#2210 WW Wednesday: gratitude

We talk a lot about gratitude in WW. I might even say it is a core philosophy in the program. Last Saturday, gratitude was the topic of the workshop.

In my humble estimation, I think you get to choose whether to be happy, sad, bored, angry, etc. Sure, things can happen during the day to tip you into another mood, but when you wake up, you get to choose how to look at the day, so why not choose happy as a good place to start?

One way to get to happy is to think about something that you are grateful for. I tend to think of things I'm thankful for at the end of the day. You might notice that over on the right hand side there is a little box that always starts with the words "Today I am grateful for..." Sometimes it can be a deep, profound thought and other times, frankly, I am thankful for bacon or Trader Joe's or Red Butte Garden or a pile of books waiting to be read. It doesn't so much matter what "it" is as long as "it" gives you a bit of joy and your thankful for "it".

My WW coach, Lana, often sends us on our way at the end of the workshop with an assignment for the week. This week the assignment is to write down three things every day that we are grateful for. I'll share a few:

• my book club leader sent me our latest book.  
• we have enough money to pay all our bills and still live nicely (if you have ever not had enough money for those two things, you know what I mean)
• texting with my mom
• walking with MT

(And yes, bacon was something I was grateful for this week! We had BLTs one night and they were dang good!)

When I feel blue, I will often think of something that I am thankful for and it makes me feel better. I wish I could say I do the same thing when I feel angry, but I haven't quite got that far yet. 

I really do think that gratitude begets happiness. Maybe it's a little corny, and I'm okay with that. Check out this post from gratefulness.org. I think it's spot on. 

There are people who keep gratitude journals. Whenever I write here or in my personal journal, I always like to write something I am thankful for each time. I started doing it last year when the word I chose was, in fact, gratitude.

Just try it. :D