Gratitude is expressing a true, deep appreciation for what we have in a meaningful way. Sometimes we get too busy juggling tasks, building careers, chasing our dreams, thinking about our 'to-do list', and we often forget to appreciate the small, but important things that actually make us happy.

 

Acknowledging gratitude can increase our well-being, health, happiness and it is also associated with increased energy, optimism, and empathy. The feeling that life is generous makes us feel grateful toward loved ones, friends, colleagues, animals and, nature.

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It can help you to make better health choices! How? When we focus on positive emotions, we feed our brain's reward system and feelings of pleasure. When we feel grateful, we experience more positive emotions and less negative ones. Negative moods affect what we choose to eat - low mood disturbs our emotional regulation, which leads us to make poor health choices (i.e., chocolate). Positive mood motivates us to maintain a healthy diet.

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According to psychologist Kori D. Miller, expressing daily gratitude can positively influence the following:

• reduces stress

• increases happiness and positive mood

• more satisfaction with life

• less materialistic

• less likely to experience burnout

• better physical health

• better sleep

• less fatigue

• lower levels of cellular inflammation

• greater resiliency

• encourages the development of patience, humility, and wisdom
   

Like anything else, expressing gratitude and the positive outcome gets better with practice. The more weeks you practice, the better you will feel.

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I have created an editable 21 days journal for you, which you can download for free. You can either save it on your laptop and edit it every day or you can print it and write on it with a pen. Click on the Word icon below to download, and you can start your journal right away. 

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