The Reason to be Grateful

It’s one of the buzziest buzz words today. Being grateful and practicing thankfulness and gratitude is one of the fastest ways to elevate your energetic vibrational frequency.

Everyone’s preaching it from Deepak Chopra to heartfelt advertisements on TV, to the latest psychology and mindfulness publications, to celebrities like Oprah and influencers on Instagram.

There’s no doubt that gratitude is more top of mind and in the forefront than ever before – and for good reason. Gratitude is a fundamental cornerstone to greater happiness and personal daily enjoyment.

But why?

Well for one, it’s incredibly simple to practice.

We all have something in life to be grateful for. Chances are, if you are reading this, that something is at least access to internet, or email, or a source by which you are able to see this. If you’re able to read this, then you’ve also been given the educational resources to become literate while some 14% of the world remains illiterate.

Another simple example that came to me while I was washing my hands the other day was how grateful I was to even have two sinks in my apartment, while I’m sure there’s people who have one for their entire family to use, and even some with no running water at all.

Every life coach and spiritual thinker talks about gratitude as the entry gateway towards higher levels of consciousness.

When you begin to be thankful for the things you have, instead of what you’re consistently chasing in front of you, it begins to do something amazing to the psyche. It starts to root you in the present moment.

You begin to focus on what is immediately happening in this moment right now. That’s mindfulness.

When things feel overwhelming or that they’re not going your way, gratitude pulls you back to center. It shows you how much you have accomplished to get to where you are and what you have, how far you’ve come, and the beauty of everything that is already yours. Gratitude can even work to fill you up with emotional joy in any circumstance and provide that boost of motivational uplift to propel you forward.

Practicing gratitude can also become a self-fueled goal.

It’s so easy to execute that you can lose everything and still be able to hit this goal of providing yourself the experience of being grateful for at least one thing (a healthy body, a cognizant mind, a chance to chase your dreams or rebuild, a chance to go deeper into your state of consciousness (meditate) every day).

And you’re probably going to tell me – “Neal, if I lost everything or something horrible happened to me, there is certainly nothing I would be grateful for.”

To this I tell you, on my fear scale of 0-100, I lived my 100. My mom’s passing on was the 100 that I never imagined would happen as suddenly and instantaneously as it did. While it was a confounding and consuming half-year thereafter, every dark cloud has a silver lining. Without the circumstances that arose, I likely would not have been able to be awakened to a calling to help people, and for the ability to do so, I am grateful.

It may not be instantaneous, and we may not realize it at the moment, but when we begin to shift our perspective from fear, disappointment, and that life is out to get us, we begin to see the other side of the coin of duality. The side that allows us to be grateful in any circumstance, perceived as good or bad. When we begin to do this, we begin to elevate our vibration higher and higher.

Gratitude is a building block because it is one of the core virtues of higher energetic vibration.

The fear of loss is the path to the dark side. By letting go of everything you fear to lose (attachment) we no longer attach ourselves to the feeling we get from people or objects. We begin to ground ourselves in gratitude for who we are without needing the external validation. We begin to realize things about life we never thought imaginable. We become at peace with ourselves and the world around us. Where criticism doesn’t jar us, and praise doesn’t hook us.

From there, we start to see people in a different light – for what they’re able to bring to the table instead of what they haven’t been able to do for us. In turn, science and researchers at Berkeley have shown that gratitude for others makes us feel better as a result, because we are elevating others. Imagine how much a work environment could change is people were genuinely grateful for everything others did?!

The Universe is a reflection of yourself. You get back what you put out.

The energy, the words, the thoughts, the vibrations; it all boomerangs back around to show us what is ultimately flowing through our own pathways of perception. I’m sure you’ve heard the quote “what you appreciate appreciates.”  

When we consciously recognize the goodness around us, our brain’s reticular activating system (RAS) begins to take note and in turn notice more and more and more good in our daily life. Over days, weeks, months, and years, our entire perspective on our reality drastically shifts. The victim mindset is no longer in play, let alone in our repertoire. Our frequency becomes one of joy, bliss, happiness, gratitude, love, and forgiveness.

This Thanksgiving is a perfect time to start a new gratitude practice for yourself – and there’s so many ways to explore this.

1. Start your day off by filling up the cup of your mind with goodness. After you turn off your alarm, before you scroll through your notifications, emails, news, or texts and before you get out of bed, say 3 things you’re grateful for.
2. In the middle of the day when things feel overwhelming or aren’t going to plan. Take a pause, go somewhere quiet for even just one minute, close your eyes, take a few deep breaths to calm your nervous system (the 4-7-8 breathing technique works great: 4 seconds inhale, 7 seconds hold, 8 seconds exhale), say three things you’re grateful for, and go back to your day in a calmer state of mind.
3. At the Thanksgiving dinner table. Go around the table and have everyone say one or two things they are grateful for. This can be in their personal life, career, family, health, daily life, or truly anything. Hearing the words of others’ gratitude only shows us how much abundance is already around us.
4. At the end of the day before bed. Take out a journal and write down 3 things from that day you are grateful for before resting your head on the pillow at night. You may start to even sleep better as those happy chemicals in your brain will flood your system with positive energy for improved sleep.

Happy Thanksgiving 2021! Grateful for YOU taking the time to read this.