Did you know that focusing on what you’re grateful for can improve your sleep, bring you more joy, and reduce stress? Research shows that this simple technique can make a big difference in how you feel.
Several studies confirm that practicing gratitude through journaling offers health benefits. It promotes well-being, increases happiness, and reduces depression.
Practicing gratitude can, among other things:
- Help you cope with difficult times.
- Improve your sleep, making you feel more rested.
- Make you feel more purposeful and increase the likelihood of achieving your personal goals.
- Help you focus on the positive and reduce negative thoughts and feelings.
Martin Seligmann, known as the founder of positive psychology, has conducted extensive sresearch on depression, happiness, and quality of life. One project, where he studied the relationship between gratitude and depression, provided some surprising results.
Subjects were asked over a certain period to take note of the positive things that happened to them during the day.
They were asked to record this in a gratitude diary:
- These could be big things, like the love you feel for family members or things you’ve accomplished.
- Or small events, like the sunshine that day or watching a movie you enjoyed.
As part of the experiment, Seligman also asked subjects to record how deep their depression was. Result: those who reported the deepest depression also reported the greatest effect!
Start Your Gratitude Journal Now – Download Mindfit and Try It for Free
Why practice gratitude?
Practicing gratitude can help you change the way you think; about yourself, about your life and how you behave. It’s a simple technique that, among other things, helps you build mental resilience and deal with though times.
It’s easy to forget all the good things that happen during a day or week. Things that do not go as planned, or small annoyances often get too much attention.
Don’t let stress, bad conscience or negative thoughts take over your everyday life. Shifting your focus to positive experiences can helps you turn off negative thoughts and feelings.
We all have something to be grateful for. This is something you can practice to become mentally stronger.
This is how you can learn to be more grateful
An easy way to get started is to shift your focus to all the good things you have in life. It’s also a great way to remind yourself of what matters to you.
What is important to you? What makes you happy? And what do you really choose to spend your time on?
1. Start small
Begin by recording positive events and experiences that happen during the course of your daily life. Take note of what makes you happy, when you master something and what you like. It can be something as simple as enjoying a good cup of coffee, going for a walk, meeting friends, enjoying a quiet moment or a nice sunset.
2. Log the Experience
You reinforce the good feeling by writing down the experience. It helps you reflect on what you’ve experienced and how it made you feel.
In addition, you can go back and look at this later when you’re facing challenges, to remind yourself of all the good things you’ve achieved or experienced. Positive memories act as a buffer against stress and negative thoughts.
3. Do this regularly
It sounds simple, but it requires you to decide to set aside a few minutes regularly to do it. Try this at least three times a week for three weeks. See what it does to you.
This is perhaps where the greatest challenge lies – remembering to do it.
Mindfit Helps You Get Started
In Mindfit, you can easily log your experiences in a gratitude journal and be reminded to do it regularly, making gratitude a natural part of your daily life.
Make gratitude a habit. Download Mindfit and try it for free – experience the benefits research shows.
