Unhinged Gratitude

Being grateful for the most mundane things can give you some peace of mind and literally rewire your brain. Consistent gratitude is something I did religiously when I was focused on getting myself out of anxiety and depression. 

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Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

There was a study done on gratitude that showed that increased and consistent gratitude led to a higher volume of gray matter in the prefrontal cortex, which means the more gratitude you have, the more space in your brain you have to make better decisions, to increase your focus and your learning, and to emotionally regulate yourself. So that's just one. That is just one example of several, several reasons why we need to focus on more gratitude. Consistent, unapologetic, unhinged gratitude will take you so far. So far. Something I did when I was working on getting myself out of addiction, out of anxiety, out of depression, all of the above. I forced myself to be grateful and to find little things to be grateful for, just to prime myself, prime my brain and my way of thinking at the beginning of the day, every day. And if you if you ever slip up and you forget, just remind yourself again. It takes no time. Um, it could be a mental acknowledgement, an internal dialogue that you have, or you could write it down and incorporate it into a daily journaling practice and just keep track of what you're grateful for. Little by little, you will start to see a difference in the way that you move, and the way that you think, and the way that you behave. It's all connected, it all comes together, and it works wonders for your mental health and actually your physical health. There was another study that was done that showed basically like the more you have a the more incorporated and consistent of a gratitude practice that you have, the more likely you are to do other things that are good for you in other areas of life, like going out and exercising, like working out on a regular basis and taking care of your physical health and your physical appearance. You are more likely to do that the more gratitude you have because you are priming yourself with positivity, and that carries out in other areas of your life. So practically what that looks like, just make a list of five things every day. This is something I would do years ago, I don't even know what year it was, maybe 2017, 16, 18, I don't know. It's all over, I don't know. When I was working on getting myself out of depression and anxiety, um, and you know, just reflecting and improving my thoughts and my habits and having this introspection that really made me just really force myself to sit down and figure out what the fuck my problems were, honestly. Um, so in somewhere in there, I started incorporating a daily regular gratitude practice in my journaling sessions. And so it could be like a brain dump and or maybe like prompts or something specific, whatever it was at the beginning, every time what I would do, I would write gratitude, underline it, and then list out multiple things, multiple things at a time, like 10 things that I could think of just right off the bat. And um, doing that at the beginning of the day really it makes a significant difference on your perspective and your mood. Um, and I think that's part of the reason why when I would be around people, outside of like other things that I would do, like physical health, um, you know, exercising, regular movement, meditation, all of those things combined, like in conjunction with that, adding the gratitude practice on it really made a difference. So, like when I'm around people, or back in the day when I was around people, I could be going through a whole bunch of shit. People would have no fucking clue because I would just be so positive and full of energy and just grateful. Just so grateful. So, unhinged gratitude looks like being grateful for the most mundane things and the most simple shit that people tend to take for granted. That is a part of the reason why I put that in my seven-day reset program, my seven-day sobriety reset program, a part of the daily non-negotiable habits, gratitude is in there because it literally changes your brain. It changes your brain, changes your mental health, the way you think, and then therefore your habits and your behaviors and the physical issues that you might be going through, like addiction. Umhing gratitude lists five things that you're grateful for every day, maybe five to ten things. And I think a lot of people overthink it when it comes to this. It's not something that has to be so monumentally complicated. It doesn't have to be complicated when you're trying to get out of your head and reshape the way you think and behave.

SPEAKER_01 5:40

Sometimes you just zoom out and just take a little bit of an inventory about what you got going on and how bad it really could be. It could be worse.

SPEAKER_02 5:53

Sometimes it's fucked up to think about other people's shitty situations and compare ourselves to that, but generally speaking, it could be worse. So think about what you're grateful for. Instead of focusing on the negative around you, you start to focus on the positive around you. That's going to prime your brain to see more positive things. It's going to prime you to think about more positive things, see more positive things, seek out more positive experiences, and so on and so forth. So having a daily gratitude practice is monumental when it comes to personal growth, transformation, healing, sobriety, addiction, well-being, wellness, all of the above. Okay? Holding space and gratitude for the little things can go such a long way. It won't feel like it's going to be a fix it. It's not like a fucking, it's not like a panacea, you know, it's not going to just be something that's going to fix all of your problems at once. But what it will do is start to reshape the way that you think, and it will slowly start to help you be in a better headspace. Some of the mundane things that we take for granted right off the bat, electricity that we have, access to Wi-Fi, access to clean drinking water, um, mental cognition, physical mobility. The fact that you can get up, get out of your house or your apartment, and go damn near anywhere you want to. Like you're not sitting in uh solitude, you're not trapped, held hostage, you're not in a coma, you can literally get up and go places. That's something to be grateful for. All the modern technology that we have. Plumbing, functional plumbing, our sewage systems. We don't have to worry about literal shit just filling up the streets. Like, think about it. Back in the day, okay? Back in the day, dang. People who were walking around, riding around on horses, having horse shit all over the street. Do we have to deal with that today in 2026? No, we don't. That's something to be grateful for. Write it down. Think about it. Grateful for deodorant and uh mouthwash and toothbrushes and toothpaste. Grateful for perfume, grateful for hair dye, grateful for cosmetics and beauty products, grateful for clothes that we have, grateful for the access to go buy the clothes that we want and that we need, grateful for the public transformation, uh public transportation that we have access to, grateful for the roads and the paving that are most of the time. I know potholes can be crazy, but for the most part, we don't have to worry about unpaved roads and uh unsafe roads. Grateful for construction teams, grateful for the taxes that pay for, that help pay for simple things that we need in our infrastructure, like construction workers, grateful for the fact that we don't have to worry about, you know, going out of the way to get the food that we want. We can go to the grocery store or the produce place and get the food. Most of us are not in a situation where we are forced to be a farmer solely for survival. Grateful for that. Grateful for the trees in our environment. Grateful for having at least one person that cares about us. I hope. And that is something to be grateful for. Grateful for the actual ability to learn and grow and change, grateful for neuroplasticity, grateful for evolution, okay? Grateful for access to all these resources and all this knowledge. We don't have to worry about um, you know, the fact that some people can't go to libraries and have access to the internet and learn and seek out knowledge the way that we, most of the people around us, we can. That's something to be grateful for. Okay. I'm just saying, grateful for teeth, grateful for a nice smile, grateful for a nice set of teeth. All right, grateful that you got all your fingers in your toes, nigga. Like, I mean, it the list really does go on. So when I say when I say unhinged gratitude, and I don't mean it in a toxic positivity type of way, where you don't acknowledge anything that's bad around you and you're forcing it. I don't mean that. I mean really taking a step back and thinking about how you have so much to be grateful for.

SPEAKER_01 11:17

And if you focus more on that every day, it will start to change your entire mood.

SPEAKER_02 11:27

It will. It's a gradual process. Sometimes it takes time, sometimes you gotta, you know, snap yourself out of rage and anxiety and depression and worry and fear and doubts and limiting beliefs and um negativity and spiraling. Sometimes you really gotta snap yourself back out of that and think about you know what, it could be worse. Shit, it could be worse. Like, I fucking hate this job, but I'm still grateful I get to go home at the end of the day. Like, nobody is forcing me to do this shit. It could be worse, you know. Like, I don't really like my living situation, but I'm grateful that this is only temporary, it could be worse. Unhinged gratitude, force it. Force it. Sometimes you've really gotta force it, and that is what I did. That is what I did when I was in the beginning stages of getting myself out of a really dark fucking place to be so fucking for real.

SPEAKER_01 12:32

Um I forced myself to be I forced myself to be un What what am I trying to say? God help me.

SPEAKER_02 12:47

I really forced myself to be intentionally grateful about all of the little things and all of the big things, and it's so easy to start listing it out when you take a look around your entire environment, you know. Like I'm grateful for the power lines and the electricity lines that we have going outside of the neighborhood. I'm grateful for fucking squirrels and birds and bees. I'm grateful for my seeing and my hearing ability. I'm grateful um, you know, for the sunsets and the sunrises. I'm grateful for the access to see those things. I'm grateful for a clear skyline where I don't have to see smoke and pollution from, you know, smog and bombing. Like, let's be so fucking for real, you know. I'm grateful that I have a towel to dry myself off with when I get out of the shower. That is unhinged gratitude, man. Sometimes I would I would go for a walk, right? I would have dark times and dark thoughts, and I would just go for a walk, and pardon me, you have to really accept the duality behind behind the shit that you're going through, the duality behind your circumstances. Like, this is really shitty, but on the bright side, man, this food is great. This is really shitty, but on the bright side, I'm so grateful I get to walk around on the sidewalk. Like, one time, y'all, this sounds so messed up. I was having such a just frantic energy behind what I was going through and what I was thinking about, and just so many fucked up thoughts, and just really pissed off and frustrated about a lot. I went for a walk and I saw somebody who had one leg.

SPEAKER_01 14:45

And I was like, you know what?

SPEAKER_00 14:53

I'ma shut the fuck up. I never mind, I'm good. I'm okay. I'm I'm okay. I'm gonna make it, I'm gonna be alright, I'm cool.

SPEAKER_02 15:09

Shit. Uh it really does change your perspective on a lot, actually. So when you're going through it, and if you want to just kind of like shift yourself into a better space mentally and physically, and literally it rewires your brain, um just be grateful. Just find gratitude in so many random things every day. Every day. Every day. Like I can think of examples back to back to back to back to back. Like the list goes on. So I just wanted to make a quick make it a quick episode and talk about that because I think a lot of us really do lose the plot, and a lot of us do get so caught up in this myopic perspective and way of being where we are just so focused and have this like tunnel vision on the shit that we're going through in our personal circumstances, and we don't take a step back, zoom out, and think about like you know what, I'm actually kind of doing okay, like it could be worse. I'm grateful for this and this and this and this and this and this and this. Oh my god, like shit. That's unhinged gratitude, y'all. That is unhinged gratitude, and you know, things do get better, and this too, this too, whatever the fuck this is, whoever's listening to this, whatever that thing is you going through, you're going to get through it. You can find the lessons in it, you can take the higher perspective from it, and you're gonna get through it, and this too shall pass. And remember, you can be motherfucking grateful even if you hate shit half the time, you can be grateful half the time. Okay, I'm just saying.

SPEAKER_01 16:59

I'm just saying. So, yeah, that's all I wanted to talk about today. Thank you for listening, and um, I'll I'll catch you on the next episode. Unhinged gratitude, okay.