2014 saw me being grateful every single day. I remembered my gratitude journal when I was chatting with someone today about the power of gratitude. You can read my 365 days gratitude journal here.
What did the power of gratitude do for me?
- Gratitude made me very happy every day.
- It showed me what an amazing full life I have.
- It reminded me of all the great and amazing people who enter my life.
- It opened my life up to acknowledge all the lovely gifts I got from friends and strangers.
Gifts magically kept appearing without my asking. Interesting coincidences would happen. I’d lose my yoga mat on the yoga retreat. On my return home a friend would send me a note asking me to review a yoga mat that she had made - It opened me up to increased positivity in my life. I consider myself pretty positive and tend to look at the bright side of things, but this daily gratitude really brought out the optimist in me ten-fold. I simply had no time for creating negativity.
- Knowing that I was writing a gratitude journal that my friends read every day on my facebook page also kept me accountable. It made me watch for extraordinary moments in my day. I became more aware and more sensitive to what was going on around me.
- Being grateful made me approach life and every day with a sense of wonder and magic. Every morning I’d wake up to this thought -What am I going to find in my magic pot to express gratitude for ?
- Gratitude removed any darkness or thoughts of sadness that I might feel, Instead in its place I got a rush of positive energy filling my body with endorphins, as If I had just done my favourite yoga pose or swam in the atlantic ocean.
- I truly believe gratitude kept me healthy all of last year and its effects are still lasting.
- It inspired my friends to start their own gratitude journal.
Most of all, being grateful for what I have ..created more abundance in my life. It was a self-fulfilling prophecy. The more I was grateful for what I have, the more I got.
Gratitude is like sending a thank you note to a favourite aunt for her lovely and thoughtful birthday gift. Next time she’s probably going to remember my note and treat me once again.
The universe is quite like that favourite aunt. Thank her and she likes to give you more gifts. Don’t send her a thank you note and she won’t bother with you next time. She’ll probably think it’s a waste of time giving you anything and turn her attention to someone who does appreciate her. I don’t know if it’s a fact, but I do feel this about the universe very strongly in my intuition.
I didn’t expect this result when i started. I just believed that being grateful was somehow the right thing to do 🙂 after I heard a discourse by a spiritual master in the bahamas over christmas 2013. She said ‘in the himlayan mountains where I live and teach, the villagers don;t have much, not even footwear. they wander barefeet. But they do have lots of one thing-gratitude and contentment. They are happy with what they have. Meanwhile I visit you all here. With all your comforts i Keep hearing you say you dont have anything. Learn from the himalayan villagers, practice gratitude”. those words stayed with me. On my return home, I started a 365-day gratitude journal and the results were phenomenal as you can tell.
This year I haven’t actually written a lot in my gratitude notebook. But I feel incredibly grateful for the cars that wait in line at the train station waiting for us to make a left turn, before they can drive on.
Gratitude makes me feel even more connected to everything and everyone around me. My gratitude journal brought tears to my eyes on many occasions. It made me realize I’m not alone in this world. There’s an infinite network of support crisscrossing my path in life and helping me daily.
In the spirit of this women’s day week, I finished the scarf I was knitting for my homeless man in Toronto. I’m pretty lucky to have a room over my head in the cold winter months and a comfortable and pretty home to sleep in. Meanwhile there are tons of homeless people in the city of Toronto who shiver in the extreme cold winter we have been having. I started knitting this scarf in the Bahamas over Christmas at my yoga retreat. Every evening during the chants, and service, I’d knit away furiously wanting to capture the energy of those positive chants and put them into the knitting.
A little boy was fascinated. came close up trying to learn to knit. asked me why ! when I told him to keep a homeless man warm, he said delightfully “its cold in New York, will you knit me a scarf to keep me warm too” of course I can’t resist a smile like that, would you?
so I went off to the main island market to buy him special wool.. and managed to knit his scarf. someone commented, with all the prayers & chanting in the evening program, entering the scarf, its going to be one very lucky homeless man.
I hope to find my homeless friend tomorrow to give him his scarf. Do you think he will like this infinity scarf to wrap him in warmth?
Try gratitude some time. It will keep you joyful and healthy. It will remind you of your connection to the world. It will keep you plugged into the world, you will have all the support you need in the work you do.
I’ll leave you with final words from Patanjali, a yogi from 2000 years ago–
Patanjali wrote – practicing santosha(contentment, or appreciation for what you have) leads to unexcelled joy. Human beings seem to forever seek satisfaction from the external world and our internal fantasies. When we comfortably accept what we currently have we can get unparalleled happiness and contentment.
–charuyoga–
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charuyoga 