How Can We Turn Gratitude Into A Daily Habit?

We talk about gratitude as a mental habit we can train, not a mood we wait for. We share simple ways to observe our thoughts, shift out of worry, and land in a calmer state fast. 
• noticing beauty we usually take for granted, from colors outside to small comforts at home 
• using a gratitude jar and daily prompts as gentle reminders 
• stepping back to observe thoughts, then choosing what we focus on 
• building bedtime gratitude into a repeatable habit and pairing it with dream guidance and a notebook 
• defining gratitude as “this is the way it is, and it could have been different” 
• checking stress with one question: does this require my attention now 
• turning worry into planning by asking what we want and what could improve the moment 
• protecting our minds from negative inputs like scrolling, news, and other people’s thought patterns 
• closing with a tiny gratitude meditation that lifts how we feel

Transcript

Sunshine And Coffee And Beauty

SPEAKER_04 0:10

We are on the line.

SPEAKER_00 0:13

Sunshine and birds and coffee.

SPEAKER_04 0:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 0:17

My goodness. Does life get better than that?

SPEAKER_04 0:20

Nope. Yeah, today's a sunny day. It's beautiful. I love the contrast between the grass, the green of the grass and the blue of the water. I think I could be grateful for that, really.

SPEAKER_00 0:33

You know, colors are a cool thing. I mean, it's kind of like having, you know, different colors. I feel for people who are colorblind.

SPEAKER_03 0:41

Oh my.

SPEAKER_00 0:42

It's a different way to go through life. Yeah. It's one of those things we take for granted. You know, it's it is the contrast. Lushness of the green, and I'm looking at the colors of all the flowers. And even the different colors of leaves. I think we we see an awful lot, but we don't acknowledge as much as we could.

SPEAKER_04 1:05

Yeah. Yeah.

The Gratitude Jar Reminder

SPEAKER_04 1:06

So our topic today is gratitude, gratitude, gratitude. And surprise. Yeah. Yeah. And it's sort of I had something funny happen this morning when I logged on to our community. The gratitude jar had jumped up to the top of the feed. And whenever a post jumps up to the top of the feed, it means somebody's posted on it. So I click on it and I look at the last member that posted, and it says that they posted 18 days ago. And I'm thinking, well, why is this at the top of the feed if uh, you know, if it was 18 days ago, I had missed their post post. So it was a good moment to read what they had wrote. And then I thought, well, while I'm here, I'm gonna post my own little gratitude. So I think it was sort of, I don't know, like a little pinch from the universe saying, don't forget, don't forget, and and to put in my own little gratitude. Funny things, eh? But it uh it just made me think, yeah, maybe today would be a good day to talk about gratitude.

SPEAKER_00 2:13

Yeah, any day is a good day to think about gratitude. I guess, you know, that would be my first point. My first point is no matter what's going on in your life, I think to be in the practice of being aware of what you're thinking. Just that that simple detachment, that simple step back, that simple observation technique. It's just such a powerful thing, right? It it serves to be an invitation, really. You know, when you step back and observe what's going through your mind, it's the reminder and invitation to say, I don't have to think about these things, right? I can think about whatever I want to think about, right? That's that's the power of the mind, right? That's using your mind instead of your mind using you, right? That's you using your mind to get through the world instead of the world using your mind to get you to do what it wants to do, right? It wants you to do certain things, mostly in our world. You know, we're meant to be part of very money-oriented consumption society, right? It's really hard, you know. I used to encourage people, I'd say, you know, pause for a second and think about how much of your life is spent either spending money or earning money. And now take all that part of your life and set it aside. And now what parts of your life can you expand that are not about spending money or earning money? And then you often find that those parts of your life are the truly joyful parts, right? And you can choose to spend your time that like thinking about those things and so well, thinking about those things will invite you to do those things, right? Remember remembering those things is the invitation and the opportunity to be engaged in those things.

SPEAKER_03 4:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:16

And so, you know, I my focus is always how can I use my mind in a way that serves me instead of my mind just running away and doing its thing.

SPEAKER_03 4:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:28

Right. And my mind will the instant I wake up. You know, it will pick up where I dropped it yesterday and it'll

Observe Your Thoughts And Choose

SPEAKER_00 4:35

take me right back to those things and those problems and those urgencies that aren't so urgent, those concerns that are really sometimes just totally out of your control, and your energy is being spent on something that really, you know, is not helpful. Your brain cycles are precious, you know, yeah, and they're yours, and your mind can be used truly to make you happier, to make you calmer, to make you more effective. And it's that observation, I think, that's the magic moment, that habit of observing.

SPEAKER_04 5:12

Yeah. Yeah, sort of like when we I'm sure everyone's had this where we go to bed with something on our mind that's pressing, and then we fall asleep, and then it's like waiting for us as soon as we wake up in the morning, and it's right there. And I think you know, I've I've made it a habit now of going to bed and immediately going into gratitude mode. It's only been a week, okay. But uh, but it just it it can become a habit that quickly. So, like I noticed last night, I I went to bed, I turned over fall to fall asleep, and then my mind was like, no, gratitude, gratitude, what are you doing? Okay. So then I laid there and I try to well, I don't try. I I I think of maybe five things that I'm grateful for, and I I try not to get other uh uh thoughts, niggly thoughts coming in while I'm doing the and then I imagine something that I'm you know manifesting or something, and then I I also say that to myself in gratitude as if it's already happened, which has been kind of fun. But yeah, so I do think again, it's only been a week of me doing this gratitude thing, and it's it is become a habit. Like when I hit the bed, that's the thought, right? My you know.

SPEAKER_00 6:38

No, I I that's I think the beauty and the magic of what we're trying to do and what we try to teach. You can, you know, uh I've said it a gazillion times. The mind is a habit. What you think are habits, how you think are habits, the same things over and over. It's just a habit. And that means that the mind can be shaped into habits, and that's a beautiful thing. So for about for a couple of years, I was trying to remember when I went to bed to ask for guidance in my dreams. Help me, in my dreams, higher self, help me to think of things. And then I started to receive things, I thought, you know, that my mind would give me, that my higher self would give me as a as guidance, as a reminder, as an outlook, as a sometimes a philosophy, sometimes insights. And then in the last 12 months or so, but mostly the last eight months, I've really gotten into the habit every morning. The first thing I think about is what did I learn in the night? What did I learn last night? And you know, sometimes I'm disappointed because I'm not great at remembering my dreams. And I'm not always, you know, uh able to keep my mind under control. But I still, even when my mind jumps out of control as soon as I wake up, I still come back to this new habit of what did I learn in the night? And then I got my little notebook here and I try to write it down. The mind can create habits for itself that serve you, no matter, no matter what you want from your mind, you can get in a practice of it. And the more you do it, the more you're going to do it, the more you're going to realize, geez, I'm doing this all the time now. And then you start to, I hope, feel empowered. The idea that although thoughts just come at, right? Like that's we all have that. We all just thoughts arising, constantly arising, just constantly reacting to the world around us, whatever we perceive, constantly coming back to us because of the life for that we're living and the conditions and the requirements and the demands. You know, we we have these thoughts that just come at us and they're just habitual. And to have those thoughts arise is not a threat. It's just a habit.

SPEAKER_03 9:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:09

And that's really normal. There's nothing wrong with me that I have thoughts just automatically arise. That's all the different parts of my mind doing their jobs. But what I can do is I can embrace creating my own habits. Yeah, okay, those thoughts came to me. Now I'm going to think about this. Yeah, all those thoughts came to me and got me distracted into this, but that's not pressing right now. I can now think about this. And yeah, like one of the most, if you're looking for peace and joy, if you're looking for focus and direction, that there is nothing more effective

Night Gratitude And Mind Habits

SPEAKER_00 9:50

than getting in the habit of thinking about what you're grateful of. And your mind will start to look for that habit. It won't take very long. You know, a couple of weeks. And your mind's going to say, Well, hey, what about what about this practice? What about thinking about that stuff? Remember, you've been doing that, and you'll those things will become stronger and stronger habits.

SPEAKER_04 10:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:12

The mind can be shaped. I think that's my big message today.

SPEAKER_04 10:15

Yeah, absolutely. I was thinking, and I think you may have answered this already, but why don't we normally experience gratitude? Like, why isn't it why why do we have to strive and to to bring it into our lives? I think you mentioned, you know, we're we're very programmed to view this this world a certain way, to get caught up in the busyness of it all, and to just become like I always I always think of a a chessboard and it's like somebody else moving us around. You know, we get we get bounced around and we get uh I also think of like a pinball machine, you know, we're just bouncing around at the whim of of society and the world. And I think to to stop it in its tracks and and to create a practice is really helpful.

SPEAKER_00 11:07

Yeah, we you know, I'm gonna go on my choice monologue. There's nothing, there's nothing more significant in your life than the choices that you make. And that habit steals choices, right? Habit is one of those things that really serves us because it keeps us focused. Unfortunately, it can keep us really focused on the negative, it can keep us focused on things that don't serve us. But the great thing is that habit can be shaped. And so you can turn these habits into things that do serve you, that do advance you. And if the habit that you can get into is observing the mind and then asking yourself, what do I want? What do I want? What is it that I want out of today? Right? Not what have I got to do today, or what's what's how do I get through today? Yeah, or how do I avoid things today? But you know, what do I want today? What would what would serve me today? What would take me towards my goals, my choices, my desires? Again, that can be a habit. That can become a habit. We don't think of gratitude, yeah, because of the program, because we're not we're programmed to have a lot of obligations as we see them. It's why we live such a heavy life sometimes, is because things that we do start to feel like obligations. They don't feel like choices, and we approach them as an obligation. Again, a mental habit, a thought pattern. So it's why don't we think of gratitude? I think gratitude is is the deliberate acknowledgement. And this is from my guides. I ask them, well, what's the core of gratitude? Like, how do I get my mind to gratitude? Right?

SPEAKER_04 12:54

Like how do I know when I'm there?

SPEAKER_00 12:56

Yeah, but what does it mean?

SPEAKER_04 12:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:58

What is the what is a true, pure thought of gratitude? And it's this is the way it is, and it could have been different. This is the way it is, and it could have been different. I'm looking at the sunshine today, and it could have rained. But here I am, I got sunshine, and I love that. You know, the flowers are in bloom, right? It's beautiful, and it could have been different. You know, I I woke up today in this beautiful place, no matter how badly I want to sell and move, right? I woke up in this beautiful place today, and the cardinal was sitting in the feeder, and the water is calm and filled with geese, and the flowers are just wide open. And it could have been different, right? So I appreciate what's around me now because it could have been different. You know, I woke up in a nice warm bed, and that's not, you know, some people don't. And so it could have been different. You know, gratitude is acknowledging the beauty of the moment, yeah, the beauty of the thing, the beauty of the person, the beauty of the the gift, the beauty of the opportunity. And it too can become a

What Gratitude Really Is

SPEAKER_00 14:10

habit. It can become a practice, even, right? You can get in the habit of a practice. Some people can say, I practice gratitude. I have a time of day every day when I'm grateful. I can get up in the morning and I can start with gratitude. It's not I have to go to work. It's, well, I got a job. And there's some really great people there. And I really do enjoy my morning cup of coffee. And I'm comfortable in my morning routine. I'm grateful for that. You know, I get to wake up with my head on a pillow. And that's just, you know, when I think about it, when I spend some time with it, I kind of love my pillow. Right?

SPEAKER_04 14:51

Yeah, that's why we take it. We place this. We take our pillows, place them. We're sleeping.

SPEAKER_00 14:56

The essence of gratitude is the acknowledgement that it could have been different. And the the thrust of gratitude is towards appreciation and acknowledgement. And the accumulation of gratitude, of things to be grateful for, fills you with an awareness of how good your life can be, and how much you could be thinking about that instead. And it opens the door to a positive expectation, and that's the power of creativity. Positive expectation. I have so much wonder in my life, so much beauty in my life, so much comfort in my life. I don't have to think about that which is not beautiful. I don't have to think about that which is not comfortable. I don't have to think about that. I'm in the habit of thinking about that. I've been told maybe that I should be thinking about that. That doesn't serve me. That's not, that's not feeding me, that's not carrying me forward, that's not making me my best. That's not helping me be my best. Right. So now I develop new habits and I get in the habit of, you know, being grateful for that one flower in that pot that's yellow. Well, everything else is red and purple and pink. And it just stands out and it catches my eye and it makes me feel like that's beautiful. And, you know, it could have been different. That pot could have been empty, you know. It could have been different. I might not have put a pot in my line of vision, you know. And it's just a habit that can become a practice that can quite dramatically change the feelings that you have and the expectations that you have from life. And that will change your approach to life.

SPEAKER_04 16:40

Yeah. And that was my next question. You know, how do we how do we feel it? For me, I know, like at night when I'm thinking about what I'm grateful for, which I hope starts to uh bleed into the daytime too, not just, oh, now's the time I need to, you know, not need, but like that I want to feel grateful for things. But I find that there's like a warmth in my in my body, there's a smile on my face when I'm thinking about, yeah, whatever I'm grateful for, lifting it off. I think there is a feeling, and it's not like joy or excitement. It's just this like, I don't know, uh like a hug, like a heart hug thing. I don't know how to explain it very well.

SPEAKER_00 17:28

A lifting.

SPEAKER_04 17:29

A lifting. Yeah, it does feel like you're lifting almost like you're floating a little bit, maybe. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:34

Now, as we speak, you know, I'm always reminded of the people that aren't that aren't feeling like it would be easy to just practice some gratitude right now. There's a whole bunch of stuff in our lives, yeah, and that is that is pressing, that is unpleasant, that is obligation, that has emotional content to it, fear or anger or resentment, you know. Yeah, sure, I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna be grateful, you know. I think there's an analysis that's really simple. Does this require my attention now? Now, not in 10 minutes, not by 8 a.m. Not, you know, tomorrow. Does this require my attention now? And I think that's a really powerful question because worry is putting your attention on something you can't do anything about now. Right? There's nothing I can do about that now.

SPEAKER_03 18:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:32

It's you know, it's 7:30 and I have to be at work at nine. Worrying about work at nine is not serving me now. Right now, what might be best serving me is getting myself in a place of calm and peace and confidence. And that will mean that when 9 a.m. hits, I'm at my best and I'm going to improve the quality of my experience because I brought myself to my best. Does that require my attention now? And if you can be in a moment where you say, Well, you know, really nothing requires my attention right now, well, then you could, and it's just, it seems so silly, but it is so powerful. I could just sort of take a sip of my coffee and appreciate the taste and the warmth and the comfort that that brings me.

SPEAKER_02 19:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:24

And I can allow myself to sit in that comfort for just a few moments. I I'm not talking about even 15 seconds. If I allow myself to sit in that comfort for two or three seconds, it impacts me. Do I need to be concerned about this now? Opens up a lot of time for us. A lot of time to just appreciate what's around us. I mean, you know, a simple example, you know, you make a point every week of buying birdseed. You put that effort in, and it's not done out of obligation. And then each couple of days you take the time to put the bird seed in the feeder. And here we are now watching a nuthatch sift through the seed. And there's nothing really to be concerned with right now, except appreciating that I've put in this effort. I've gone to work every day and I've been doing my thing, and I was able to get myself a mug that I really, really like, or somebody gave me this wonderful mug. I mean, I'm holding a mug that they gave me for doing a little talk to some students at Trent University.

SPEAKER_04 20:31

Oh my God, really.

SPEAKER_00 20:32

And every time I touch this mug, that reminds me of that. And I appreciate that opportunity to have had, you know, the chance to

Does This Need Attention Now

SPEAKER_00 20:40

positively affect people. And it's filled with coffee, and I like the coffee, and then that hatch is eating its seeds. And of all the things that I know I need to be concerned with today, none of them require my concern right now. And so now I just squeezed for myself a few seconds of pleasant, calm mind. And now I can take that one step further and be grateful for it. Just say, yeah, could have been different. This is pretty darn good. I do a good job of taking care of myself. I do a good job of building a nice life around me. I I know what I like, and I make sure that even the small things are there for me. I'm doing pretty good. Yeah. And I deserve that.

SPEAKER_03 21:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:24

I'm worthy of this comfort in this moment, right now. And these kinds of simple thoughts are potentially a new habit, which could happen every morning for 30 seconds to the point where I look forward to those 30 seconds.

SPEAKER_04 21:40

Yeah. Yeah. Gratitude doesn't have to take half an hour. It it's just little tiny tiny thoughts. We think about how there's correct me if I'm wrong, but like sixty sixty plus thousand sixty thousand plus thoughts running through our head every day. And just changing even 10 of those little thoughts to, oh, what am I grateful for? Or it's so nice that this is happening right now. You know, you don't even have to have the word gratitude in there or grateful. It's just a noticing in the present moment of what's around you or what brings you that that peace, you know, that that feeling of goodness.

SPEAKER_00 22:22

And if by chance those thoughts keep getting intruded upon, keep getting hijacked, keep getting pushed towards worry or concern, then instead of worrying, plan. All right, I'm gonna have to go to work today. And at 9 a.m., that rotten person that I call my boss is gonna be attacking me. So instead of worrying about what might happen, start planning. Well, how am I gonna prepare myself for that? You know, it's gonna cause a lot of emotion in me. Well, what should I be doing? What could I be doing to make my life better? Maybe in this moment that I'm sitting frustrated with my boss, I can just open up job opportunities on my phone. I can just dream for a few moments. Well, you know, for me, the the biggest question that uh I've been taught is well, what would what could make you feel better in this moment? What could improve your life? And examine that question honestly. Am I in the market for a new job? What could I do that I what I would want to do? Instead of worrying about, you know, letting the future concern of some bad situation uh dominate your thoughts, yeah, address it. I have choices, I don't have to continue doing what I'm doing. There is got to be a way through this to something better. And then worry becomes planning. And the more I think of the possibilities, the more possibilities there will be. That's a really neat concept. You know, if you every thought has a vibration, every thought has a meaning to you. And when you embrace the thoughts, they're gonna bring more thoughts just like it. So if you're going to say, Oh, that rotten boss is gonna be rotten to me again today, you're gonna dwell on that. Pretty soon you're gonna remember every time they've been rotten to you. And you're gonna start dwelling on every time you wanted to tell them off or react badly. And that energy, that vibration is gonna bring more and more thoughts just like that. And that is, you know, that that power of habit. So use the power of habit. And instead of dwelling on a thought that's gonna generate more thoughts of that negative, negative feeling, negative emotion, negative vibration, use that moment to come up with positive thoughts. Go after something. How could I make this different? How could this change? What

Turn Worry Into A Plan

SPEAKER_00 24:55

would I want? What do I want? What would make me happy? That's a really great question. What would give me confidence? What do I need to have the confidence to be a little more direct, a little more intentional, a little more assertive in my life to go after what I want? What could do that?

SPEAKER_04 25:16

Yeah, it brings me back to a few days ago. I saw a specific kind of car, and I really focused in on this car. I liked the look of the car. I thought, oh, you know, one day maybe I'll get that kind of car. And then suddenly, and I think we've all had this experience, but suddenly that car was everywhere. Like I was noticing it everywhere in this one jam-packed day of this car like showing up everywhere. They must have had a sale on them or something. But anyway, I think to your point, Les, when we focus in on something, we start to notice it everywhere. So if we're focusing in right as soon as we wake up on how the boss is going to treat us badly or whatever we're focusing in on, we are going to set ourselves in motion to notice that at every twist and turn of the workday. And, you know, and if it's if it comes with bad feelings, if it comes with anger or lots of different feelings, but if it comes with any of that, it's just going to be compounded over and over throughout the day. It doesn't surprise me that when we work with clients and they start changing their internal habits, they are much less susceptible to noticing the issues that they used to notice all the time and that used to get them riled up at work, at home, in society. Does that does that make sense?

SPEAKER_00 26:49

Does to me. No, it's, you know, to use that old tired phrase, it's science. It's been, you know, these these things have been proven over and over and over that human beings notice what they're looking for. And human beings are thought habit beings. That, you know, 80% of the thoughts you have in a day, and yeah, it's between 60,000 and 130,000, depending on the study. Of all those thoughts in the day, over 80% of them are thoughts you've had before. And over 90% of those thoughts that you've had before are negative. They're a negative interpretation. There are criticism and anger and frustration. They are habitual. And the beauty of the mind is that it's habitual. The problem with the mind is it's presently programmed to be negative. You can shift that. You know, protecting your mind, I think, is huge. To say, to observe your mind and say, this is mine, this is my space, you know, that's really kind of cool out of all the things in the world. Your mind is actually completely and totally under your control. And although things can come charging into it and grab your attention, although things might, you know, push their way in front of you and demand your attention, you can say no. No, I'm not going to think about that. No, I'm not going to give you my anger. No, I'm not going to let you wreck my day. No, I'm not going to give into this. And then having some really good habits and practices to resist that and take yourself to a different place, that's really learning to use your mind for your own benefit. And that's the stuff we're talking about.

SPEAKER_04 28:32

Yeah. I think even though we have our own thoughts, I think anything we consume becomes part of our 60,000 to 130,000. So if you think about scrolling or watching the news or watching, you know, these things become we might not think of them as our thoughts, and that's why we just watch it.

unknown 28:54

Right.

SPEAKER_04 28:55

But even others, even people around us, to think about the idea that we become like our five closest

Protect Your Mind From Inputs

SPEAKER_04 29:05

people in our life. We get consumed in other people's thoughts and they become habitually our thoughts. And if we're watching TV, whatever's being said on the TV, even though we might have critical thinking, I think it does sometimes wiggle its way into our mind.

SPEAKER_00 29:23

Yeah, we share thoughts and we we seek, you know, whenever I think about TV or scrolling or reading or movies, I always think of them as comfort. And what we're seeking there is the cessation of the negative thinking. When we go and stick our head in our phone, you know, which is really normal. And if we were to just observe ourselves while we're doing it, we notice that it's comforting. That's why we're doing it. We want to slow down, we want to stop our thinking, our habitual thinking, and we want to introduce something else into that habitual thinking because we just want to stop thinking about purpose. We just want to stop thinking about this problem that I have with somebody. We want to just stop thinking about money and our concerns about money. And it becomes very comforting to just give ourselves something else to think about. And so it's real normal that when you know cat videos make me smile, I'm gonna just go look for some cat videos. It's it's no different than drinking a coffee or or having a having a whiskey or all these things. These are things that we do because they shift our habitual mind into something different. So there's nothing wrong with us that we want to be comforted from the negative habitual thoughts. In fact, that's just genius. I found something to get me out of my negative habitual thoughts. The hope is that we can take something that is actually positive, that actually serves me, that actually gets me closer to what do I really want? What do I want from me? What do I want for the world? What do I want for the people I love? What do I want for today? If these kinds of thoughts can lead us away from the negative habitual thoughts, then we're being actively engaging positively the possibilities of our mind.

Tiny Gratitude Meditation And Close

SPEAKER_04 31:30

Yeah, yeah. And back to gratitude, I think wrote it down here today. I'd like to end this podcast with a tiny little gratitude meditation. It's a very tiny, you'll see how easy it is by how tiny it is. But yeah, do you have anything else to say before I no?

unknown 31:47

Okay.

SPEAKER_04 31:49

So yeah, let's let's go through it here. And it's it's really simple. And if you're in a place where it's safe to close your eyes, just go ahead and close your eyes.

SPEAKER_01 32:01

And just noticing your breath. Noticing what it's like to breathe in and breathe out. And now placing your hand on your heart center. And back to the breath. You don't have to count this, but just noticing the outbreath a little longer than the in breath. Just allowing it to be natural. Now taking a moment and thinking or allowing thoughts to come to you. What you're grateful for. And opening your eyes. And so what happened for you?

SPEAKER_00 34:16

Yeah, my my immediate response is better.

SPEAKER_04 34:20

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 34:21

And that's the that's the magic of it, right? The magic of it is geez, that feels better.

SPEAKER_03 34:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:26

That's that's good enough. If I can if I can raise how I feel two or three degrees, right? So that I'm a little less stressed and a little less concerned and a little less worried and a little less focused. If I can just get myself up, just like, oh, that feels better. That was worth the time.

SPEAKER_04 34:46

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So we end today with gratitude. We're grateful for you being here live with us, and we're grateful for our listeners who listen to us afterwards. And we hope you have a beautiful day. Thank you for hanging out, and we will see you later.