Cultivating an Attitude of Gratitude!

What is gratitude?

Gratitude is about focusing on what's good in our lives and being thankful for the things we

have. Gratitude is pausing to notice and appreciate the things that we often take for granted, like having a place to live, food, clean water, friends, family, even the weather.

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It’s not always easy to practice gratitude, especially if you’re having a bad day for example. But in those moments, if we can, it’s even more important to be grateful. Practicing gratitude can help you feel better, appreciate what you have and attract more of what you want! You can be grateful for all sorts of things, big or small- and the more your practice, the more you will notice that there is so much to be grateful for!

Gratitude Research

Research from across the world has shown that learning to practice gratitude, does more than just help you feel better. In fact, regularly practicing gratitude can:

• Increase your happiness and your optimism levels

• Practicing gratitude can help build your resilience as well as your self-esteem and this in turn can help you deal with challenges and difficult situations

• Gratitude helps you deal with stress better and as a result can reduce stress, anxiety and depressive symptoms.

• People who practice cultivating an attitude of gratitude reportedly slept better and had fewer health issues

• Some studies have found that practicing gratitude can help with your grades too!

It's pretty amazing what practicing gratitude can do for us. Can you imagine the benefits, if we each took just a few minutes every day to do this? The great thing about it, is that you can practice gratitude anywhere and at any time. No fancy props, subscriptions or tools necessary. If you learn how to practice it regularly, it can act as your own superpower!

How to practice gratitude at home, with family or in the classroom

• Three Good Things

Try to record three positive things that happen to you each day. Identify not just what the rewarding experience or event was, but also why or how they came to be.

You can practice this in a journal, or to make it fun for your family, friends or students you can do this before starting classes at school, at dinner time with your family, or as part of your wind down routine before going to sleep.

• Gratitude Journaling

Similar to three good things, one easy way to start a gratitude journal is to

practice writing your gratitudes on a regular basis in a journal.

Before you go to bed, think about your day and try to remember some good things that happened during the day.

These can be small (e.g. a delicious sandwich, a fun game you and your friend played together, your parent giving you a cuddle, the teacher noticing something you did) or anything that was significant to you. You'll find that the things you're grateful for everyday will change.

• It's important to not just think about what you're grateful for, but to write them down

• Ask yourself why that particular thing made you feel good

• Keep practicing- consistency is key

• Gratitude Jar

Every day, simply think about something you're grateful for, write it

down on a small piece of paper and then fold it up and add it to a jar. At the end of the week, month or year, you can open the jar and read about all the wonderful moments you recorded!

• Gratitude Garden!

Next on our list of fun exercises to practice gratitude- why not try and grow a gratitude garden! Draw a flower on a piece of paper. In the bud, in the centre of the flower, write what you are grateful for, and then in each of the petals ask yourself why it makes you grateful and how else it makes you feel. Adding the "why" to your gratitude practice makes it even more powerful!

Tip: All of these practices can be done on an individual level or adapted to be done as a family or classroom.

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Teacher/ Parent Resources:

• The greater good monthly themed calendar is a great way for families and classrooms to participate towards common goals. You can subscribe to it here: https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/happiness_calendar/ics

• How Gratitude Can Help You Through Hard Times: https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/how_gratitude_can_help_you_through_hard_times

• How to Foster Gratitude in Schools: https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/how_to_foster_gratitude_in_schools

• Three Ways to Cultivate Gratitude at School: https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/three_ways_to_cultivate_gratitude_at_school

• Book- Making Grateful Kids: The Science of Building Character by Jeffrey Froh Giacomo Bono: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1599474166

Tip: The science of gratitude is fascinating. I speak about it more as part of my Positive Education Workshops for teachers and parents. If you're interested, get in touch!