With a new year in full force, now is the perfect time to turn the page, forget the past, and start fresh.
While there are many ways to do that, one of the best ways is to count your blessings. Gratitude goes under the radar, but it’s one of those gifts that keeps on giving.
To show off the importance of counting your blessings and how you can do so in the new year, we’re going to break down why you should express gratitude and feature a few ways how you can.
Why should you express gratitude?
It doesn’t matter if you work with commercial roofing experts or are a manager of a fitness center, you should express gratitude.
Expressing gratitude not only gives you a chance to tell people why you’re thankful for them but it can make them feel important, wanted, and loved.
Not only that but as One Medical points out, expressing gratitude can lead to these benefits: It can improve your relationships, productivity, and performance, as well as help you sleep better. It can help your heart in a metaphoric and literal sense because it can make you feel good and protect vital organs. It can, of course, give your mental health a boost as well.
In its most basic form, counting your blessings can ensure you’re not taking people, things, or places for granted because you’re telling friends or loved ones what they mean to you via your actions and words. You’re also living in the moment and taking everything in, while getting the most out of your life.
How to count your blessings
Everyone counts their blessings in different ways, from a dentist in Lakewood, OH to a hockey player in New York, but here are three ways you can count your blessings.
- Keep a daily journal: A daily journal doesn’t have to take up all of your time, but it can if you want it to. The point behind keeping a daily journal is to not only write down your thoughts and how you’re feeling, which can help with awareness, but it can also help with memory and problem solving (among other benefits).
- Tell people you’re grateful for them: This is one of the more basic concepts but it’s also hard to do at times and it can make a huge impact. In a materialistic world, sometimes the best presents are telling others what they mean to you. Gratitude can strengthen relationships and benefit everyone involved.
- Let your actions do the talking: Not taking people (or things) for granted can show in your actions by treating others with respect and giving them the time of day. Your actions can do the talking by listening and being present in conversations. While this doesn’t directly tell people why you’re happy to have them in your life, it’s about being kind to one another and respecting them. It can be as simple as not checking your phone and letting someone else do the talking while you presently listen.
Being more aware of what we have can help us not take so much for granted. As this article points out, replacing the phrase “I have to” with “I get to” can help you change your approach and attitude.
People take a lot for granted, from the clothes we wear, to the water and food we consume, to the closest people in our lives. While many people struggle with being present, we should all take the time to count our blessings, and we hope the information in this article can help you achieve exactly that.
