Practical Guide To Gratitude During Coronavirus & Other Uncertainties

So,

I'm just going to let you introduce yourself because there's a lot going on with you and I have questions.

So,

We'll just start there.

That's fine.

I will say,

I'm very spiritual,

But my practice is not about the spirituality.

It's about really being practical and acknowledging all the aspects.

So,

If you're feeling crappy,

And I won't say crappy online,

But if you're feeling crappy,

Really feel it and be there for a minute because when we start to pretend that everything is okay,

Like I was getting a little crazy in the beginning because I was like,

Oh,

It's going to be okay.

Just breathe.

No.

No.

So,

I want to be able to express that part as well.

Okay.

And I love that.

And I really want to get into that conversation because that is totally me.

I'm spiritual,

But there's also part of me that's like,

Hey,

We're in this three-dimensional world for a reason.

And even if we are spirits having a human experience,

We're here to have that human experience and all of this mundane stuff that we don't like to deal with,

Including icky feelings is part of that.

So,

And one of the topics I want to bring up today is like the whole COVID thing and remaining grateful throughout the whole COVID thing,

Which is hard for some people to do.

But before we do that,

I just want to introduce you today on the show,

I have this Maya Rubin.

Am I saying your name right?

Am I?

Okay.

Maria.

Yes.

Okay.

So today on the show,

I have this Maya Rubin,

This Maya,

Hold on one second.

Cause I want to do.

Where are you located?

I'm in San Francisco.

Very nice.

So you're locked down.

Oh yeah.

We've been on lockdown for five weeks since like,

I feel like March 18th since mid March,

We've been on lockdown.

How about you guys?

Are you on lockdown in Florida?

I know Florida is not very differently in South Florida.

We are technically.

Yeah.

But you know,

Our governor changes his mind every other day.

He's you know,

He's friends with the big guy.

So he changes his mind and the way he's going to do things and they opened the beach and they realized that was a disaster.

So,

You know,

I looked at the,

I was walking yesterday and I was like in tears all morning and I,

And I turned my head and I was facing east and I live like five miles from the beach.

Like I joke cause I lived two miles,

Less than two miles before now,

Like five.

And I'm like,

I moved to the hood,

But I'm looking at the,

I'm looking east and it's early in the morning and I'm looking through a chain link fence and all of a sudden I see you know,

The sun is up and you could see the colors of the sunrise through the trees and I'm like,

Oh my God,

I miss it so much.

And like just tears.

I realized I was like,

I felt like a prisoner cause I'm looking through this chain link fence and I could see the trees in the horizon and the beautiful colors.

And I'm like,

Wow.

Like I always,

I was always grateful,

But I didn't realize how badly I missed getting up at six o'clock or some ridiculous hour to go watch the sunrise.

And now that's not available and it's like,

Dude,

Like seriously.

So they're gonna,

They're talking about opening it up and I don't know what that's going to look like or how that's gonna,

You know,

I don't know.

I mean,

Honestly,

Yeah,

I just,

It's like one of those things where,

Because I think in California we've been on lockdown for so long and I'm like,

Listen,

You got like,

I'm from Michigan originally and I see everybody on my social media,

Not everybody,

But some of the people,

Particularly people who are of Republican persuasion,

Who are really upset about this whole lockdown thing and the governor telling people that you can only go out for essentials apparently,

You know,

She's being compared to a Nazi or whatever.

And I just can't,

I can't help but think it's like you guys like,

Okay,

Realistically,

We have to do this lockdown for a couple of months.

Like realistically,

Like that's just sort of what's happening.

But if everybody did it,

We would be fine.

And that's the thing.

It's like these people who are fighting it and I get it too.

I get that,

You know,

A lot of people are,

Which brings me back to gratitude,

A lot of people are worried about how they're going to pay their bills,

How they're going to feed their families,

How they're going to do all of these things.

And that's a very real fear and that's something too that I want to talk about practicing gratitude in a time of uncertainty because people have lost their jobs and they don't know if they're going to get one when this is going to be over and they don't know when this is going to be over.

And what do you say to people that come to you and say,

I don't know how to be grateful in this time.

Like things are really bleak.

You want me to answer you now or you want me to answer you online?

We are online.

I'm recording.

Oh,

I'm sorry.

I'm sorry.

I know we were going to do the whole intro,

But we just got into it.

You know,

It's like,

Let's just do it.

You know,

By the way,

By the way,

Everyone,

This is Vismaa Reuben.

Just in case you were wondering who I was talking to.

Vismaa is a bestselling author.

She's a teacher,

But more importantly,

And the thing that I really love about her is that she is what she likes to deem as a gratitude gangster.

And I really want to get into all of that.

And I really want to get into all of that.

I don't know.

You pick a question.

I'm going to start with the deep,

Like,

You know,

I will answer that because I think that that's a super important question.

And I think that,

You know,

Like we were talking and I don't know if this part was recorded,

But in the beginning of this whole crisis,

People were very upset with,

Or I was very upset with the idea of,

You know,

Oh,

It's going to be okay.

Breathe through it.

Everything's okay.

And,

And I was,

I was really getting upset with people because I was like,

This is real.

People have real fears.

They have real experiences that they're dealing with.

They have real emotions.

Like you were saying,

They lost their job.

They don't know when they're going to get a new one.

And I think,

You know,

The first thing I would tell people is to,

To experience whatever you're feeling.

If you're feeling sad,

Feel sad.

If you're feeling angry,

Feel angry.

If you're feeling,

You know,

Pissed,

Feel,

Feel all of it.

And then what we don't want is that you to,

To get into that place where you're wallowing and you're staying there.

So the first thing,

You know,

I would say to you is really just take a deep breath,

Really take a deep breath.

And this sounds kind of silly and a little woo,

But it works.

So you're going to open your arms up and wiggle your fingers,

Look up to the sky and ask yourself,

What am I grateful for today?

What do I have to learn from this?

And I think that's the most important question.

Like,

What can I learn from this?

What is the lesson that I'm supposed to learn?

What is it that I,

What is it that I'm supposed to,

To gain from this?

And I think,

You know,

One of my coaches one time said to me,

I went to this event and I was so excited.

I was at this Apple festival and hundreds of thousands of people were going to go.

And I was like,

Oh,

Excellent.

I got a booth.

I was thrilled to death.

And I think I sold $300 with stuff.

And I called her up.

I'm like,

Oh my God,

I can't believe this.

This is horrible.

And she said,

What are you worried about?

I'm like,

I thought I was going to,

You know,

Raise enough money where I could be set and do research and work and build program.

She said,

Is your rent due today?

I said,

No.

She goes,

Is it due tomorrow?

I said,

No.

She says,

Is it due on next week?

I said,

No.

She said,

What does it do?

I go in three weeks.

She goes,

Then in two,

Two weeks and six days or three weeks and six days is when you pick that back up.

She goes,

Because right now there is absolutely nothing you can do.

And the worrying about it is not going to make a difference.

And I know that that sounds for some people really,

You know,

Kind of like you're blowing it off,

Whatever.

You're not making it important.

But the bottom line is this,

What you resist persists,

What you think about constantly,

Which you bring your thoughts,

Create a reality.

So if you're constantly worried about all these things that you can't do at the end of the day,

You're going to keep bringing more of that in.

You're not going to have the time to be open and creative and free and start to look for those other options,

Those other possibilities.

And you know,

I understand where people are coming from because all of my events have been canceled as well.

My huge event that I was going to go to in May canceled a huge event.

I'm talking like 50,

000 people are going to go through this event in July canceled.

So I get it.

But if I sit here and focused on all of the income that I lost because I couldn't go to these events,

Where does the availability of creating something different open up?

So the first thing I would say to people is allow yourself to feel that.

And then at some point after you're there for a time,

Give yourself a time limit.

You need to take those feelings and really compartmentalize them and put them aside.

And then from that place,

You can start to look for your gratitude practice.

Because really,

When you give that energy and say,

Okay,

This is what's real for me right now,

I get it.

But that doesn't mean that every aspect of my life is falling apart because I call gratitude like CPR.

The first part is compartmentalize.

Compartmentalize those areas that aren't working.

And then you have the freedom to look for your gratitude in other places.

You take a deep breath.

So throughout the day,

Literally,

We walk around on our cell phones,

Pause,

Take some deep breaths and look for those moments that bring you joy.

And I'm Jewish,

So we had a Passover Seder for this year on Zoom.

It was the first time I can honestly say that I think my entire family was well behaved,

Present,

Really,

Because we're always like,

Oh,

Who's got the wine or poking at each other.

But we were present.

We were focused.

And then afterwards,

We were going to hang up and go eat our own prospective dinners because we were in all different parts of the country and even the world.

And my brother's like,

Why are we all hanging out?

Because let's eat together.

So we sat on Zoom in 9 or 10 different places,

And we all had our dinner together.

And it was so nice to see.

That sounds really nice.

It was,

Right?

Because the things that we say we want,

We don't make time for.

And now that we can't have them,

What is it we want them?

We want them,

Yeah.

Well,

I feel like that is really one good thing.

I know that there is,

I don't like the part of people dying in this pandemic.

That's definitely something I don't like.

But I feel like,

As a point to what you were saying before about you were looking through the fence,

And you realized how much you missed waking up at an ungodly hour to go watch the sunrise.

And it's things like that where now we get a chance to look at things that we took for granted before,

Or maybe we didn't like a lot.

A lot of people now are like,

I miss going into the office.

I miss going into work.

And back in the day,

They would complain about having to wake up early to go to work.

So I think in a lot of ways,

By taking things away,

It makes us really appreciate the things that we have,

Including friendships and socializing.

I know me,

I can be kind of an introvert.

I'll make plans and I'm like,

I don't want to go out.

Now I'm like,

I will give you a million dollars if I can go out and hang out with my friends for like an hour,

Please.

So I think in a lot of ways,

When we are facing adversity is when we realize how lucky we are.

I think that the hardest part about being grateful is that I think people don't realize that it's practice.

So I think our whole lives,

We're used to thinking negative,

Or we're used to focusing on negative things.

And it's not going to happen overnight.

And I think that that's where a lot of people fail because they're like,

Okay,

I'm going to be grateful.

I'm supposed to be grateful.

So I'm going to shift all my energy into being grateful.

But the problem is it's like playing the guitar,

Right?

You're not going to play this masterpiece your first time that you play it.

You have to practice every day,

Every day you have to bring yourself in.

So can you talk a little bit to that,

Like things that people can do to sort of start practicing being grateful to become more familiar with that practice?

I want to say two things that you talked on.

I'm so grateful you said about a gratitude practice because it's a gratitude practice.

I'm putting my headset in because the law person decided to come right outside my window.

Did you say the law enforcement or the law person?

Law person.

I was like this story has two different endings.

FBI is outside.

I got to go.

I love the idea of a gratitude practice.

You'll never catch me saying an attitude of gratitude because it's about a gratitude practice,

Not a gratitude perfect.

That's number one.

So we get these chances throughout the day to stop.

And this is what I tell people and it's kind of what I said before,

Throughout the day,

Stop,

Set the alarm to go off and really when that alarm goes off,

Stop what you're doing,

Take a few deep breaths and then look for your gratitude win.

So who or what made a difference for you?

What did I do for myself or somebody else?

Did I do something new?

Did I do something nice?

And then what made me smile or laugh to my side?

And I think it's really important to start to pay attention to what is it that you do well.

And that's one of the reasons why if somebody is keeping a gratitude chart or a gratitude journal,

Write your gratitudes only in that journal.

Give everything else for another journal.

So if you're somebody who loves to get up and journal and vomit in the journal and all your feelings,

That's great,

But don't put it in your gratitude journal because the gratitude journal is only going to be filled with things that happened that were fantastic and wonderful and spectacular.

So if somebody doesn't have that practice,

I think that you can start to put it in place.

And let's say there's nothing that happened that you're grateful for.

There's two things.

You can give out a free gratitude journal calendar every month and it's filled with action steps for that purpose that we're talking about.

So if you feel like you need an extra boost or you want to take that practice to the next level,

There's something that you can do there that will give you that extra piece of energy.

And April's calendar is all geared towards being quarantined,

Like the fact that we're home and we've got to find things to do.

But at this point we can either wallow or find ways to celebrate.

And there's classes being offered,

There's museums,

Trips that you can take on the internet.

It's not the same thing necessarily as seeing it,

But you could sit in your underwear and go visit a museum.

Zoos are having some really amazing animal cams where you could check out the animals.

There's so many things right now that we can do.

There's so much free education out there.

So now is the time if you're home and you wanted to learn a new skill,

Jump on the internet and find somebody who's teaching things.

There are so many people who are offering an abundance of free material.

I've been sitting through classes for the past couple of weeks because like I said,

All of my stuff has been canceled.

Listening to podcasts.

Go ahead.

I was just going to say,

I think that that's a really important piece of it too,

Is realizing that some doors may be closed for you,

But not getting stuck looking at those doors.

Like when one door closes,

Another opens,

Right?

As the saying goes.

And it's like really focusing on,

Because life is just constant change like this.

And you know,

At different points in your life,

There's always going to be something like this quarantine.

It's not really about the situations that happen to you.

It's how you're going to make it through it.

How do you get through when you can't control the environment outside of yourself?

And I think the answer is right there.

It's like,

You need to focus on the things that you can control.

Like,

Okay,

Let me look at new opportunities.

These are clearly not working.

Maybe it's the pandemic.

Maybe it's a sign from the universe.

If you're into that sort of thing,

Maybe whatever it is,

I need to make the change.

I need to implement changes.

And I think as human beings,

And I know that I'm guilty of this too,

I think that change is a very scary thing.

Whether it's changing a career or changing your lifestyle or changing your awareness from anxiety to gratitude,

Those can be very hard things for people to do.

You said something before about,

Hang on,

Because I just lost my train of thought.

You just said it again about the idea of,

We don't like change because our brain is hardwired to protect us,

To keep things the same,

To look out for warning.

So we start to pay attention to those things that may cause these signals in our brains that,

Hey,

Warning,

Change,

Danger,

Which protects us.

And at the same time,

We get to start to shift that and say,

No,

We're going to start to focus on other things.

And if somebody that's listening is in that space of,

I hear what you're saying,

But I don't know what to do.

I can't find anything.

And here's what I would say to you.

Get up and move.

Get up and move your body.

Even if it's five steps,

If you're not taking any steps,

Get up and take five steps.

If you like to dance,

Put on music and dance,

Like literally shake this stuff out of you.

Shake it out,

Shake it out.

I remember when the whole thing started and I was stuck in my house,

I'm like,

You've got to be kidding me.

I put on music on,

I got on the Facebook live and I'm like,

Come on,

People dance with me,

Like move your body.

And it really was funny and it was silly,

But it moved it.

It took things out.

The only activity that I was having in the beginning of this pandemic was running to my refrigerator.

And I had been going to yoga a couple of times a week.

I was walking,

I was doing things and I was like,

Okay,

This has to stop.

So I decided that I couldn't take control of everything at one time.

So I put myself on a plan,

30 days,

10,

000 steps or more.

And with iPhones,

They have a pedometer stuck in there.

So that's something small that you can see.

So maybe not be 10,

000,

Maybe it's a thousand if you're not taking any steps,

But just start to do something that you can celebrate the little milestones and find reasons to celebrate,

Find things that you're grateful for.

If all of a sudden you can hear the birds outside your window,

That could be a moment of gratitude.

There's these big iguanas that hang out all over Florida.

They're not indigenous to where we are,

But people buy them as pets and I let them go.

But there's now one that lives on my front porch.

I'm not thrilled he lives on my front porch,

But I really love when he sticks his head out and he's in the grass and he's just super cool.

And as long as he's not too close to me.

But we can find things,

We can change our awareness to look for those things that bring us joy.

And it's almost like,

You know,

Watch a kid,

A child.

They laugh at silly things or little things or an animal who,

You know,

You buy the toy to the animal and they're in and out of the box or the paper bag and they're running around.

We get to.

.

.

Oh,

Sorry.

And both of like,

You know,

Children and animals,

It's not like they're always happy,

But they don't stay attached to the negative feelings.

Like a kid will have a meltdown like that,

But then two seconds later,

They're like dusting it off and they're laughing and they're playing.

And you know,

Like a dog could start barking ferociously at somebody and then,

You know,

Three seconds later,

They're like licking your hand or whatever.

It's like,

They don't.

.

.

We tend to get stuck in our negativity.

Like I know,

And even,

You know,

I mean,

We're all doing this because we're learning,

Right?

And it's like,

I know with me personally,

And I can only speak from my own personal experience,

It's like,

I've become increasingly better at letting things go.

But sometimes like I had this road rage the other day and I thought about it for hours after it happens,

You know,

Like something where I should have just let it go there.

All the energy and all the thought process that I put into that,

That I could have been putting into something nurturing or something loving or something caring.

So it's really deprogramming yourself,

Which is,

You know,

It's like anything else,

Right?

You do it through a constant,

A daily practice.

And the other thing that you said that I really,

Really resonate with is the idea of celebrating little things.

I met this woman on a plane,

This was probably about a year ago,

We were talking and she had a business that was helping people celebrate the little things in their lives.

And I had never heard this concept before.

And I thought it was so delightful.

And after that,

I really got into this whole idea of like,

Because you know,

We sit there and we complain about things when things don't go our way.

But like good things happen,

Even if they're small,

Like,

Hey,

I made a batch of cookies.

Whoo,

I made a batch of cookies.

Hey,

You know,

I listened to this podcast and I learned something.

Whoo.

I learned something.

I learned anything,

Anything,

Anything.

So I love that.

Can you give us examples of things that,

You know,

You would give as like,

Actually,

Like,

I know you said,

Like,

Like,

Keep a gratitude journal.

Is there anything else that you could say,

Like throughout the day that people could do to sort of put them more in this frame of mind?

And also,

I guess my next big question would be why gratitude?

I mean,

What does gratitude do to play devil's advocate to help you?

Does it really change things for you?

Does it change more than your perspective?

What does it do?

So I'm going to answer that first.

So there's,

You know,

The chicken or the egg,

Which comes first.

People ask is happy or happier people more grateful or grateful people happier.

And what research is showing is that grateful people are happier.

So if gratitude is at the top of the emotional scale,

Like the most,

The highest emotion you can have.

So if you practice gratitude and that's,

And again,

It's not about being grateful.

It's not about being happy every second of every day because there's,

It's an ebb and flow.

So I will tell you from my experience and from the people around me,

When you practice gratitude,

What it does is even when you're having those moments,

Those messy moments,

Those challenges,

Kind of like what we're in now,

You don't stay stuck in that space.

You're able to find,

You're able to still find the juicy moments.

And if I may share a story with you,

My aunt was in the hospital in 2013 and we knew she,

I mean,

2013 was the biggest test of my life,

But one piece of it was my aunt was in the hospital and we knew she wasn't coming out and she's,

We're in the hospital,

The whole family,

We're all hanging out and she says,

Everybody,

Okay,

I need you to leave the room for a minute.

And we marched out and she says,

Stay.

Okay.

Well,

Her daughter-in-law at the time was there.

Her son was there.

Her husband of four years was there.

I was there,

A bunch of other people,

But she asked me to stay.

So again,

She,

We knew she was dying and she looks at me and she says,

I need you to help me with my bed pan.

Why me?

Why not the nurses?

Why not your daughter-in-law who you have a great relationship with?

So I helped her.

I did my thing and then I left and I'm driving home and it was like a 45 minute drive and all of a sudden I was like,

I had to pull over because I was hysterical.

And what I got in that moment was that my aunt said to me without using words,

I love you and I trust you.

And then the bottom line is this,

When we practice gratitude,

It doesn't mean that every moment is going to be perfect,

But what that practice does,

It allows you to find perfect moments no matter what the situation is.

And I think that's the power.

You know,

You look at some of the greatest positive psychologists and you ask them,

Do you ever get upset?

And if you listen to them,

Most of them will tell you that they have to work really hard at happiness.

They have to work hard at bringing their energy levels up.

And the way you do that is by finding these delicious moments throughout your day that bring you joy.

And with the practice of gratitude,

What it does,

It brings it to the forefront.

So it's not something that it's like this,

It doesn't have to be this huge monumental thing,

But before you might've noticed the flower,

But when you have an active gratitude practice,

That flower is more vibrant and smells beautiful and you see it in a different light.

So it's really about allowing you to see what's right in front of you in a different way.

And it's not again about witchy woo,

It's about shifting something in your brain.

Cause I can be in the middle of a deep conversation and feel this moment of gratitude and somebody says to me,

What does that feel like for you?

And it's the same feeling like when I get anxiety and I have that knot in my stomach,

It happens in the same place,

But instead of it being this tight feeling,

It's like this fluttery and that's how I experienced it,

Happy and joyful.

And again,

The practice is what causes you to see this more often.

So you asked me,

How do you get people to do it?

And the simplest thing is to tell people to turn on those cell phones to go off every three to four hours and stop.

And when that alarm goes off,

Stop what you're doing and take a deep breath and say,

Look around you.

What am I gratitude wins?

Who and what made a difference for me?

And that may be something as somebody simply opening up the door and letting you in first.

It may be somebody saying,

Wow,

You know what?

I really love your smile.

And how often does somebody give us a compliment?

Oh,

Not my smile.

Right?

It really is the small things I have to say today.

I was getting ready for our podcast and I said,

Okay,

Well,

Since I'm going to have the gratitude gangster on my show,

I should probably do an exercise in gratitude.

So I did,

I just like listed five things and it's amazing how simple those five things are yet not simple.

You know,

It's like I have a roof over my head.

Oh my God.

I'm so thankful for that.

I have a cup of hot coffee in my hand.

I'm so grateful for that.

Like all of those things that we take for granted every day are really the things it's,

It's all the little things that make up our lives.

You know I'm,

I'm Greek and we just had Greek Easter.

My mom made these Greek cookies.

I'm grateful that I ate a thousand Greek cookies in two days.

You know,

I'm like,

My pants aren't grateful,

But I am.

So so yeah.

So I love that.

I think all too many times we focus on big things like,

Oh,

Like if I was rich,

This wouldn't,

You know,

Like if I was rich,

If I was 70 pounds thinner or whatever,

If I was,

You know,

All these huge things and we don't,

We don't look at what we have because the thing is it's like you look at people who have those big things.

You look at rich and famous people who you think have everything that other people want and they're not happy.

I mean,

They're so,

You know,

It's like,

Look at all the drug overdoses and look at all the suicides and look,

Look at Prince.

You know,

Look at Heath Ledger.

Every White House.

Yeah.

It's just,

It breaks my heart.

It's like everybody,

And that's why I really feel like it's important to stress that gratitude and happiness are not a destination.

You know,

We make it into this whole journey thing where it's like,

Oh,

If we just reach this one point,

Then we'll be happy forever and we'll never complain.

Like that's not true and that's not how it works.

And the problem is how our brain is wired because if our brain is wired like this going into it and we're not happy with the things that we have,

When we get to that point,

We'll say,

Yeah,

I have money,

But I don't have this thing or I don't have as much as this person or it'll just never be enough.

So I really love that whole concept of being aware of the small things like,

Hey,

Do you have your family?

That's awesome.

Even if you guys don't get along all the time.

So I'm going to give you a challenge.

You have a challenge?

I think so.

It's not that hard.

So I love that you said that you found things like off the top of your head to be grateful for,

But here's the challenge today.

Find three things that are unique to today.

So if you're just starting a gratitude practice,

It's great.

Start listing as many things as you can,

But if you really want to hone in that practice and you really want to start to get that brain looking or working for you,

Start to find things that are unique to the day.

And it may be a little bit harder because we were in a quarantine,

But I'll have to tell you,

You know,

We met yesterday and I share this with people because this is how magical life can be.

If you allow it to be,

We met yesterday,

You said,

You know,

I'd like to interview you.

When can we find the time?

And we made it happen like this.

Boom.

We can find those moments,

But we have to be open to saying yes and to really be looking for them.

I have no idea who you were and in part of my,

It was funny because for one second,

I'm like,

But I mean like,

I don't mean it that way.

I'm just saying that.

No,

I have to say,

I'm just kidding.

I'm totally kidding.

But it was just like the one thing it was like,

Yes,

Let's see how we can connect to make friends.

I love the fact of social media because we can make these connections and find different ways to make life really magical if we want to.

And I want to be very clear on something that does not mean that you do not ever experience anger or sadness or frustration or,

Cause I experienced all of those,

You know,

And I don't know if you were recording the time,

But yesterday I cried all day.

I was,

I was weepy all day long,

You know,

Something,

But then you know,

You bring it back.

But one of my favorite positive psychologists is Taub Ben-Shahar and he asked somebody one time,

He goes,

You know,

There's only two types of people who never experienced negative emotions.

Do you know who they are?

And the host was like,

No.

So he says the only two types of people who never experienced negative emotions are either dead or psychopaths.

So if you're experiencing,

Experiencing sadness,

Anger,

Frustration,

Fear,

Any of those things,

Celebrate because you're not dead and you're not a psychopath.

That's beautiful.

And I hope that that's as reassuring to everyone out there as it is to me,

Because I think that that's really human.

It's like you said,

You were weepy all day.

I don't think there's a single person that's going through this right now that isn't feeling some sort of negative emotion.

Like I think that I have had a point where I have cried every day,

You know,

And I also run these live meditations.

So I've been meditating a lot,

Morning and night,

Sort of becoming a little bit more comfortable with those feelings.

And I think that that's another step in the gratitude too,

Is that you can't feel gratitude.

Because I think that there's two types of people,

Right?

There's people that sort of like,

I mean,

There's more than two types,

But for the sake of this argument,

There's two types of,

Or discussion,

There's two types of people.

There's a type that wallow in negative feelings,

And there are other people who just avoid feelings completely.

And to the people who avoid feeling anything,

Like,

I just want to say that you need to become,

This is why meditation is such an important practice,

Because you just sit with thoughts and feelings that you try to run away from all day.

And I say this all the time,

Whether it's through alcohol or drugs or food or TV or drama and relationships or whatever it is that helps you run away from it.

Like if you could just sit with it and open yourself up to whatever feelings are going through you,

Then you'll be more receptive to gratitude as well.

Very good point.

So I think that,

Yeah,

I think that going back to,

We've covered so much today,

I'm like,

What point am I going back to?

You wanted me to tell you about gratitude gigs,

So that's how we started.

Three days later,

Here we go.

You're like my new best friend,

We're going to sit on this phone.

I know.

Everybody's going to be like,

This podcast is three days long.

What is going on?

See,

Isn't that crazy?

Right?

Yesterday,

You didn't know who I was.

You're like,

Who is this crazy person emailing me and wanting to do an interview with me?

I didn't think even,

I didn't even think crazy,

But I was like,

This is really cool.

So I'm like,

I'm manifesting,

I'm manifesting.

Do you have any stories of like manifesting things through gratitude?

Because I know for me,

I will tell you,

I was in a really bad spot where everything in my life has just been,

Since probably September of 2019,

It's like anything that can go wrong has gone wrong,

Including this pandemic.

Although now I'm starting to think that this pandemic is more of a gift than anything else,

Because I'm starting to see the positive in what it means to slow down.

But anyway,

In January,

Because I was so stressed out,

I decided to start working out to try to alleviate my stress.

I started going to the gym like every day.

I was taking this yoga class and I was in my yoga class and it was like seven o'clock at night or something.

And I was getting these chest pains.

And so I was like,

Oh my God,

Like I felt like I was having a heart attack.

And so I decided to just make it through my yoga class and see what happens.

And so I'm like sitting there having a heart attack in down dog.

Like I'm like,

Yeah,

Everything's fine.

Nothing to see here.

And I go home and I just kept having these chest pains,

Kept having them.

I woke up in the morning.

I still had the chest pains.

So I called the nurse and the nurse is like,

You need to go to the doctor right now.

And I was really scared because I was like Googling things,

Which don't do.

If you don't know what's wrong with you,

Do not Google because it's always lung cancer,

Just FYI,

It's always lung cancer or a tumor of some kind.

So according to Dr.

Google,

So I go,

So I'm getting ready for my appointment.

I'm freaking out.

And all of a sudden this voice in my head was just like,

You know what?

There is nothing you can do about this right now.

Don't freak out.

It's going to make everything worse.

I want you to just look at things that you're grateful for right now.

And I practiced that.

I was grateful for my coffee.

I was grateful for the couch that I have that I could sit on.

I was grateful that I had health insurance,

That I could go to the doctor.

I mean all of these things.

And it was crazy because there was no traffic on the way there,

Which it's San Francisco.

There's always traffic.

It was like 9 AM.

There was no traffic on the way there.

I got there.

There was actually parking at Kaiser,

Which there's never parking.

I got in immediately.

All these good things.

Everybody was so nice to me.

I got in and it was just like a small thing.

She was like,

Yeah,

You're too stressed out.

You need to calm down.

But other than that,

You're totally healthy.

So it's like maybe that would have happened anyway,

But I feel like because I sort of added.

And that's just one example of times where I was like,

I'm so stressed out,

But I'm going to choose to not be stressed out,

Where things just always worked out fine.

And the thing is that if you're here,

I think the important thing to remember,

No matter how much anxiety that you have,

Is that if you're here,

Things have always worked out for you.

That's it.

As long as you're still alive,

Things have always worked out for you.

So I'm sorry I interrupted you.

You were saying?

No,

I think that was a powerful conversation.

I also like the idea of you're here,

Things always work out for you.

Now you get to choose how you see it.

I think that's very powerful.

And I was trying to think of manifesting per se.

I think that if I look at 2013 and again,

Going back to that,

That was a year where it could have been a year from hell or a year from,

There was a lot of growth and I truly attribute it to a gratitude practice that I was able to make my way out of that and happy,

So to speak.

So Valentine's day,

My dad had part of his lung removed.

Two days later,

I got a call at 830 in the morning,

My cousin's husband was killed.

Three weeks later,

My aunt went into the hospital.

That's the one I just told you about.

We knew she wasn't coming out.

And three weeks after that,

Maybe my mother had a stroke.

So I was like,

And when my cousin's husband was killed,

I was at work on a Saturday.

I was teaching.

We were doing Saturday school,

Preparing for these lovely state tests.

And my principal's like,

What do you need?

You don't need to be here.

I was like,

All right,

I need to get out of here.

I'll be here today.

I'm getting my ticket.

I won't be here the rest of the week.

So I bought my ticket the next day.

I left to Atlanta and I remember thinking,

Oh my God,

Thank you that I had a credit card and that I had the time off of work,

That I had the money to pay for the ticket to go to Atlanta.

And I remember being there and rolling the salami and making the platters look pretty.

Because God forbid my grandmother looks down and goes,

What are you serving?

And I'm like,

What's that?

Being a service cousin.

You're going to serve that to people?

How horrible.

And sweeping the floor and making the phone calls that she didn't want to make.

And I was experiencing tremendous sadness,

But all my mind was focusing on was the parts that I was grateful for.

Like being able to be there and again,

Be of service.

And then when my aunt was in the hospital,

There were a few times,

Because my uncle had Parkinson's and he was exhausted.

This was his high school sweetheart of almost 40 years.

And I finally said to him one night,

I go,

Listen,

You need to go home and you need to go to sleep.

You need to sleep in your bed.

And I was angry at the time that some of my family members,

Because they weren't stepping in the way I thought they should step in.

So there wasn't just like this altruistic,

I was grateful every moment of the day,

Because there was a lot of anger there.

There was a lot of frustration.

And I would say to him,

I go,

Go home,

Take a nap,

Sleep,

Please.

And I remember the one night,

It was the night before my step-mom's birthday and it was in May and he went home and he woke up in the morning.

He's like,

How is she doing?

I go,

She's fine.

And I'm like,

How are you?

And he's like,

Oh my God,

I slept.

And you could hear it in his voice.

And again,

It was that moment for me that it was like,

I got to be of service to the people I care about.

And then fast forward to September,

My aunt had already passed away and it was September and my uncle,

Again with Parkinson's,

I go to my townhouse.

My tenant had called me up and she said,

I'm leaving.

I said,

All right.

And this place was like,

She didn't leave it very nicely.

And my uncle,

I look up and he's on this like eight foot ladder.

I'm like,

What are you doing?

He's like,

Your house needs to be painted so you could get a new tenant.

I'm thinking to myself,

Oh my God,

He's got Parkinson's,

God forbid.

He falls.

And I said,

Why are you on a ladder?

What are you doing?

And he's like,

I'm painting,

You need help.

You've been here for me for the past six months,

Eight months.

Let me do something for you.

And it was like,

I remember the feeling of being super grateful,

Number one.

And number two,

Learning to shut up because it's,

And being able to,

Learning how to receive because I'm not always,

I'm not,

Now I am.

Until recently I wasn't always the best receiver,

But he wanted to give me that gift and I needed to be open to receive it.

So I said,

Okay.

So he sat there and he painted my house and he did everything that he needed to do.

My stepdad was there and then my cousin showed up and he was willing to chip in and do what needed to be.

It was just all of these moments.

And that house was a very stressful situation and renovating it and getting ready for the tenant and all that other stuff was very,

Very stressful.

But I was still tapping into that space of gratitude.

And I think those,

I could tell you millions of stories like that,

That happen all the time because I practice constantly looking for those moments.

And even through this pandemic,

I think being able to experience the emotions that I'm feeling.

Like yesterday I was like all day,

Woo,

And my mother lives in an assisted living facility and she called me up and she was,

The day before she called me and it was having a fit.

And normally my normal way of being with her,

And I'm going to tell the truth on myself,

But sometimes I get,

You know,

Like,

What do you want me to do?

I cannot do anything.

I can't pick you up.

I can't take you out.

And I remember like starting to feel like anxious because there was nothing I could do to help her.

And I stopped myself and I said,

Breathe through this and talk to her like you'd want to be talked to.

And I said,

Mom,

I understand where you're coming from.

I was like,

And being able to just be compassionate.

And when I finished that conversation,

She calmed down and I wasn't in a state of like,

So being able to be compassionate for me was something I'm grateful for.

Being able to experience a new relationship with my mother throughout all of this,

Because she is my,

My biggest nemesis and my biggest cheerleader.

Like my favorite person on the planet and the one that drives me the most crazy.

And it's been very interesting watching this dynamic between us because you know,

Today,

I can't even think of what day it is.

Today's Wednesday.

So Monday and Tuesday,

She called me up and finally I was like,

Look,

Here's how we got to get through this.

There's nothing we can do except make the situation better.

How can we make the situation better?

What can we do together to,

You know,

And she's again,

She's been locked up.

She can't get out.

She can't see anybody.

She can't do anything.

I go,

Mom,

I said,

All I want to do is hug you.

And she started to cry.

We were both ready.

And I've been very present to how much I miss her and how much I take sometimes our relationship for granted,

Even though it's not necessarily the way I want our relationship to be.

It's not perfect by any means.

She's bipolar and she thinks that I'm the,

You know,

She can point a finger and ding the magic wand and I'm going to do everything,

Stop everything and run.

But it's,

It's been,

Um,

I think for me,

That was such a powerful moment yesterday just to be able to have that space to say,

This is,

This is what's so for me,

I understand what's so for you.

I understand you're frustrated.

I understand and be compassionate.

And then at the same time share where I was coming from.

By the time we got off the phone yesterday,

We were both in tears,

But it was like a,

It was a joyful tear.

It was a happy tear.

It was an expression of love tear.

So that was kind of cool.

It's amazing when you can take a situation where it's becoming aggressive,

The air is becoming aggressive or hostile in whatever way,

And you can inject some compassion into it.

It's amazing how quickly things can turn around,

You know,

Um,

Just in that story with your family,

I think that's all too familiar.

I think we all have a family member or several where,

Where,

You know,

It's just,

It's easy to get into some sort of argument or debate or fight with and you know,

They trigger you and you trigger them and it's this sort of,

You know,

Ongoing thing.

But um,

To be able to step away from that and say,

You know what,

I know it's not perfect,

But I am so grateful for you.

And because nothing is perfect,

Right?

I think that's always the thing to remember.

And you know,

And if you fuel things with,

With more aggression,

Which you know,

Is easy to do because emotion is contagious.

Um,

And as a good friend of mine said,

You know,

Other people push your buttons,

But it's your family that put them there.

And so,

So to be able to sit there with that and say,

You know what,

I know we can go two different paths with this,

Which is,

You know,

Another reason I promote meditation so much is because people think that meditation is about stopping your thought process and it's not,

It's,

You're never going to stop your thoughts from coming.

We have like a million a day,

But what it's really there for is so that you can just witness it as it's happening and you won't be so triggered to react when things happen.

So um,

That's one point.

I think my other question for you would be,

You know,

It sounds like 2013 was a hell of a year for you and I know everyone has,

You know,

I feel like I'm sort of going through my dark night of the soul or I have been for the last year.

Um,

And so I guess what advice do you have for people who are going through these dark times?

Like how do you switch from,

Um,

Seeing things as,

Oh my God,

Everything is just shit to saying,

Okay.

Because like the thing is,

It's like when you're in times like this,

You're going to break down or at least I know I do.

I've had,

You know,

Mornings where it's like,

I'm like,

I don't even want to get out of bed.

I don't want to face what's going on.

How do you go from that point to saying I'm so grateful?

Again it goes back to what we said in the beginning,

Set that alarm to go off.

When that alarm goes off,

Get up and start to look around and see if there's anything that happened.

And if nothing has happened,

You're going to keep doing that process.

And that process just by putting that practice in place,

You're starting to get your brain to say,

Okay,

I got to start finding something I'm grateful for.

The other thing is,

Is do something you know will bring you pleasure.

I don't care what that is.

A healthy pleasure.

Let me say that.

Do something that will bring you a healthy pleasure.

I'm not saying go get annihilated and I'm not saying go,

You know,

We'll leave the rest of what I was thinking about for myself,

But you know,

Do something that's healthy.

So you get up and walk for a little bit.

For me,

When I'm in that space,

I have to move my body.

So maybe it's get up and walk.

That works for me.

Or dance.

And if you're not able to do that,

Maybe you're able to journal.

And if you don't like to journal,

Maybe you have a voice recorder on your phone,

Vomit everything you need to say,

Like literally word vomit into that phone and everything out.

Find a way,

Find something that allows you to release it a little bit.

And then you really get to start asking yourself,

What are my gratitude wins?

And it may be something super small,

But you've got to start training your brain to look for those moments.

And if you can't find them,

Like I said,

Create them,

Walk,

Move,

Dance,

Sing,

Blow bubbles,

I don't know,

Bake if that's what you'd like to do,

Find something that makes you feel better.

And then if you're constantly having a conversation with somebody,

You know,

The other day I was having a conversation with somebody and he was telling me his life and with every,

He had every reason to be frustrated and upset and things were going,

Everything that could go wrong was going wrong.

And I said to him,

I said,

We've been talking for 20 minutes.

I said,

I didn't say it this way.

What I said to him in the middle of the conversation is I said,

What is the best thing that happened to you today?

And he's like,

What?

I said,

What's the best thing that happened to you today or this week?

And he said to me,

He's like,

Wow.

He goes,

He says,

I guess I do have so much to be grateful for,

But I wasn't allowing myself to see it.

And sometimes when we're in the middle of it,

It's like,

You're in the middle of the forest.

You can't see each individual tree,

Pull yourself back for a second and ask yourself,

Even in the middle of the pandemic,

There has to be one thing that went well.

And it might be the fact that you get to tuck your kids into bed every night or that you have,

If you live alone,

You know,

And I know people who live alone,

I live with my best friend and sometimes it's like,

Well,

I go to work,

But he's not working.

And he's in the other room.

I'm like,

Go to work.

You wish you lived alone.

Yeah.

But it's again about learning,

You know,

And then there's times that,

So whatever it is,

There's always something that you can find.

And I know that's very cliche.

And the grass is always greener too,

Right?

So it's like,

You know,

I've been self quarantining.

And so it's like,

From my end,

I'm like,

Oh my God,

You have a person in the house.

That's amazing for you.

It's not always that amazing.

And for you,

I'm sure you're like,

Oh,

I just wish I could just have this place to myself for like one day or whatever.

So the grass is always greener.

So the things that don't make you happy,

What you're,

And the things that you're wishing for that you think are going to make you happy.

Once you get those things,

You're going to find problems with it because everything is flawed.

So it's again,

Yes.

You know,

And I get that,

Thank God,

I intellectually get that.

So it's really about finding that thing and,

Oh,

Nothing goes,

Nothing's going right in my life.

Then make something go right.

Smile,

Practice smiling,

As ridiculous as that sound,

Practice smiling at everybody you see.

And it's so silly and it's so ridiculous that you'll start to laugh because you feel like such an idiot doing it because it's so unnatural or just find,

And I really keep going back to the same thing.

Find something,

Create something,

Listen to,

You know,

What makes me crack up is I go onto the,

And I'm really going to tell him myself,

But I go onto the autocorrects on the,

There's a whole website of autocorrects.

Read those and they are,

They are juvenile and hysterical at the same time.

So I read them and you think of what people,

And they probably make them up anyways,

But they're so funny.

I find myself laughing out loud.

And then if I really want to get ridiculous,

I'll go one of my friends and I'll send you the link.

I'm like,

You're going to be the right side.

I'm going to be the left side.

So we'll go back and forth once in a while.

We'll read these to each other.

And I'm like in tears.

What happened to you?

And they're so ridiculous.

They're juvenile.

They're silly,

But they crack me up,

You know,

And it just breaks up the mood a little bit.

So I,

And I'm not trying to take away from anyone's situation,

But as easy as it is for you to give me a list of everything that goes wrong,

Force your brain to look for something that goes right.

Force your brain to find those things.

That's the thing.

As easy as it is on our bodies and our mindset,

For some reason,

It's easier to be depressed and anxious and to go to those thoughts than it is to be happy and have gratitude and to find things that give us pleasure,

Which is it's,

You know,

Which is why we're talking about the practice.

And you know,

I think that I think that,

Yeah,

Like finding small things.

I was listening to this.

He's a really famous guru and I can't remember his name right now,

But he said one day he was in a restaurant and he was,

He was with his friend and he was like,

His friend was,

He was just having a hard day or a hard life or a hard month or whatever.

And he was like,

Oh,

Everything is shit.

You know?

And the guy was like,

Everything really?

You can't think of one single thing to be grateful for.

Not one single thing.

And the guy was like,

No.

And he said,

The minute he said,

No,

He said,

You know,

Two people walked in.

The woman had like a shaved head cause she had chemo.

The other guy was like in a wheelchair and they both just kind of walked by him and like smiled and he was like,

Oh,

I was like,

I guess I have my health.

I guess I have this.

And I know like sometimes when you're like really stuck in that situation,

It's like,

No,

Like sometimes you're just defiant.

You're like,

I don't want to think of anything good because I'm having a pity party right now.

And that's that.

And that's okay.

And I think that's where we get to say that's okay.

And we're allowed to have those moments.

And but how good did those moments make you feel?

You know,

And I think that,

I think the other really powerful thing is to surround yourself with people,

Even if it's one person who will allow you to have that pity party and finally turn around and say,

Listen,

No,

Enough.

You know,

I have,

I remember it's funny cause sometimes I'll go and say,

Oh my God,

I can't believe this is happening.

And my friends will look at me,

They're like,

This is my life works for you because I've trained them to understand that life works for me.

Things happen.

Yeah.

No matter what things happen,

Even if it's the crappiest situation,

Somehow it works out miraculously and get yourself a tribe of people or one person to say,

Life works for you.

Even if it doesn't work for you at this minute,

You know,

You've got to find something.

I have a friend who does the same thing to me.

So call me and I adore her and we go over the same things every day.

And finally I said to her,

You know,

This has to stop.

This has to stop every day.

What's the best part of your day?

What's the best part of your day?

And it's,

It's really training the brain to start to focus.

And,

And here's the other thing.

If you want to feel better,

Cause you don't like where you're at,

You'll do the work and the work is not always easy.

It's very simple,

But it's not always easy.

It's much easier to bitch and complain and moan and groan and find evidence that life is hard and it sucks and it doesn't work.

And it's just as easy once you get into the habit of finding the other stuff.

Cause I could give you a whole list of things that don't work,

But being in that space doesn't serve me,

You know?

Well,

Exactly.

And for the list of things that doesn't work,

There's an equal list or maybe greater of things that do work.

And even if,

I mean,

I think that's why really,

Again,

I'm going back to focusing on the small things because it's like,

You know,

Your heart's beating,

You're breathing,

You're alive,

You have a cold in your head,

Whatever it is,

There's like a ton of things that are working for you.

And I do think that emotions are addictive too.

So a lot of times it's like,

We just like to,

To really be honest with yourself and to be able to look at yourself and say,

Okay,

Am I just having anxiety right now because my world is falling apart or is there a pattern here?

Does this happen a lot and why does this happen?

And I think that yeah,

I think that that's kind of the difficult part of it too,

Because for a lot of people,

Anxiety and depression is,

And not to demean it at all,

Because I know that I go through this as well,

I think is it's addicting too,

Because it's something that we've always known and it's something that we just always go back to.

Yeah,

That's my whole point on that.

Yes.

You know,

My mom is clinically diagnosed as bipolar,

So I understand that,

That it's,

That sometimes that we allow ourselves to stay in that space and sometimes medical help is needed and we need to reach out to the professionals.

And I think that's necessary too.

And again,

That's the,

That's a moment of gratitude right there saying,

Listen,

I need help and going on and getting the help.

I think that that's very powerful also.

But well,

It's definitely,

And I think what I mean from that is like,

It's not just like,

Oh,

It's just,

You know,

I don't want to make it look like it like depression is superficial or it's something that you can just snap out of because I know it's a lot harder than that,

But I do think that a lot of times we tend to get stuck in certain ways.

And yes,

I do think that going to get help is like saying like,

Hey,

I don't want to be this way anymore.

I don't want to be stuck in this cycle anymore.

Just like with anything else.

So if you can do that,

That's amazing.

Sorry.

I cut you.

You know what?

No,

You're fine.

Um,

Pam grout says,

Start each day,

Putting your hands in the air,

Screaming,

Declaring,

Shouting from the rooftops.

Today is going to be a magical day.

And um,

I remember reading her book in 2018 and I was,

One of my coaches said,

Oh,

Read this book.

It's thank and grow rich.

I'm like,

All right,

I'll read it.

So I was driving home from Miami to Tampa and I was,

I was staying with my uncle,

The same one I was telling you about.

And he was in a,

An assisted living facility,

But they were,

They told him,

Listen,

You need a CNA to stay with you because you can't take care of yourself.

Blah,

Blah,

Blah.

He was not behaving for anybody.

So my cousin called me up and he's like,

Look,

Will you stay with my dad for the next month so we can find him better housing?

I said,

Sure.

So I went and stayed with him and I was a CNA,

Which I have no,

No practice.

I don't know how to do any of this stuff,

But I hung out with my uncle and he was pissed and miserable and blah,

Blah,

Blah.

So I was listening to the book,

Whatever.

And I get there,

My whole mission and being with my uncle at that time was to create one moment of gratitude for him where he can forget his situation.

He had just had two major surgeries.

His wife had been gone for five years.

He was living in a,

In a different city than when we all grew up together.

He was by himself.

The only person there was his best friend.

And so his life was totally different.

He was living with basically strangers.

So I said,

If I could create one moment of gratitude for him,

That's what I'm going to do.

All right.

So now I had been with him for a couple of weeks at this point and I started to say,

You know,

Wake up,

Today's going to be a magical day.

And I could remember hearing to myself going,

Who are you kidding?

Like,

Are you kidding me?

Today is a magical day.

Do you see where you are?

You're like sleeping on an air mattress in the middle of this tiny room in an ALF.

Your uncle's pissed off all the time.

And I said,

Declare it.

And I remember really fighting with myself and going,

Okay,

Today is going to be a magical day.

And then that boy's like,

Uh huh.

And my focus was,

And I had work to do for my gratitude movement.

I have things to do.

And I thought I was going to go there and be in half time to do these things.

I didn't get anything done in the month that I was there in that aspect.

But I remember waking up and saying that,

And then just reminding myself throughout the day,

Today is going to be a magical day.

Today is going to be,

Now mind you,

I wasn't going out anywhere.

I couldn't leave him alone unless he was sleeping.

I couldn't even go to the store for five minutes.

I risked every time I did that.

I wasn't exercising.

I wasn't moving.

I wasn't walking.

But that declaration and that every time I was going into declare it,

Remember,

Remember.

And I remember one day in particular,

I said to him,

I said,

Bruce,

I said,

I had turned off all the news,

No news.

I was listening to the music and he loved to make fun of me sing because I have the worst singing voice,

But I sing every song and I sing my own lyrics.

And you know,

For years after this happened,

He would tell my relatives,

Like,

She drove me to Gainesville and she sang every song and she didn't shut up the whole time.

And I was like,

Bruce,

I'm driving,

I'm singing.

So we're at his nursing home at this point and I'm singing and we're singing and he's like,

I could see him rolling his eyes.

And I finally said,

Bruce,

What are you grateful for?

And I honestly thought he was going to say to me,

Nothing,

Because that's the response I got frequently.

And he looks at me and he's like,

You.

I lost it.

So I think that when we declare today to be a magical day,

Whether we believe it or not,

We're telling our brain to look for these moments.

We're telling our brain,

There's two,

There's a couple of mantras that I love.

One is today is going to be a magical day.

And the other one is I am a not.

And sometimes I have to go through the process and ask myself,

You know,

If I'm having a rough patch,

I say to myself,

Okay,

Today's going to be a magical day.

And if I'm really going through something,

I'm like,

If I believe that I am enough,

Would I be reacting to the situation this way?

And those are these things that these are the tools that I use on a regular basis.

So if somebody's going through something and they're like,

Life sucks,

This is hard,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah.

We need to break that record because that's enough already.

We need to,

You know,

Get it stopped,

To stop skipping and say to ourselves,

Go ahead.

I was just going to say that is so key.

Like that's a very important question.

If I thought I was enough,

Would I be reacting to the situation the way that I am?

That is so powerful.

That question has uncovered so much for me and released some of the holds that past relationships were having on me that I didn't even realize were still holding me.

That question has allowed me to break free from certain behaviors that in certain patterns,

Even in my family,

Like this is dumb.

Like this is ridiculous already.

How long can I still have the same roles and the same script with these people that I supposedly love and care about and adore?

If I believe that I'm enough,

What would I say to somebody?

Hey,

This behavior doesn't work for me.

This is what comes up for me every time you do this or say this,

Or don't do this and don't say this.

So break the script,

Change the script.

That's amazing.

And you do that by asking questions like that.

I mean,

I just want to say it one more time.

If wait,

What was the question?

It's early over here.

It's early.

No,

You're good.

If I were enough,

Would I be feeling this way,

Thinking this way?

If I were enough,

Would I be reacting to this situation this way?

That is so powerful.

So it's like,

If you think throughout your week or throughout your month or throughout your life,

If you pick out situations like your road rage,

Somebody cut you off,

Or something happened in a friendship or somebody cheated on you or whatever,

If you looked at that situation and really asked yourself that question,

How would you answer yourself?

What would come back to you?

That's incredible.

And I think that I am really from the school of thought that everything in our lives goes back to that question.

So yeah,

That's really important.

That's a key component in this.

I love it.

I love it.

So you asked me about gratitude gangster.

I did.

You also said,

We're never going to get to it by the way.

We're never.

No,

No,

I want to get to it right now.

But you also said something about your gratitude movement,

Which is really interesting.

So maybe those two are tied together and you can start with gratitude gangster,

Which we've been talking about for,

Well,

We started talking about like 40 minutes ago,

But now we'll finally get to it.

So a gratitude gangster is a person who is skilled in the art of appreciation,

Who lives life to the fullest and who finds magic in life's challenges.

So when I first started getting involved in speaking,

People were like,

Well,

What are you going to call yourself?

Excuse me.

Be the gratitude guru,

The gratitude goddess,

The gratitude expert,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah.

And I was like,

All right.

And I'm like,

There's a,

You know,

I got a little of a rebel in me.

So those words,

I am a goddess,

But that's not,

You know,

That wasn't the image.

So my last year teaching,

I taught in a public high school and my last year teaching,

My last few years teaching,

My kids were keeping gratitude charts.

So they had to each month come up with 20 unique things that they were grateful for each month.

Now tell a ninth grader,

You're going to keep a gratitude chart.

They're going to look at you like you have five heads and that you're the stupidest thing that ever walked the earth.

So that's basically what happened.

They thought I was a moron the first day of school.

And we talked about it almost,

I had them every other day.

So every time they saw me,

It was on the board,

You know,

Remember gratitude chart at the end of the month,

What are you grateful for?

And I would share with them these moments that were kind of like,

We've been doing,

You know,

And I appropriate moments to share with high school kids.

But like I had this,

You know,

My dad was in the hospital,

But while he was in the hospital,

This was a magical moment that we had.

And throughout that process,

The last few years I was teaching,

My dad was slowly deteriorating.

And as soon as I quit,

He basically died.

But so I said to them,

We're going to find these things.

And by November,

They were like,

Thank you for making us do this.

And by June,

Or by May,

They were coming up to me and saying,

Wow,

You know,

I realized how many,

I'll never forget one little girl,

She lived just with her dad,

Had no contact with her mom.

And she goes,

You know,

I realized how lucky I am that I get to spend time with my family and the people that I love the most.

I would have taken this girl home.

That's how wonderful she was.

I would have adopted her.

I'm like,

You want to come home with me?

She's like,

No,

I could do cooking clean.

She's like,

Miss,

I'm not going to eat.

I love my father.

I'm not,

You can't adopt me.

I adored her.

Like I would have,

I would have wanted it for my own.

And you know,

Other kids were like,

I realized there were two brothers that were in my class.

One was a 10th grader,

One was a ninth grader.

And he's like,

We're getting along so much better.

And somebody else was telling me that,

You know,

Her relationship with herself,

She goes,

Before I got into this class,

I didn't think I mattered.

And she was,

Now I know I matter.

And it was all through this practice that we were doing.

So that was kind of the backstory.

So one day we were,

It was probably like April.

That's a powerful backstory.

That's,

You are a gangster.

That's amazing.

I mean,

That must feel really good to know that you've changed somebody's life on that level.

It does.

And I will say this,

And this is one of the most important reasons why I created this movement is because we need consistency.

We need the constant reminders because when something starts to feel good,

Many of the times we stop doing it because we're like,

Oh,

I got this.

Like,

Oh,

I started to lose weight so I can have a cookie or I started to feel good.

I don't need to run today.

Tomorrow I'll do it up tomorrow.

So it's the consistency.

The consistency and the constant reminders and having people in your face.

So it was probably April and it was my last year of teaching and we were sitting around in a circle and this was a group of 10th graders.

I adored this group of kids and we're sitting in a circle.

We had just read a story about two separate stories about gang members who got into gangs and then they got out of gangs.

And I said,

You know,

I don't get it.

Why would somebody want to be in a gang?

Why would they want to be,

You know,

Go through the gauntlet and have people beat them up to get into this membership?

And I'll never forget Alex looks at me and he's like,

Miss,

We're gangsters.

Really?

Tell me more.

I don't know if I even said tell me more because I think at that part I held my breath.

I was like,

Oh God,

Where are we going?

So I was like,

Okay.

He's like,

We're gratitude gangsters.

We walk around and tell people,

I like your shoes.

And then William chimes in and goes,

And I like your belt and I like your hat and I like this.

And he's like,

Do you know any of those guns?

And I'm like,

No guns.

It's like,

Miss the guns that have the flags that say thank you.

Cause that's what we carry around.

And I took a deep breath.

I said,

You have almost made me cry right now.

I said,

I am blown away,

You know,

By,

By your ability.

They got it.

That,

That was the bottom line.

They got it.

They understood.

I,

I knew that they understood the power of the gratitude practice because they just explained to me what,

What it was all about.

It's about acknowledging the small things and acknowledging and talking to other people and making people feel good,

Making ourselves feel good.

So at that point I said,

All right,

I'm going to be a gratitude gangster.

Well,

I got so much slack.

Like you can't say that.

That's not a nice word.

You have to call yourself the guru.

I'm like,

No.

So I finally was like,

No,

This is,

This is it.

So it works now.

And people even now,

Cause I'll say,

If I introduce myself,

I'll say,

When I say gratitude gangster,

The first time you got to go,

What?

And I remember recently somebody saying no,

Because there's no gangsters here.

And I smiled and I didn't get upset.

And I was like,

I have learned now.

Okay.

So I did it and people followed suit.

And then once I spoke at her organization,

She came up to me after and she's like,

I,

I just want you to understand.

I get it now.

So it was it was a magical moment,

But these ninth graders,

Or they were 10th graders,

These 10th graders understood the power of gratitude.

And that's how that whole idea of gratitude gangster got started.

Well,

I want to thank you so much for I've kept you.

But thank you.

This was awesome.

My pleasure.

Thank you so much for coming out and hanging out with me on the podcast.

And I hope you'll be back.

I would love to.

Can I just tell people how to find me and get the,

Get to the membership?

Absolutely.

Yes.

Of course.

So to join the Living in Gratitude Today movement,

All you have to do is go to livinginggratitutoday.

Com forward slash join,

Or you can text the word grateful,

G R A T E F U L to 64600 and everything is right there.

And again,

The idea of the movement is to give you continuous support and reminders that gratitude is your superpower so that you're able to find those juicy moments,

Even when life feels messy.

So you text grateful to 64600 and then what happens?

You start getting text reminders of being grateful.

No,

So that's my easy card.

So it's a digital business card.

And that way,

If you want to opt in to get the free gratitude calendar,

You can do that.

If you want to go to get some of a gratitude swag,

You can find out about that there.

Different workshops that I'm putting together.

And then on occasion I'll send out reminders,

Hey,

You know,

This is coming up.

So the movement is where you really get the ongoing practice or the ongoing information.

And I send that out about twice a week,

Mondays,

Sundays and Wednesdays.

And the idea again is it's different techniques,

Different tools,

Pieces of research that I find.

I've talked to some of them with my group this week that quite honestly I tried and doesn't work for me.

So when I go email them again today and say,

Hey,

How did it go for you?

Like for me,

It wasn't working.

So this won't be a tip that will go in my toolbox,

But maybe it will be something else for somebody else.

And the idea is that the more we know,

The more tools that we have,

We're able to pull through them when we need,

Or when that icky yucky mask to pull ourselves out.

Because the ultimate goal is to feel better,

To feel happier,

Even if we're feeling happy,

Take it to the next level.

Yeah,

And it's not a one size fits all,

Is it,

As you found out with that exercise.

It's like different things work for different people,

Depending on where you're coming from.

Well,

Thank you.

You heard the woman.

Text her,

Get into the movement.

Gratitude is very powerful.

I know that it's been very powerful in my life.

Thank you for giving us tips.

And yeah,

We will see you again soon.