I wrote an entire book on the subject, so it’s my opinion that gratitude is good for you. That it can save your life.
But is my opinion based on anything other than how it worked for me? Is there scientific data to back up my opinion?
I’m in the process of researching the science. There’s a lot of anecdotal information out there. There are hundreds of books like mine. In fact, I’m sure mine isn’t the best book written on gratitude. It’s just my book.
It’s my story. And my story is that gratitude was good for me. When I had stage IV colon cancer, it was frequently the ONLY thing that worked for me, that kept me from being paralyzed by fear.
So I want to quickly share just three things (and believe me, there will be more of these posts because there are so many “just three things” articles I can write) that prove the point that gratitude can be transformational:
- It helps us live in the present.
- It helps us celebrate the present.
- It generates positive emotions.
I’m not an expert on anything, other than myself. What worked for me.
Let’s look at the first point.
It Helps Us Live In the Present.
So much of our anguish comes from living elsewhere other than the present. Long ago I read Natalie Goldberg’s Long Quiet Highway and underlined this line: “Every moment is enormous and it is all we have.”
How true is that? This is the only moment we’re guaranteed, the one we’re in right now. My heart could stop while I’m writing this. The house could blow up. I could walk outside to get the paper (okay, we don’t really still have newspaper delivery, but still. . .) and slip on the ice.
We are not guaranteed any moment past this one we’re in. So why do we dwell so much in past or future moments?
There’s comfort in dwelling anywhere other than the present. We love rehashing what’s already happened. By going back, we’re sure we can learn from our past.
Everyone prefers projecting into the future.
“Here’s how I’ll do it better,” we think. Or “Here’s how I won’t repeat how badly I screwed up last time around.” Thinking about how much smarter we’ll be tomorrow is a national pastime. (I’m an expert at how clever I’ll be next week if I can just survive this week.)
One of the best compliments my husband gives me is when he says, “You are so good at being present, at living in this moment.”
“Every moment is enormous and it is all we have,” has been my life mantra for a long time. I’ve worked on being conscious that the actions I take right here, right now, are the only actions I have any control over. If I can make the world a very slightly better place right here, right now, that’s all I have to do with my moments.
Being grateful brings you back to the present. Projecting worry goes away when you say, “I’m grateful for my life, my kids, my partner, the sunrise, the book I’m reading, my friends.” You’re brought back to right here, right now, to what you have in this particular moment.
And that leads you to point 2, which is that gratitude helps you celebrate the present. Which generates positive emotions. You’ve just experienced all three of the points above.
The dominoes start to fall in the right direction when you choose gratitude.
I’m grateful you’re right here, right now. Let me know how gratitude is changing your life today.
Bunny Terry is a native New Mexican who grew up on a farm in northeastern New Mexico. Her first writing job was typing stories on index cards on her family’s Underwood, stories that were uncannily like the ones she read over and over in O Ye’ Jigs and Julips, her favorite childhood book. No one thought to save those index cards for posterity, although there is the theory sarcastically circulated by her siblings that they will certainly be worth millions someday. 