How to live a happier and more positive life with the practice of gratitude every single day.
Your brain cannot experience a negative emotion and gratitude at the same time. By practicing gratitude daily we are training our brain to always be happy and to find the best case scenario in all of today’s events and all of your past, present, and future experiences.
Now here’s a quick 3 minute exercise you can do every morning to practice gratitude:
First thing in the morning do not check your phone, do not turn on the TV, and do not turn on the radio. When you do this you get information from the outside world and this information is thrown at your brain and automatically puts you into a reaction mode. You are reacting to the comments and desires of others. You check a Facebook message or a text message or an email and you respond to that which means your brain is catering to the wants and desires of someone else out there instead of creating the life you want to live.
It is so important to block off this first hour of the day for you and only you. This is when your subconscious mind is the most open and receptive. We want to use this time to help create the life you want by creating the perfect day with our own thoughts and imagination.
“Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited, whereas imagination embraces the entire world, stimulating progress, giving birth to evolution.” -Albert Einstein
You can create happiness, you can create money, you can create powerful relationships and that first hour of the day is so important in order to do this.
Here’s what to do when you wake up or as early as you possibly can in the morning preferably before you have started the work day and the daily distractions of checking email, social media, and the news.
1.Get yourself a gratitude journal, just a cheap notebook from the dollar store will work just fine or you can get yourself a fancy one from the bookstore. I like to keep mine right by my bed so I can write first thing in the morning and last thing at night before I go to sleep.
2. I want you to write down three things that you’re grateful for. You can start with the most common things most people are grateful for like family, health, and relationships. Here’s where the real magic happens though. You want to really feel the emotion of gratitude when you write these things down. Imagine your life with these people, things, and feelings. Smile, read them aloud. If you need to take the journal with you and read it 2-3 times a day especially if you are going through a tough time and need to be reminded of how many amazing things you have in your life to be grateful for.
3. Remember doing this exercise every day for 30 days has the power to change your life. You’ve probably heard it takes 21 days to form a habit. This is one of the reasons why I recommend 30 days. You need at least 21 days to form the habit and 30 days is usually a calendar month which means literally you can change your life in a month and be in a completely different place mentally, spiritually, and physically. By doing this exercise daily it trains your brain throughout the day so you’re constantly looking for things to be grateful for. So now when someone cuts you off in traffic or you stub your toe these little things don’t matter because you’re living at such a high vibrational frequency of gratitude and happiness that these little things just don’t matter.
Bonus tip-Grab a pen and write down the things that have hurt you and the experiences of your life that you haven’t forgiven people for and write down…I’m so grateful that this happened to me because it taught me this. When you can do this that’s when you have complete power and control over your entire life.