Lifestyle - practicing gratitude video

Listen to Shelley Crawford, an EMCC Global Accredited Master Practitioner and Accredited Supervisor, talk about how to practice daily gratitude. 

In this video, I'm going to talk about the positive benefits of gratitude or saying thank you. Gratitude is essential for society to function well because it motivates reciprocation or payback or pay forward, even if there is no other incentive for repayment. When you think about what gratitude means to you, what words come to mind? Now take a moment to think about how receiving a heartfelt thank you from someone affects you and how you feel when you say a genuine thank you to someone else. Most people feel really good about themselves either way. Showing gratitude is not merely a soft skill that creates good feelings. The science of positive psychology shows us that there is a really positive effect behind the power of gratitude. In addition, positive thoughts that centre on thankfulness activate the release of happy hormones, dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin. These brain chemical messengers spark us to feel optimistic and motivated. This is referred to as the gratitude circuit. When the gratitude circuit is triggered, it prompts us to be more aware of positive events. Evidence has shown that a regular attitude of gratitude, and regular is the key word here, can help us feel more moments of happiness. 

 

Simply writing down in a diary or journal for just five minutes a day about what we are grateful for can enhance our day-to-day and long-term happiness by over 10 %. One of my favourite gratitude exercises is the feel blessed list. The idea is that when you think of a particular word like nature, you write one thing that you feel blessed with that relates to that word. So for instance, for the word nature, you might write down, I feel blessed to have a forest close by that I can walk in. Now, don't think that in order to feel positive, you have to ignore other negative feelings. Negative and positive emotions can exist side by side and can both be present on any given day. We have complex inner lives, and we are allowed to feel gratitude and sadness or gratitude and grief at the same time. It is not shameful grateful to not feel grateful. Your feelings are neither good nor bad. They just are. Look at gratitude as only one part of your experience. One part of you might be so grateful that you have a good job, but another part might feel really angry at your colleague for hurting you. 

 

Some research found evidence that expressing gratitude to our significant others or children results in improved quality quality of those relationships. So don't forget, feeling gratitude and expressing that gratitude is really good for your overall well-being. If you feel you need more support or things deteriorate for you, please get hold of your doctor or otherwise, log in to your Verve portal and click the link to request a survey. You will then be able to access all the support you need.