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Gratitude Experiment: Day 28
More on the “End-of-Year List”…
We know that the recognition, celebration and documentation of 5 things we are grateful for on a daily basis creates an energy that attracts more blessings into our lives…at least that’s what the Gratitude Experiment is out to prove. Well then, what will happen when we commit to recognizing, celebrating and documenting a list of 100 things for which to be grateful in this past year?
Anyone?
I’m thinking it will create a tremendous amount of energy which we will carry into the New Year, creating an opening for our blessings to multiply exponentially.
It will also cause us to understand…on a very deep level…that our lives are blessed and the Universe is for us. And, when we understand that, there is no stopping the good that will rush to us. Why? Because our acceptance of it allows us to receive it…and receive it abundantly.
I also recommend making a list of 100 accomplishments for the year…large and small. Where have you stepped out in faith? Where have you taken a deep breath and regained your composure? Where have you done something that was difficult…where your fear was trying to hold you back…but you did it anyway? Where have you made a decision to overlook someone else’s flaws…or your own? Where have you made a decision to be more loving and less judgemental? Where have you grown in any way this year?
This exercise ensures that you own your power. You begin to realize how terrific you really are. You begin to realize that you are always growing…always expressing a little bit more of your authentic self every year.
These two exercises together…done at the end of the year…will create more blessings than you can even imagine right now. So, do not delay. Get out your journal or your pad of paper now and start the process of abundance multiplication!
And, let me know how it goes for you. What was the exercise like for you? Are you beginning to see good manifest in unexpected ways already? Share it with us!
Many blessings,
My gratitudes…
I am grateful for a loving, supportive coach that understands, and is willing to work with, my daughter.
I am grateful for second chances and amazing synchronicity.
I am grateful for the heat in my home.
I am grateful for the increase of love in my heart and in my life.
Gratitude Experiment: Day 27
Another end-of-the-year activity I look forward to is the list of 100 things to be grateful for that year. In addition to the 100 things to be grateful for is a list of 100 things for which I acknowledge myself during the year….those things I accomplished when it wasn’t easy, fears I’ve overcome and places where I grew…even just a little, this year. This exercise was given to me by my dear friend, life coach, Rhonda Britten (way back before she was famous.) It proved to be a very powerful tool for self-acceptance and living in the energy of gratitude. It closes out the year on an energetic upswing, helps me own my power and sets me up to create a fabulous new year.
I recomend it highly. So get out your notebook or yellow legal tablet and just start it. It may seem overwhelming at first, but just start with one…then another one will come…then another. It doesn’t have to be huge, monumental things. The small blessings are just as important. It’s when we acknowledge our blessings in this way that we begin to see how amazing our life really is and how fabulous we really are. And when we do that, we cannot help but attract even more.
My Gratitudes for today…
I am grateful that my kids love the winter break camp they’re in and both are getting to experience how joyful it can be to help kids who are younger or have special needs. It warms my heart.
I am grateful for the conversation with my husband and his understanding and support of me.
I am grateful that everything is falling into place in a perfectly synchronistic way.
I am grateful.
Gratitude Experiment: Day 26
I am grateful that at the end of every year, I have (and we all have) the opportunity to release everything from the year that no longer serves us and begin again…fresh, with a brand new year. I am grateful that when I release the energy of regret, judgment, resentment and any thing that would keep me small, I am free. I am free to create my future without that negative energy re-creating similar situations. I am free from restricted energy flow. I am free to co-create my life and live my life with fresh, positive energy. I am so grateful for this capacity to begin again.
I release all disappointments I experienced this year…all hopes of things I wanted to work out, that didn’t seem to work out like I wanted…I get to release them into the light and let them go. I no longer need to hold on to that energy because the healing energy of Love is here dissolving it and unblocking the flow of good into my life. I am grateful!
I release anything that would keep me small…anything that would hold me back from fully expressing my authentic self. I am grateful that I have the choice. I am grateful that with divine light and divine guidance, I steer a new course and re-create my life anew. And so it is!
Gratitude Experiment: Day 25
I am grateful for candlelight services, singing Christmas carols and the opportunity of participating in it with my children.
I am grateful for friends, both old and new, with whom to celebrate the holidays.
I am grateful for lively conversations by the fire and lots of tasty treats.
I am grateful for my daughter who helped me in the kitchen…working side-by-side with me, without missing a beat, or complaining…the entire day. What a great help she is, and what a terrific way to bond with her.
I’m grateful for my other daughter who showed signs of selflessness and generosity with her sister…trading her gift for something her sister really wanted. I am grateful she loves her guitar and doesn’t seem to want to put it down.
I am grateful for my husband’s neatness gene who cleared away the mess in no time…and generally keeps our house looking spiffy.
I am grateful for the beauty of candlelight and the bubbles in champagne.
And phew! I’m grateful it’s over…at least until next year.
The Gratitude Experiment: Day 23
As we enter this Christmas time in earnest, all of us who celebrate the birth of Jesus…in whatever way…can, and do, express gratitude for the man himself.
Even though most scholars agree that Jesus wasn’t actually born on December 25, this is the time we have agreed to celebrate the birth. Celebration is gratitude taken up to it’s highest level. I’ll be talking more about that in the coming days as we move into the celebration of the New Year.
But for now, I am so grateful for the choice Jesus made and his personal dedication and ultimate sacrifice to live a life in complete oneness with God. He demonstrated the promise that it is possible to be completely one with Source. In fact, there was no place where God left off and Jesus began, and was therefore able to instantly manifest Infinite love, healings, peace and supply. He was the Light of the World. This promise he told us was possible for all of us. Most of us have yet to realize our potential, but many of us are at least awakening to the truth that it is there. Thanks to Jesus (along with other enlightened masters like Buddha, Krishna and others.)
So, today I am so grateful for the life of Jesus and love the spirit of Jesus continues to pour into our hearts. I am grateful that I am becoming aware of my divine potential and am given glipses of being in total oneness with Source. In gratitude, I open to receive more.
The Gratitude Experiment: Day 22
I am so grateful that, for at least one time a year, I connect with distant family and friends I haven’t seen in a long time and catch up with them. It’s really true that a connection once made in love is never lost.
I am grateful for a time of year when I don’t need to count calories. I can just enjoy the smells and flavors of the season. Diet and exercise will come soon enough (isn’t that what January is for?). So, for now, I’m going to enjoy!
I am grateful for Eckhart Tolle and his giggling voice on a CD reminding us to ask ourselves, “Who am I?” and then don’t answer. If you answer…then that’s not it. It’s in the silence before an answer comes. It’s deep, but he giggles with this which makes it light and fun.
I am grateful for email technology which allows us to send out Holiday letters with one click…and even at the last minute!
Happy eve of Christmas eve!
The Gratitude Experiment: Day 21
I had the privilege of seeing a fabulous production of Nicholas Nickleby this weekend (Parts 1 & 2!) at our local Playmaker’s Theatre. And, there in the first act, emblazoned on a large banner covering an entire “wall” of the school for outcast boys, was the following prayer:
“For the blessings we are about to receive may the Lord make us truly thankful.”
The schoolmaster demanded the boys chant this “prayer” before they received their pitiful crust of bread and drop of milk. And, if I remember correctly, it is the exact same prayer the headmaster of the orphanage in Dickens’ Oliver demanded his boys say before receiving their gruel. In fact, I think they sing it in the movie version.
Let’s look at that for a moment, because I think that for centuries people have equated the act of “giving thanks for what you have” with a sense of lack. As if God were demanding our gratitude and that we’d better be thankful for the little we have because some people don’t even have that much (not to mention the control the headmaster, or church leader was attempting to exert on its people.)
Interesting, isn’t it? No wonder the transforming power of the practice of gratitude has been hidden for so long…mankind has completely misunderstood it.
Thankfully in the 21st century, we’re a little more enlightened about both the treatment of young people and the purpose of gratitude.
Far from being a practice we must do to appease a fickle God who might just take away what little we have if we don’t show our appreciation, the practice of proactive gratitude states that the blessings we have in our life are a visible manifestation of a loving, limited Substance that lies behind the form. And, that the recognition, celebration and documentation of the visible manifestation helps us to remember the limitless Source from which they come which opens us up to receive more…much more. It also helps us to remember that we are so loved and supported by Life itself which desires only our happiness and success in life.
Remembering this, let’s recommit this holiday season to acknowledge our many blessings and open to receive even more.
My gratitudes for yesterday…
I am so grateful for reconnecting with an old friend and having a rift in our relationship healed so that we can both, once again, experience the love and joy of our friendship. I am so grateful for her.
I am grateful to have had the whole day to…finish my Christmas shopping! Hurray!
I am grateful for the love and support of my business coach, Jo, who devoted 2 hours to helping me reconnect with my mission in life and helped me figure out how to move forward.
Gratitude Experiment: Day 20
Yes, the holidays are upon us once again. It’s that festive time a year when there seems to be so much to do and so little time to enjoy the actual experience of it.
It’s so easy to get caught up in the busyness. And, I know the best way to let go and surrender into the moment is to stop. take a few deep breathes and notice what there is around me to be grateful for. So, I’m doing that now. Breathe, breathe, breathe…Okay, that feels better.
I’m so grateful for the beauty of the Christmas season. I love seeing the lights on houses and giant snow flakes on street lamps. I love all the decorations.
I am grateful for my daughter’s insight this morning. “We all have a light within us that’s a different color from each other. Everyone’s light is a slightly different color…like a Christmas light…and we’re all light strung together just like a string of Christmas lights.” I’m so grateful for her.
I’m grateful that the we got (despite last minute cancelations due to sickness) babysitters in place yesterday so we could go and see the production of Nicholas Nickelby in the afternoon and evening. I’m grateful to have had such a nice dinner with my husband and friends in between shows.
I’m grateful that we’re able to help out a family who has difficult time recently. It feels so good to be able to help.
Gratitude Experiment: Day 19
As The Secret creator Rhonda Byrne explained in her movie and subsequent book, gratitude is at the top of the list of the most effective methods for attracting more abundance…and all things good…into your life. In fact, she said that “if you remember only one thing from The Secret, let it be the practice of gratitude.”
Many other leaders in the field of Law of Attraction, and spiritual masters as well, have also placed the practice of gratitude (focusing on what is good in your life, as opposed to focusing on what isn’t working) at the top of their list of transformational practices.
The reason is simple, the practice of gratitude creates an energy…an attractive energy that magnetically draws to you more of the same.
Now, if you don’t happen to believe in energy or the law of attraction, that’s okay. You can look at it from a very practical standpoint. When you are focusing on and celebrating what is good in your life, it makes you happy. You can’t help but smile and be in a positive frame of mind. So, when you are in a positive frame of mind, people want to be around you. They want to get to know you better. They want to give you their business. They want to do favors for you. Your body’s immune system becomes stronger, so you become healthier. Therefore, practically speaking, the practice of proactive gratitude naturally increases good in just about every area of your life.
But, you need to be consistent. You need to figure out a way to incorporate this practice into your daily life. I’ll blog on this topic in the next few days. In the meantime, count your blessings, log on and document them here.
Here are mine from yesterday…
I am grateful for the wonderfully supportive people at my new networking group. What a great group of people. I’m grateful that I found them and they’re welcoming me.
I am grateful that my child slept peacefully through the night even though she wasn’t feeling well.
I am grateful that my car is fixed beautiful and without much effort on my part. Everything was just taken care of by their insurance company (USAA)…and with a smile even.
I am grateful that the weather forcasts snow on the weekend…and that it didn’t happen during the week causing school closings and traffic nightmares.
I’m grateful for the opportunity to share what I feel passionate about with people like you from all over the world.