Seriously? What do I have to be Grateful For?

Have you seen me lately?
Have you looked at what a wreck my life is?
There is very little that is working right now.
And then I get a research study that tells me that if I started making the decision to be grateful, then I'd feel better - physically and emotionally.

researchers found that the prac­tice of grat­i­tude can increase hap­pi­ness lev­els by around 25%. Sec­ond, this is not hard to achieve — a few hours writ­ing a grat­i­tude jour­nal over 3 weeks can cre­ate an effect that lasts 6 months if not more. Third, that cul­ti­vat­ing grat­i­tude brings other health effects, such as longer and bet­ter qual­ity sleep time.

Some ideas to get started: Keep a “Grat­i­tude Jour­nal” where you write some­thing you feel grate­ful for. Doing so 4 times a week, for as lit­tle as 3 weeks, is often enough to cre­ate a mean­ing­ful dif­fer­ence in one level of hap­pi­ness. Another exer­cise is to write a “Grat­i­tude Let­ter” to a per­son who has exerted a pos­i­tive influ­ence on one’s life but whom we have not prop­erly thanked in the past, and then to meet that per­son and read the let­ter to them face to face.

Come to think of it, when I think about the wonderful friends I have, the dog who adores me, the way my new socks feel, I have a lot to be grateful for.