Set a Timer – Five Minutes of Gratitude Nerdiness

The best way to be intentional about Gratitude? Set a timer.

Thank you, thank you, thank you for being here. Those of you who read my blog post about waking with those words in your head will be nodding your head about now. If you missed it, find my best advice about starting your day right here.

Now that you’re waking up with the simplest words of gratitude front and center in your brain, let’s concentrate on how we allow your gratitude nerdiness to flourish. To do that, you need focus.

Long ago I learned a focus trick from Gary Vaynerchuk. I’m grateful for him teaching me this one trick that has worked for almost two decades, as long as I actually put it to use.

Set a Timer.

I’ve promised you this will be a five minute a day gratitude practice. I swear you’ll start to see a shift if you consciously give the grateful corner of your brain just five minutes each day for the exercises I’m providing.

This first five-minute exercise is about focusing on ONE Thing for which you’re most grateful. Only one thing. This is not a “give me ten” list. This is only ONE thing. Like the “thank you, thank you, thank you” mantra/prayer/affirmation/meditation upon waking, this is very simple. It’s so simple, it almost feels like a trick.

Here it is. Be sure you have your timer ready. Mine is a red apple kitchen timer. You can use your phone timer, but you’re going to have better results if your phone is in another room. Or at least in airplane mode so that you can’t get a text or a notification in the midst of the five minutes you’ve promised yourself for the purpose of building your gratitude superpower.

I want you to think of ONE thing your grateful for, but Be Specific.

If you say “My family,” (perhaps out of a sense of obligation because isn’t that what we all think we should be grateful for?), name them individually. If you say, “my life,” name one portion of your life you’re grateful for. If it’s “my health,” name a specific health condition you’re grateful for (my strong heart, my ability to walk two miles every day, my new knee, my pretty elbow [more on that in another post]).

Once you’ve thought of your ONE thing, start the timer. And then for five minutes, write down the details about this ONE thing you’re grateful for and why. We all have five minutes to honor something that’s so valued in our lives, right?

If you’re not the sort to write something down, you’re welcome to meditate on your ONE thing, but I know from research and experience that silent meditation is not as powerful as writing it down or saying it aloud.

Here’s the cool thing.

If you’ll do this every day, the five minutes will seem like nothing. You’ll want to take more time. Your timer will become a ten or twenty minute timer. You’ll be so accustomed to giving voice to your gratitude that it will roll off your tongue and out of your heart through your hand to ink on the page.

Give yourself five minutes and One Thing right now. And thank you, thank you, thank you for being here.