Strategy #7: You Can Possess a Grateful Attitude
Part 1 - Gratitude
Gratitude is a developmental construct. As children, we learn about gratitude from our families and in school. As we grow, we learn more about gratitude in the workplace and among our friends and neighbors.
Gratitude not only makes life a little easier, it’s also a powerful strategy for coping with challenges and difficulties of life. Gratitude is an inherently human emotion that involves feelings of appreciation and thankfulness. Gratitude helps people deal with loss and disappointment.
An exercise that has been tested in psychological sciences and found to have value in promoting positive emotions is “gratitude journaling.” Beginning a gratitude journal is quite simple and its goals are straightforward: to create a positive mind-set by recording grateful thoughts on a daily basis.
In one study conducted by Robert Emmons and Michael McCollough (2003), two social scientists who have extensively studied the adaptive qualities of gratitude, they proposed a gratitude journaling intervention with the following instructions provided to the study participants:
There are many things in our lives, both large and small, that we might be grateful about. Think back over the past week and write down on the lines below up to five things in your life that you are grateful or thankful for. (p. 388).
In the Emmons & McCollough study, those persons who engaged in gratitude journaling showed better well-being on measures of self-esteem and life satisfaction. These researchers concluded that inducing feelings of gratitude through journaling was more successful in generating positive emotional feelings than two control groups that consisted of participants who kept journals that did not focus on gratitude.
Gratitude not only makes life a little easier, it’s also a powerful strategy for coping with challenges and difficulties of life. Gratitude is an inherently human emotion that involves feelings of appreciation and thankfulness. Gratitude helps people deal with loss and disappointment.
An exercise that has been tested in psychological sciences and found to have value in promoting positive emotions is “gratitude journaling.” Beginning a gratitude journal is quite simple and its goals are straightforward: to create a positive mind-set by recording grateful thoughts on a daily basis.
In one study conducted by Robert Emmons and Michael McCollough (2003), two social scientists who have extensively studied the adaptive qualities of gratitude, they proposed a gratitude journaling intervention with the following instructions provided to the study participants:
There are many things in our lives, both large and small, that we might be grateful about. Think back over the past week and write down on the lines below up to five things in your life that you are grateful or thankful for. (p. 388).
In the Emmons & McCollough study, those persons who engaged in gratitude journaling showed better well-being on measures of self-esteem and life satisfaction. These researchers concluded that inducing feelings of gratitude through journaling was more successful in generating positive emotional feelings than two control groups that consisted of participants who kept journals that did not focus on gratitude.
Your Gratitude Journal
- Make a gratitude journal. Record your thoughts during the day about your daily experiences in a grateful way (reflecting on things that make you smile, bring you happiness or joy, or make you feel at peace).
- Set a minimum number of entries per day (e.g., no fewer than 5) and increase the number of entries per week, up to 15, as you get better at noticing things for which you are grateful.
- Recollect what you have felt grateful for in the past.
- How have these things positively influenced your everyday living?
- Realize that the world is “not perfect” but you can be grateful no matter what condition you are in.
- You can be grateful whether you are sick or healthy. If you are sick, you may choose to be grateful for the times that you feel good. If you are not sick, you can be grateful for your good health.
- You can be grateful in difficult situations. In such instances gratitude may not solve your problem, but it can help you find positives even when they may not be apparent. If you have been in an accident, you can be grateful that your survived it. You can also be grateful for the things that you have left versus those things that you have lost.
- You can be grateful in the presence of loss. For example, the death of a loved one is a profoundly sorrowful event. However, statements like “I am grateful for the time we had together” or “He/she lived a long and healthy life” can negate emotions such as anger, sorrow, blame, guilt, and shame.
The demonstrate this, sit back in your chair for a moment. Close your eyes. Recollect the best thing that happened to you during the past week. Take a minute and pay attention to those feelings that were associated with this positive event. Are you grateful for the event? Assuming that you are, you can dwell on the reasons that you feel grateful. As you practice this simple exercise for just a few minutes, you will notice that your affect will change in a positive direction and not just about the event, but for other things as well. You may feel that “it’s great to be alive” or “Good things happen to me.”
Although it is easy to generate gratitude in a neutral situation, or when things are going well, applying gratitude to difficult life-span transitions can be even more challenging if you do not have routines that include gratitude.
Develop a Grateful Attitude
The following are ways you can develop a more grateful attitude:
- Finding (or creating) a positive mind-set.
- Valuing yourself and the experience – good or bad.
- Diminishing the seriousness of the negative event.
- Building your self-confidence.
Part 2 - Positive Aging and Gratitude
Gratitude, like forgiveness, is a reframing technique. Because gratitude and misery are incompatible - that is, you cannot be grateful and miserable simultaneously – people who have experienced difficulties in life or are confronting a challenge of obstacle can keep up a positive mood and thereby generate resources for coping by simply practicing thinking grateful thoughts. The ability to engage in grateful thinking is a skill that requires practice.
Mobilizing Resources for Gratitude
Gratitude does not occur in a vacuum, and it requires effort to be grateful, especially when circumstances are such that it is easy to dwell on the negative. When you experience a loss, a setback, or a tragedy it is almost natural to focus on the negative. If you do so, one of the consequences of that focus is the magnification of the loss.
Cognitive shifting is the element of gratitude that helps you move your thoughts about a difficulty or a tragedy from the negative to the positive. To do this you must discipline yourself to focus on what you “have” instead of what you “don't have.” This involves letting go of negative emotions that keep you attached to set backs. It is fair to say that almost everyone has experienced disappointment at one time or another, and the process of recovering from a challenge or tragedy can be not only time-consuming but infuriating as well, particularly the more blame we place on ourselves or others who we construe as responsible for a difficult circumstance.
Gratitude takes some effort to shift your focus from what you have “lost” to what you have “left.” Gratitude also works for more significant instances, including the loss of one’s health, the loss of a home, and even the loss of a lifelong partner. Gratitude does not objectively replace your losses, but it provides an alternative way to think about them that allows you to generate resources for coping.
I have designed the “Reframing Regrets” exercise to help you learn how the emotional valence-shifting aspect of gratitude works.
Cognitive shifting is the element of gratitude that helps you move your thoughts about a difficulty or a tragedy from the negative to the positive. To do this you must discipline yourself to focus on what you “have” instead of what you “don't have.” This involves letting go of negative emotions that keep you attached to set backs. It is fair to say that almost everyone has experienced disappointment at one time or another, and the process of recovering from a challenge or tragedy can be not only time-consuming but infuriating as well, particularly the more blame we place on ourselves or others who we construe as responsible for a difficult circumstance.
Gratitude takes some effort to shift your focus from what you have “lost” to what you have “left.” Gratitude also works for more significant instances, including the loss of one’s health, the loss of a home, and even the loss of a lifelong partner. Gratitude does not objectively replace your losses, but it provides an alternative way to think about them that allows you to generate resources for coping.
I have designed the “Reframing Regrets” exercise to help you learn how the emotional valence-shifting aspect of gratitude works.
Reframe Regrets - Exercise
Identify something in your life that you currently regret, that is, something in the past that you wish you would have done differently. This regret can be big or small. It might involve another person or it may simply involve you. Write that regret down.
1. Describe a regret.
Example: I regret not finding more time to be with my grandson when he was very young. Now he has little interest in me.
Now it’s your turn.
2. Reframe your regret.
Using the same example: “But I am grateful for the time that I did spend with him” or “My grandson and I still have time to cultivate a relationship.”
This grateful reframing puts a positive twist on the regret, thereby nullifying much of its negative emotional impact. You focus on what is good about the memory and these “good thoughts replace negative reminiscence.
In addition to making this affirmative statement, you can strengthen it further by focusing on the times that you have spent with your grandson. You might review photos you have of these times to generate positive emotions from your memories.
If you succeed in engaging in this kind of grateful affirmation, your mind will naturally move to those positive times that you spent with your grandson and you will experience a general sense of well-being about yourself as well as a good feeling about your grandson. These positive emotions can then be translated into motivation to initiate more contact with your grandson. As you follow this line of thinking, you will have generated emotional energy to act on your thoughts.
4. Change your regret into an opportunity.
Reframe your regret into a positive gratitude statement.
Example: There is no time like the present to interact with my grandson and make our relationship better.
Gratitude can be useful tool for dealing with one of the biggest challenges we can experience in life, the loss of a loved on to death. Research in grief and bereavement has identified the ability to generate positive features of the lost loved one or aspects of the relationship of which one is grateful for as a way to mediate feelings of loss.
Stroebe, Hansson, Stroebe, and Henk (2001) reinforced the efficacy of grateful memories of a past relationship that ended in death as a source for the survivor’s coping in the future. As you make a concerted effort to generate grateful thoughts, they will give you added resources to continue to reap the benefits of living.
1. Describe a regret.
Example: I regret not finding more time to be with my grandson when he was very young. Now he has little interest in me.
Now it’s your turn.
2. Reframe your regret.
Using the same example: “But I am grateful for the time that I did spend with him” or “My grandson and I still have time to cultivate a relationship.”
This grateful reframing puts a positive twist on the regret, thereby nullifying much of its negative emotional impact. You focus on what is good about the memory and these “good thoughts replace negative reminiscence.
In addition to making this affirmative statement, you can strengthen it further by focusing on the times that you have spent with your grandson. You might review photos you have of these times to generate positive emotions from your memories.
If you succeed in engaging in this kind of grateful affirmation, your mind will naturally move to those positive times that you spent with your grandson and you will experience a general sense of well-being about yourself as well as a good feeling about your grandson. These positive emotions can then be translated into motivation to initiate more contact with your grandson. As you follow this line of thinking, you will have generated emotional energy to act on your thoughts.
4. Change your regret into an opportunity.
Reframe your regret into a positive gratitude statement.
Example: There is no time like the present to interact with my grandson and make our relationship better.
Gratitude can be useful tool for dealing with one of the biggest challenges we can experience in life, the loss of a loved on to death. Research in grief and bereavement has identified the ability to generate positive features of the lost loved one or aspects of the relationship of which one is grateful for as a way to mediate feelings of loss.
Stroebe, Hansson, Stroebe, and Henk (2001) reinforced the efficacy of grateful memories of a past relationship that ended in death as a source for the survivor’s coping in the future. As you make a concerted effort to generate grateful thoughts, they will give you added resources to continue to reap the benefits of living.
Develop a Life Pattern of Gratitude
If practice makes you better at being grateful, then sustained practice can work to establish a life pattern of gratitude. It is easier to be greatful when you persist at it and find new ways to engage in feeling grateful. If you do this, gratitude will become a natural part of your life routine.
Flexibility and Gratitude
An attribute of gratitude is that it shifts your focus from a fixated set of negative thoughts to thinking more broadly and positively about a situation or an event. It is common to get stuck in a loop of thinking from which breaking out becomes difficult. So why do people sometimes concentrate on a single idea? It may be that such preoccupation has some adaptive purpose.
For instance, if you are trying to achieve a goal, then focusing on it may sustain your motivation. In this sense focus or fixation is adaptive. When you focus on something you become attuned to it; you think about it, talk about it, and desire it. If you are focused, you are not likely to be distracted. Fixation is a form of focus that is future oriented. The present becomes less meaningful because your interests are in obtaining a future goal or reward. Great achievements are credited to people who cultivate this kind of focus.
Fixation can also work against you, however. If you fixate on something you cannot achieve or that is harming you. Setting unachievable goals is sure to be disappointing. For example, not everyone can become a professional athlete, make millions of dollars, or own expensive cars. An unrealistic fixation will also diminish your ability to live in the present.
The more unrealistic your fixation, the more power it has to make your present circumstances seem valueless. You might look around at your current situation and feel discouraged with what you have. Your spouse may be letting you down, your job may be unsatisfying, your salary in adequate, your appearance unappealing. All of these types of fixations breed disappointment and are a product of rigid thinking that is also future focused.
When you fixate on something you obsess over it whether it is reasonable or not. Misery can come from this kind of rigid thinking and behaving. Are there ways to break this cycle?
This is where gratitude can be helpful. The scientific literature on gratitude labels it as a reconstrual process that is present, the here and now. You can be grateful for your ability to play sports, for your spouse, for your job, and for the things that you have. If you follow the admonitions that come from teachers of gratitude (who may be parents, religious leaders, instructors in school) then you must closely examine what you have in the present with the goal of finding positive meaning in it.
You might look at your spouse and see a loyal companion or some aspect of his or her physical appearance that generates positive emotions in you. If you do this, you will begin to feel context in the present. Gratitude is a flexibility tool to help you break fixation cycles.
For instance, if you are trying to achieve a goal, then focusing on it may sustain your motivation. In this sense focus or fixation is adaptive. When you focus on something you become attuned to it; you think about it, talk about it, and desire it. If you are focused, you are not likely to be distracted. Fixation is a form of focus that is future oriented. The present becomes less meaningful because your interests are in obtaining a future goal or reward. Great achievements are credited to people who cultivate this kind of focus.
Fixation can also work against you, however. If you fixate on something you cannot achieve or that is harming you. Setting unachievable goals is sure to be disappointing. For example, not everyone can become a professional athlete, make millions of dollars, or own expensive cars. An unrealistic fixation will also diminish your ability to live in the present.
The more unrealistic your fixation, the more power it has to make your present circumstances seem valueless. You might look around at your current situation and feel discouraged with what you have. Your spouse may be letting you down, your job may be unsatisfying, your salary in adequate, your appearance unappealing. All of these types of fixations breed disappointment and are a product of rigid thinking that is also future focused.
When you fixate on something you obsess over it whether it is reasonable or not. Misery can come from this kind of rigid thinking and behaving. Are there ways to break this cycle?
This is where gratitude can be helpful. The scientific literature on gratitude labels it as a reconstrual process that is present, the here and now. You can be grateful for your ability to play sports, for your spouse, for your job, and for the things that you have. If you follow the admonitions that come from teachers of gratitude (who may be parents, religious leaders, instructors in school) then you must closely examine what you have in the present with the goal of finding positive meaning in it.
You might look at your spouse and see a loyal companion or some aspect of his or her physical appearance that generates positive emotions in you. If you do this, you will begin to feel context in the present. Gratitude is a flexibility tool to help you break fixation cycles.
Gratitude and a Positive Focus
In an Internet survey of over 110,000 respondents, researchers Park, Peterson, and Seligman (2005) asked the respondents to endorse strategies that were associated with positive emotions. Gratitude was one of the more frequently noted strategies that they found associated with positive feelings about life and living. If you cultivate a grateful disposition, you will need to focus on the positive that life has to offer.
If you are feeling good, it is often because you have a sense of appreciation for what you have or what you are experiencing.
Although the capacity for gratitude is within us all, the challenge is finding ways to invoke it. To think that gratitude is a naïve mechanism that simply allows you to ignore the challenges and the difficulties in life suggests that it is not fully understood. Some things will not change. We need strategies and techniques to deal with the vicissitudes of growing old.
If you are truly grateful, you will not ignore reality, but you will be skilled at finding meaning in the “good and the bad” that you encounter.
If you are feeling good, it is often because you have a sense of appreciation for what you have or what you are experiencing.
Although the capacity for gratitude is within us all, the challenge is finding ways to invoke it. To think that gratitude is a naïve mechanism that simply allows you to ignore the challenges and the difficulties in life suggests that it is not fully understood. Some things will not change. We need strategies and techniques to deal with the vicissitudes of growing old.
If you are truly grateful, you will not ignore reality, but you will be skilled at finding meaning in the “good and the bad” that you encounter.