Giving Thanks

Today is Thanksgiving and we must allow ourselves to look back and reflect on a year likely filled with dramas and ups-and-downs with those in our lives. Many of us will also use this holiday as a chance to put it all on hold just for now and to embrace the magic of the holidays, which have a way of bringing us back together each year as we bring it to a close.

As we anticipate celebrating Thanksgiving together this year with family and friends, clean house frantically for a day or two before company arrives, and finally get to eat too much food that took forever to cook as a family, we are overlooking the true meaning of giving thanks: The true spirit of giving thanks is reflected in the magic we can embrace and share with others by expressing gratitude for the multitude of blessings we are gifted with not just through the holidays, but all year long.

The spirit of gratitude is always within us, though often lies dormant within us during daily life, which is when we and those around us need it the most.

Under normal circumstances we tend to focus, fixate, and ruminate on the “bad” or what we don’t have. Turning around our thinking to rest in a place of consistent gratitude is a challenge, but most definitely a new skill worth learning. Flexing our gratitude muscles not just during the holiday season, but all year long is a blessing we can all learn and benefit from while we share its magic with others.

Tips for bringing daily magic into your life:

1. Communicate and reciprocate your gratitude to others every day at least three times to start.

2. Work on living in the moment by allowing only specific time frames in your day for future planning and stress rehearsal.

3. Allow yourself a specific, limited amount of time for negative thinking and then change the channel. Practice makes perfect and you’ll notice a difference in your thinking almost immediately.

4. Practice doing one selfless act each day, no matter how small.

5. Don’t waste precious time in not telling others how much you care about them. Make this a daily practice.

6. At the end of each day resolve to spend 5 minutes before falling asleep to think only about the positive things that happened in your day.

7. Keep in mind you are a magnetic, energetic being and that the universe brings to you that which you focus upon with the most feeling and intention (good or bad).

8. Remember that the tough times make the good ones sweeter. Don’t let those good ones pass you by. Commit yourself to this.

9. Think about how a particular challenge served your growth and made you stronger when you hit a rough patch later on. Pick a different one each day.

10. Recall that without obstacles there can be no achievement, and recall at least one achievement that helped you feel good about yourself, choosing a different one daily.

Give yourself a simple one week challenge right now: Do everything on this list for 7 days, recording your current levels of daily gratitude on a scale from 1-10 daily. At the end of seven days check your results and compare them to the new blessings you have drawn into your life =)

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