen,

The sound of birds on a spring morning,

That's one of my favorites,

Our health and for most of us our ability to see,

Hear,

And move our bodies,

The special relationships that we get to form with others,

The experiences we have in life that teach us something new about ourselves,

And then not to mention music and art and laughter.

I like the thought that gratitude can also be felt in the acknowledgment of the interconnected nature of life.

So each of us exists within an inconceivable network of support from all things.

In one of my favorite articles by writer and teacher Leo Babauta,

He says this and it's a little bit of a longer excerpt,

But I think it's relevant.

So he says,

You are reading an article written for you by me sent across the internet thanks to the work of thousands and thousands of engineers and power workers and workers and computer factories using a computer device produced by thousands of people around the world.

You are alive because you ate food and drink produced and delivered and served by thousands of people.

You have shelter built by thousands of people when you consider the manufacturing process and it's powered by a power system where thousands of people work every day with water coming to you produced by thousands of people,

Cable or internet entertainment streamed to you that was produced by millions of people.

Your furniture,

Clothes,

Appliances,

Car,

Roads,

Work buildings,

And city were all built by millions of people.

It can feel vulnerable to see our level of dependence on other people and the extent to which we co-create each other's lives.

But it's also an acknowledging this truth that we are able to open to gratitude for all the ways we are supported by other people.

So that's people close to us as well as those we have never met before and never will meet.

Even in the midst of life's greater challenges,

We can still hold gratitude in our hearts.

A Taoist sage named Chiang Tzu once said this,

When you open your heart,

You get life's 10,

000 sorrows and 10,

000 joys.

So this is the nature of life,

Right?

And we don't need life to go well at all times in order to tap into gratitude.

I want to say that again.

We don't need life to go well at all times in order to tap into gratitude.

Instead,

We can cultivate a grateful heart that can stay open and tender in the face of both celebration and adversity.

So gratitude can hold all of what life brings while still burning the flame of appreciation for life in general and all that we have been given,

Most of all,

The gift of life.

So feeling grateful is sometimes easier said than done.

I know this is especially true for me.

I tend to focus more on what I don't have or the things in my life that I can improve.

And there are many reasons why it might be hard for us to feel grateful,

Many of which are not our fault.

The brain is hardwired to focus on lack of negativity.

So this is known as the negativity bias.

And even when positive or neutral things of equal intensity occur,

Things of a more negative nature have a greater effect on our psychological state.

And so we're just more likely to focus on the things that aren't going well in our lives or the things that have a more negative tone to them.

We also tend to compare ourselves to others,

Especially in the world of social media.

And when we do so,

We fall victim to the belief that others have more than what we have,

Or that the grass is greener on the other side.

Our ability to feel gratitude can also be hindered by mindlessness.

So this means just going about our days kind of lost in thought or distractions.

And we're unable to even notice the gifts all around us because we're just kind of caught in this mind haze.

So I'm sure we've all experienced these ways of thinking and being.

And it doesn't feel good,

Right?

When we're caught in negativity,

Comparison,

Or mindlessness,

We feel disconnected from life.

So these three things,

The negativity bias,

Comparison,

And mindlessness,

They're not habits of the mind that we should feel shame about or try to get rid of.

But they are important tendencies to be aware of when we have the intention to cultivate gratitude in our lives.

And when we hold these things in awareness,

They're less likely to hijack our lives.

I also just want to normalize that we all go through periods when gratitude feels out of reach.

You know,

At times we go through dips when we're facing something particularly challenging or our general outlook just feels bleak.

And in these periods,

There can be a tendency to feel even worse about ourselves because not only do we feel down,

But we also don't feel grateful.

But the truth is that it happens to all of us and it's normal.

So rather than feeding unhelpful thoughts about ourselves or forcing an inauthentic form of gratitude,

We can just be with our present moment experience however it is.

And then when gratitude does naturally arise and we're not forcing it,

Then we can really lean into that.

So how can we cultivate gratitude in an intentional way?

So like mindfulness,

Gratitude is a muscle that we exercise by choosing it over and over again.

And it's a choice in perspective.

So first and foremost,

We can turn toward gratitude just by reflecting on the preciousness of life.

I mean,

Really,

It is both a rarity and opportunity to be born as a human being.

And every day we can express things for what most of us have access to food,

Water,

Shelter,

And opportunities to cultivate wisdom and compassion.

Mindfulness is also a tool that we can use to strengthen gratitude.

So when we are mindful of life by bringing this nonjudgmental awareness to the present moment,

It helps us attune to the beauty and richness of each moment.

This helps us to be grateful for what we have here,

Right now,

And then as an extension of that for life in general.

So contemplating impermanence is another practice that can help us sense the preciousness of all things and therefore our gratitude for those things.

And I find that this practice in particular for me can really generate a sense of gratitude.

And even just like a couple moments of contemplating the impermanent nature of all things can do that for me.

So really the idea is to remember that everything is so fragile and here for only a short time.

And we get to enjoy it for a short time as well.

Keeping this truth close to us can naturally lead to feeling deep gratitude for all that we have and all that we have the opportunity to experience because we know that it won't be here forever.

Lastly,

Another way that we can intentionally cultivate gratitude is through generosity.

So rather than waiting for something to be given to us,

We can cultivate a sense of gratitude by giving to others and doing so without expectation of something in return.

Generosity can help us feel gratitude for our ability to help and support others and the good feelings that come from that when we do.

So all of these intentional ways of thinking and acting can water the seed of gratitude in us.

And of course we can also journal about what we're grateful for or bring gratitude into our meditation practice.

The practice of metta or loving kindness meditation is a specific meditation that is a great way to cultivate gratitude.

So by bringing to mind others and offering your well wishes for them through loving kindness,

Gratitude can naturally arise.

When we consistently prioritize gratitude in our lives,

It changes our perspective of the world and fills us with a sense of abundance,

Even in the midst of hardship or scarcity.

The natural tendencies of the human mind makes it so we have to be intentional about cultivating gratitude,

But it is so worth it.

Every day we wake up holding life,

Its gifts,

And our relationships like sand in our hands.

Everything is impossible to grasp onto,

And yet we are gifted the choice to choose gratitude for all that we have in this brief time that we are here.

Before we do a brief reflection,

I just want to leave you with this short piece in a New York Times article that's called 12 Tiny Stories of Gratitude.

So this one is written by a woman who is expressing what makes her grateful for her neighbor.

Your hello waves,

Your bouncy gate as you mow our lawn since it's right next to yours.

Your spicy chicken curry when our third was born.

Your stop when my son's green ball rolled into the street and I wasn't there.

Your giant trampoline filled with little feet from every house.

Your send the kids over so I could sip coffee in silence.

The passing down of the dinosaur costume you made,

A pink dress,

Puzzles.

How you thought of me,

Looked out for me and my family in this disconnected world.

So in our meditation together,

Let's go ahead and find a comfortable seated position.

Letting your spine be long,

Your shoulders soft,

Maybe resting your hands in your lap or on your thighs.

You can let your eyes close or just let your gaze soften.

Letting your forehead be soft,

Letting your jaw be loose.

Just take a few moments to take some deep breaths.

With each exhale,

Seeing if you can let your body just soften a little bit more.

Just arriving here in this moment and sensing into your body and tuning into the breath.

And now feel into your heart space,

Just sensing what's here now.

There's any sensations,

Any tightness or softness.

Maybe imagining yourself breathing directly in and out of your heart space.

Maybe it helps to place a hand over your heart and feel the pressure of your hand.

And now take some time to bring to mind either a person or a thing,

Something in your life that you feel gratitude for.

This might be a specific person in your life or it might be a greater,

More general idea,

Like the idea that we're all interconnected and support each other in ways seen and unseen.

Or maybe it's just something simple like the warmth in your house or the sunrise this morning or a good meal that you recently had.

And if it feels difficult to access gratitude right now,

Just let that be okay.

And see if there's anything,

Even something really small that you can bring to mind.

And if not,

That's okay.

So whatever you've chosen,

Just let the qualities of this thing fill your awareness,

Whether it's the details of the person's facial features that you're imagining or just the qualities about them that you feel particularly grateful for,

Or maybe imagining in detail the colors of the sunset or sunrise.

Whatever it is that you're feeling grateful for right now,

Just let it come into sharper focus.

And as you do so,

See if you can sense any shifts in your heart space,

Maybe a feeling of openness or tenderness or warmth.

You might imagine a color that comes to mind when you think of your gratitude.

Maybe even just the image of a flame in the heart space.

And now just spend these next couple moments letting this feeling of gratitude expand out through your body.

Maybe it helps to imagine yourself expressing outwardly your gratitude for this person or thing,

And just giving yourself a moment to lean into this gratitude.

And thanks for your practice and awareness today.