Five Things about Gratitude

 Here's Five Things I've learned from I Want to Thank You: How a Year of Gratitude Can Bring Joy and Meaning in a Disconnected World by Gina Hamadey.  

Here's a couple quotes I loved:

"Gratitude is optimism. It's choosing to see the contours of what's there instead of the shadows of what's missing.  And gratitude is a pathway back -- to a friendship, to hobbies you once loved, to identities you've shed."

"Expressing gratitude in this vulnerable, openhearted way is not cool.  It's warm -- disarmingly so.  And that's what makes it powerful."

1. The 2014 book Making Grateful Kids lists 30 strategies for teaching kids to be grateful, including modeling gratitude, encouraging grateful thinking by pointing out good things that were happening, and the people responsible for them.

2. Gina writes to "food people" one month (mostly associated with her food career), writes: "I remember... thinking how special it was to cook for one of the food people I'd identified this month, all of whom had been so generous and provided me with so much pleasure."  The cooking was set in motion by Gina's original thank you letter.  At the end of meal, she compliments the other person's sneakers, which causes the other person to send her the same sneakers as an (unexpected) gift.  "Generosity leads to gratitude, which leads to generosity."

3. The actual theme for the food month is "life enhancers.... something that gives you daily pleasure."  To find your own, she says, "Think about how you spend extra money or time.  If you found $10 on the street and had to spend it on something nonessential, what would you buy? You have one extra hour and can't spend it doing something productive. What do you choose to do?  Ask yourself if there is something you never tire of talking about.

4. Tom Chiarella, in Esquire, in an article "How to Give a Eulogy," says "a eulogy is, above all, the simple and elegant search for small truths."  Condolence cards function similarly to thank you notes, I realized.  Ideally, they shed light on the deceased by sharing a specific memory. It's a final thank you to the person who is gone, addressed to their loved ones. ... Perhaps writing them down and sharing them with the people who loved him, and thanking them for sharing in that love, will help her process the grief.  So... (in this chapter about thanking other for health things) "write from the heart... describe what you remember about that person's role in your life -- something specific that they said or did while you were in their care and how that made you feel."

5. Oliver Sacks in his book, Gratitude: I cannot pretend I am without fear. But my predominant feeling is one of gratitude... I have had an intercourse with the world, the special intercourse of writers and readers. Above all, I have been a sentient being, a thinking animal, on this beautiful planet, and that in itself has been an enormous privilege and adventure."

She suggests that you buy a Thank you Folder

She uses Artifact Uprising to print on card stock