The holiday season is here and one of the things I really enjoy is the opportunity it brings for reflection on all that we have and all we want to create. This time of year reminds me of the importance of gratitude and the impact in has on our satisfaction, our fulfillment, and our success. Yet, there are several stumbling blocks that can get in the way of our appreciation for the people, things, and circumstances in our lives.

Some of the Benefits of Gratitude

Thankfulness and gratitude enable us to enjoy all that we’ve done, have and are. It makes us more charismatic and creates better relationships because we are giving others something they value highly: recognition for their efforts. Gratitude enables us to keep a positive mental attitude because focusing on everything that makes us happy keeps us enthusiastic and in an “up” state. And being thankful opens ourselves up to more things to be thankful for because we get what we focus on: when we focus on problems we get more problems; when we focus on opportunity we find more opportunity; and when we focus on gratitude we find more and more to be grateful for.

The explanations of the benefits of gratitude range from the very spiritual to the very practical. Whether you believe in “the law of attraction” or “ask and you shall receive” or not, the practical side is very easy to understand. For example, let’s say that you are looking at hiring a real estate agent to sell your house and you interview two agents:

o The first one spends their time discussing the downsides of the market, how difficult it is to work with the banks, and how much they really need your listing. During your meeting, they interrupt to take several phone calls.

o The second one talks about how much they appreciate you taking your time to speak with them and they make a point of shutting off their cell phone so that they can focus on learning how they can best help you. They tell you how lucky they are to be in a career that gives them the opportunity to help people through a big transition – whether it’s helping find their dream home or helping sell their current home quickly so that they can get to the next stage of their lives. They discuss how there is always opportunity, even in a down market, and how fortunate they are to have some really great connections in the banks, title companies, and at other agencies so they can make things happen quickly and smoothly.

Notice in that example how gratitude doesn’t function in isolation. Rather, it creates an attitude that is a foundation component of other very important success traits and habits. You wouldn’t hire the second agent just because they know how to say “thank you”. What makes them so attractive is their focus on your needs, their believing that you are instrumental to their success, their “can do” attitude, and their strong professional relationships.

Other examples [these are taken to extremes, but you get the idea]:

o Do you want to be around the person who treats you like the most important person they will meet today, or the one who regards you as a waste of their time?
o Whose company do you want to keep: the person who is bitter and has nothing good to say about anything in their lives or the one who is joyful and enthusiastic about the finding new opportunities?
o Do you want to give your patronage to the businessperson who complains about their customers or the one who makes you feel welcome, important, and appreciated?
o Would you rather work with a supervisor who takes just a moment to thank you for all your extra work on a project or the one who treats your late nights as a given expectation?
Now, flipping these examples around and thinking about creating the business and life you want, how do you think gratitude would increase YOUR fulfillment and success? Would it make a small difference or would it completely tear the lid off and create massive change in the quality of your life?

What Gets Between Gratitude and Us?

From observing my own life and the lives of others, I’ve noticed several things that get in the way of gratitude (as well as fulfillment and success).

Simple awareness goes a long way towards overcoming each of these.

1. Independence. Being fiercely independent has some real advantages, but it can also blind us to ways in which others can help us do things better, faster, more effectively, etc. Independence can let us convince ourselves that we did it “all by myself!” (as my toddler would say); completely ignoring the direct and indirect impact that others have had on our success. Gratitude helps us to celebrate all that we have done on our own, appreciate the influence that others have had, and recognize how much more success, fulfillment, etc. we can create when weexpand beyond ourselves.

2. Being “real”. For years, I used to assert, “I’m not a cynic, I’m a realist!” and I viewed all that was negative in the world was real while looking at all that’s good and joyful was insincere, fake, or naive. But I wondered why there were some amazingly positive people who had been through things I wouldn’t wish on an enemy while others who had largely uneventful lives were brutally cynical and negative. I began to realize that good stuff happens and bad stuff happens and neither is more “real” than the other. What I found to be real is that we get to CHOOSE what we focus our attention on. I discovered that life is much more fun when I choose to focus my time and energy on increasing the positives than on listing the negatives (and I decided that life is too short to not have fun).
The biggest danger from this stumbling block comes when we use being real (aka cynicism) as a way of absolving ourselves of responsibility for our lives; when we use the negative in the world to rationalize and justify why we can’t, shouldn’t, and won’t try to create our ideal life; when we have given up on our dreams and try to destroy the dreams of others.

3. Perfectionism. Those of us afflicted with this strength get caught in a trap where we are unable to celebrate and have gratitude for our successes because, no matter what we have achieved, we feel we could have done it faster and better. There’s always room for improvement and we perfectionists concentrate on the gap between what we did and how it could have been done. We don’t celebrate climbing Mt. Everest; we lament all of the ways that it fell short of being the perfect ascent. When we don’t appreciate our own victories, we are unable to be grateful for what we have accomplished, for the opportunities we created, and for the help we received.

4. Getting caught up in life. When we get in the survival mode of reacting to the problems of the moment, it’s easy to fixate on that one tree that’s troubling us and overlook the entire forest. When all we can see is that one problem it’s so very easy to not notice the efforts of others, take circumstances and resources for granted, and miss everything else around us. One of the things I love about Thanksgiving (and the rest of the winter holiday season) is that it’s a big reminder to step back and take a look at the whole spectrum of our lives.

5. Glory of the underdog. There is something about society (at least American society) that really celebrates suffering. By and large it’s socially acceptable and even encouraged to be a downtrodden, unappreciated, martyr; yet, it’s practically taboo in most circles to discuss how fortunate, lucky, and blessed you are. It’s fairly normal to talk about how bad your day is, how much your boss hates you, how terrible things are going, and all of your physical and emotional scars. This is a socially comfortable form of one-upmanship that gets sympathy, empathy, and camaraderie. Yet, if you talk about how great things are going, all of the phenomenal opportunities that are coming your way, how fantastic your relationship is with your spouse and kids, or how well your business or career is going, you are typically regarded as a braggart to be scorned or a naïve fool to be pitied. These social norms just serve to keep our attention on all that we dislike in our lives.

6. Focusing on all that we don’t have. It’s pretty easy to compare ourselves to others that have more, or grieve for all that we want, but how often do we stop and consider all that we have. This newsletter has readers in over 60 countries and, with a small number of exceptions, we have never met. Yet, despite not knowing the unique circumstances of your life I am confident that you are one of the wealthiest and probably most fortunate people to ever walk this planet. If you are reading this, chances are:

1. You are alive. That alone is worth celebrating. No matter what your circumstances are, right-now-this-second you are alive. What you do with it is up to you.
2. You will outlive most of the people in history. It was a pretty short time ago that even the most advanced countries had a life expectancy of 40 years or less. Go back a few more years and surviving even into your thirties was a pretty good accomplishment.
3. You have access to clean water (not to mention heated water and indoor plumbing).
4. You do not want for food. You most likely have reserves for the next meal, or even the next month.
5. You have shelter, clothing, and protection from the elements.
6. Your world is not limited to travel by foot. Either because of your own vehicle or access to buses, trains, plane, and ships you can easily travel hundreds and thousands of miles. This opens up quite a few options few of our ancestors had.
7. You likely have the opportunity to choose and change your career, relationships, or location.
8. You are in a society that is governed with at least some democratic principles.
9. Human knowledge is currently doubling every 3-5 years and you have nearly instant access to all of it via books, television, and the Internet.
10. You can communicate across the globe in seconds. Consider how fast people were able to communicate across hemispheres (never mind across the country) prior to the telephone, telegraph, or reliable mail service.

Don’t think any of these things are VERY special or remarkable? Try going without for a month or so. In fact, our current level of sanitation, medical ability, transportation, communication, access to knowledge, and opportunity make us better off than even royalty of just a few hundred years ago (would you rather have the power of a king or disease free water and hot showers?). And these are just the basics, which are easy to take for granted simply because we are so accustomed to them. What about the people and things in each of our lives that really make life special?

7. Guilt. This is the flip side of #6 and ties in closely to #5, where we dwell on how much better off we are than others. Wanting to help the less fortunate is one thing, but allowing guilt to diminish our appreciation, respect, and gratitude for what we have is quite another.

Opening Ourselves to Gratitude

Most of the financially successful people I have met, and certainly all of the balanced, fulfilled, and happy people I’ve encountered approach their lives from a very thankful perspective. Whether we are talking about business owners, retirees, homemakers, athletes, or executives, gratitude has an enormous impact on our success and satisfaction.
Yet, the magnitude of gratitude’s importance is something that has taken me a long time to learn. And my appreciation of its importance continues to deepen as time goes on. At one point or another in my life I have been tripped up by each of the six stumbling blocks listed above and I see others struggling with them everywhere.

So how do we bring more gratitude in our lives? The first and probably most import thing is just being aware of the extent to which gratitude affects our lives and the common ways it can trip us up. The second way is to continually step back and find things for which to be grateful. An exercise I created for myself and have recommended to many others called the “5 Celebrations”. This is simply a daily log of five things that happened during the day that are worth celebrating (or for which you are grateful). A key to this exercise is finding at least five things each day. Sometimes they will be huge (e.g., “I got married!”) and sometimes they’ll be smaller (e.g., “I didn’t spill soup on my new clothes!”), but you have to look until you find at least five. You’ll begin to notice more and more good things in your day, and looking back over time you’ll be amazed at all the great things that have happened. Reviewing your 5 Celebrations when you are feeling down is a great way to help cheer you up.

The Bottom Line

We get what we focus on and when you choose concentrate on finding what’s worth celebrating you find more and more things to celebrate.

© 2003 Broc Edwards. All rights reserved. May be distributed if full attribution is given and copyright notice is included.

About the Author

Broc Edwards is a personal effectiveness and balance coach who works with business owners, professionals, and individuals to help them create their ideal businesses and lives. Broc is typically sought to help people create better results, get past their stumbling blocks and blind spots, start and grow their own business, achieve personal and professional goals, get more done in less time, become better managers and leaders, accelerate personal and professional development, and create balanced and fulfilling businesses and lives. As one client put it, Broc “helps people get out of their own way.”

In addition to individual coaching, Broc publishes the weekly e-newsletter “Living From Choice”, conducts TeleSeminars and presentations, and is the creator of the “It’s Time for ME!™ Life Balance System”. You can learn more about how Broc can help you grow your business and transform your life at www.targeted-results.com or you can reach Broc directly at broc@targeted-results.com or 888.415.7056.

Life Coach