Every morning, with the sunrise as my witness, I sit with my gratitude journal, pouring my thankfulness onto the pages. It's a practice that's reshaped my world, especially as someone navigating life with Parkinson's. Join me in exploring the transformative power of gratitude, where we look beyond the simple 'thank you' and embrace a deeper appreciation for the blessings in our lives. With heartfelt stories and scientific insight, we dive into how gratitude can increase happiness, bolster resilience, and even improve mobility for those of us with Parkinson's. This episode is a tapestry of personal reflections and scientific findings, all pointing to the incredible influence gratitude has on our well-being.
This journey through gratitude also brings us the inspiring story of a woman who found success and adaptability after moving to Poland, showcasing gratitude in action. Studies lend credibility to our conversation, revealing the nuanced effects of gratitude and self-efficacy on health-related quality of life, with intriguing differences between genders. As we unpack these findings, we're reminded of the potency of long-term gratitude practices. So, allow me to challenge you: weave gratitude into the fabric of your daily life. Whether it's through journaling or mindfulness, this episode invites you to elevate your happiness and cherish your journey, one grateful moment at a time.
Living with Parkinson's doesn't mean giving up on a great life. In this episode of Live Parkinson's - Live and Exceptional Life, we explore the surprising power of gratitude! We'll delve into the difference between gratitude and thankfulness, and how cultivating an attitude of appreciation can transform your experience with Parkinson's.
Discover the science-backed benefits of gratitude:
Boosted happiness and well-being
Reduced stress and anxiety
Improved sleep and physical health
Stronger relationships and a more positive outlook
Learn practical tips on how to cultivate gratitude in your daily life, even with Parkinson's challenges.
Join us for an episode that will empower you to live a more grateful and fulfilling life with Parkinson's!
Disclaimer: This podcast is for educational purposes only is not intended to treat or diagnose Parkinson's Disease. Please ensure that you are following the treatment plan developed by your doctor. Please ensure before starting anything new you get approval from your doctor. The information being provided is based on my own personal experiences and does not guarantee that it will benefit everyone.
Every morning, with the sunrise as my witness, I sit with my gratitude journal, pouring my thankfulness onto the pages. It's a practice that's reshaped my world, especially as someone navigating life with Parkinson's. Join me in exploring the transformative power of gratitude, where we look beyond the simple 'thank you' and embrace a deeper appreciation for the blessings in our lives. With heartfelt stories and scientific insight, we dive into how gratitude can increase happiness, bolster resilience, and even improve mobility for those of us with Parkinson's. This episode is a tapestry of personal reflections and scientific findings, all pointing to the incredible influence gratitude has on our well-being.
This journey through gratitude also brings us the inspiring story of a woman who found success and adaptability after moving to Poland, showcasing gratitude in action. Studies lend credibility to our conversation, revealing the nuanced effects of gratitude and self-efficacy on health-related quality of life, with intriguing differences between genders. As we unpack these findings, we're reminded of the potency of long-term gratitude practices. So, allow me to challenge you: weave gratitude into the fabric of your daily life. Whether it's through journaling or mindfulness, this episode invites you to elevate your happiness and cherish your journey, one grateful moment at a time.
Living with Parkinson's doesn't mean giving up on a great life. In this episode of Live Parkinson's - Live and Exceptional Life, we explore the surprising power of gratitude! We'll delve into the difference between gratitude and thankfulness, and how cultivating an attitude of appreciation can transform your experience with Parkinson's.
Discover the science-backed benefits of gratitude:
Boosted happiness and well-being
Reduced stress and anxiety
Improved sleep and physical health
Stronger relationships and a more positive outlook
Learn practical tips on how to cultivate gratitude in your daily life, even with Parkinson's challenges.
Join us for an episode that will empower you to live a more grateful and fulfilling life with Parkinson's!
Disclaimer: This podcast is for educational purposes only is not intended to treat or diagnose Parkinson's Disease. Please ensure that you are following the treatment plan developed by your doctor. Please ensure before starting anything new you get approval from your doctor. The information being provided is based on my own personal experiences and does not guarantee that it will benefit everyone.
Hello and welcome to Live Parkinson's Live an Exceptional Life. I'm your host, chris Custombatter, and I've been living an exceptional life with Parkinson's for the past 14 years. The mission of this podcast is to help as many people as possible living with Parkinson's lead a great quality of life. Now, today's topic is one that's really near and dear to my heart lately, and that's gratitude and thankfulness. Have you ever felt like you're constantly chasing happiness, like the next promotion or vacation will finally make you content? Well, what if happiness wasn't a destination, but a journey fueled by appreciation? Studies show that practicing gratitude can actually boost your happiness, reduce stress and even improve your physical health. So buckle up, because on today's episode, we're unlocking the secrets of a grateful heart. One of the reasons I wanted to talk to you today about gratitude and thankfulness and what the differences are between the two is I like to start out every day with a gratitude journal and I write down three things that I'm grateful for, and the reason I do this is because it helps me start the day off on a positive note, because it helps me to step back and appreciate the things that I have in life and the beauty that's all around me in nature and the outdoors, because it's easy to get bogged down in the daily stress of paying bills and thinking about your symptoms and other things. So being grateful allows you to step back and look at the big picture and take a step forward on a positive note during the day. So we're going to talk about gratefulness, gratitude and thankfulness. So let's start out with what is gratitude. So let's break it down. Gratitude isn't just saying thank you. It's a deeper feeling of appreciation for the good things in our lives, whether they be big or small. It's recognizing that those things add value and enrich our experience. So, for instance, I'll give you an example Three weeks ago I became a grandparent for the first time. My son Derek and daughter LaMalle had their first child, bonnie, and I can express the gratitude that I have to be able to go and hold her and see her and just be in awe of new life and how she looks is starting to explore the world. So that, to me, is gratitude. It's a deep feeling of appreciation for the good things that I have in life. So I was. I'm also able to go visit my daughter, emily, in Philadelphia at the same time when I'm visiting with Bonnie, derek and Mali. So it's that gratitude in my heart that I'm able to appreciate the ability to do that After 14 years with Parkinson's. A lot of times we think, oh, you're not going to be very mobile. But I'm grateful that, with the proper medications, treatment plan from my doctor, exercise, nutrition, positivity and staying socially active, it's helped me be able to do the things that I want to do and I'm able to go visit Bonnie, or she's able to come to where I live and visit me.
Speaker 1:
Now, how's that compared to thankfulness? How's this thankfulness? This is the outward expression of gratitude. It's the thank you we say when we get, when someone gives us a gift, or the act of kindness we show in response to something we appreciate. So, for instance, I'm very thankful for every Person that listens to this podcast. It just touches my heart and I can't thank people enough. So it's an outward expression of gratitude and what I'm trying to do is express how I feel about the act of kindness that you all show and and tuning into this podcast. Or it's when someone gives you a Gift, because maybe you want, went above and beyond it, it's something unexpected for them and they give you a gift. You're very thankful for that. You show thanks by saying, writing them a thank you note and Recognizing that they really appreciated what you've done for them.
Speaker 1:
Now that we know what gratefulness and thankfulness are, let's look at the science behind gratitude. Did you know that gratitude has a biological basis? When we feel grateful, our brains release dopamine. Hmm, sounds familiar. We've heard a dopamine before, haven't we, especially those of us that are living with Parkinson's. And Dopamine is both a feel-good chemical and it helps reinforce positive behaviors, helps us reinforce pleasurable activities, but it also helps us with our movement. So it it does two things in terms of Parkinson's is going to help us with our mobility, but also Dopamine is involved in the Pleasure Center. So like when somebody goes to a casino and they're playing the slot machines and they pull the lever and all of a sudden it goes ding, ding, ding, ding. They're gonna all of a sudden go wow, and there's all this dopamine release and they're gonna be excited.
Speaker 1:
One of the problems that we have today is that especially teenagers become addicted to cell phones because Every time they hear the ding of a text message or the ding of a notification from Facebook or Instagram, they immediately have to go and check the message, and so what that does is it reinforces that Every time you hear a ding, dope, shot of dopamine is released Makes them feel good and they have to go and check. They have to be very careful in terms of especially with people young people when they're getting that quick shot of dopamine. It's easy to become addicted to that because it's a feel-good chemical and then when you release that dopamine, it can lead to increased happiness, optimism and resilience. So what are some of the benefits of gratitude? Well, increased happiness and well-being. When you're grateful, you take a step back and you appreciate and you're happy and you you feel good about yourself because you're really looking at all the positive things in your life.
Speaker 1:
A second thing it does is it helps to reduce stress and anxiety, because if you're Grateful for things, it helps to focus on the things that are positive and less on the things that are negative, and that's going to help you reduce your stress and anxiety. Because typically, when you have anxiety and I've struggled with anxiety in the past in my life, so I can speak from the heart about it but when you getting to anxious moments, what you tend to do is you tend to fuel the fire by Continuing to build negative thoughts, so you may start to feel anxious about something. And then you start doing the what if? Well, what if this happens? What if I can't breathe? What if I have to get out of here? What if I have to do this? And then your body starts to release Adrenaline and that's the fight or flight Response and you start looking around and your heart starts beating faster, your breathing becomes shallow, your palms become sweaty and you have to get out of there. So you, when you focus on things that you're grateful for, you're actually looking at things from a positive manner and you're pushing those negative thoughts out, so it's going to help you reduce your stress and anxiety.
Speaker 1:
Being grateful also builds stronger relationships. When you can look at your friend, your spouse, your partner, whoever it happens to be, and you can look at them and say I really am grateful for all the things that you do for me, or I'm grateful for the time we get to spend together. I'm grateful for the children we have, whatever it happens to be, you're going to build stronger relationships and stronger bonds with those people. And it could be a co-worker as well. Maybe you work as a part of a team and you're grateful for the work that they do and they're grateful for the work that you do, and it helps to build stronger working relationships as well.
Speaker 1:
And then gratitude helps improve your sleep. Whenever you're grateful, you just have a positive feelings and you have that overall sense of well-being. It makes it easier to sleep because you're not going to bed with a lot of racing thoughts, negative thoughts, that are going to keep you awake. So being grateful is really going to be able to help you improve your sleep. And then, finally, it's going to help with your physical health as well. When you're grateful, a lot of times you get up and you're ready and you have a lot more energy because you're looking at things in a positive manner and you want to get out there and exercise because you know it's good for both your Parkinson's symptoms and it's going to help you with your mobility and flexibility and your balance. So it's going to be grateful and the gratitude is also going to help with your physical, physical, overall health. So how do we cultivate gratitude?
Speaker 1:
Well, there's a number of different ways that you can do. You can accomplish this. One is gratitude journaling, and this is usually what I do in the early morning hours when I first wake up. Is I do gratitude journaling or I have a gratitude journal and what I do is I write down three things that I'm grateful for each day, and that's going to start the day off, like I said, on a great foot, and I'm going to start looking at things from the positive aspect rather than the negative aspect. Another thing you can do is what they call the gratitude jar, and with the gratitude jar, what you do is you write down things that you're grateful for on slips of paper and then you pull one out whenever you need to pick me up. So maybe you had a rough day and you go over to your gratitude jar and you pull out one of the pieces of paper and you read it and you say, wow, I didn't, I didn't realize, I was grateful for that. So that's a great way. When you're having an off day or you're having a bad day or your motor symptoms or giving you problems, do go over to the gratitude jar and get a quick pick me up. Another thing you can do is practice mindfulness.
Speaker 1:
You can take time each day to appreciate the simple things in life, and that is spending time with your friends, spending time with your family, doing your, the hobbies that you love to do, maybe you have animals. We actually have two rescue boxer dogs and one of the things I can say about the boxer dogs and just dogs in general but I've had boxer dogs all my life and we rescue them. We've been rescuing them for the past 18 years and these are often dogs that are come from horrible conditions whether it be puppy males, where they're beaten and just not fed and not treated very well and then they come into your house and you show them love and all of a sudden, within a few months, you start to see a change in them. But one of the things that I'm grateful for with my dogs is they're always happy to see you. You could be having what you consider the worst day, and when you walk in the door and their little stumps are wagon and they're racing around and they're just so excited to see you and they want to spend time with you. It just makes you grateful that they're a part of your life and that they're there to help you see things in a positive light, so that they actually show the ultimate love, because they love you and they're happy to see you, but they don't expect anything in return and by having the boxer dogs. It's really enhanced my life and made me more grateful for to be able to help these poor souls that have been treated poorly and then give them a great quality of life. And they may have started out life in a bad way and not have been treated very well, and it makes me feel good that the remaining part of their life they have. They get their treats, they go for walks, they'll sleep in the bed with us or they'll jump up on the couch and you pat them, you get them belly rubs, all those things, and then you see how, where they were and then how they're living life now and it's you just have to be grateful and appreciate the things that they do for you and then, finally, you can express gratitude to others.
Speaker 1:
Thank the people who make your life better. I mean, one of the things I always like to do is I will always hold the door for people. I always say good morning or good afternoon, good evening, how are you today? Because when you acknowledge people and you ask them how their day is, a lot of times it breaks them out of what they were the negative thoughts they might have been thinking. They turn around and say, oh, someone's actually interested in how I'm doing today, that's great. And then so you actually change. You can change someone's whole mindset. So a lot of times, people do things and they don't feel appreciated, and there's nothing better than to walk up and say you know what I really appreciate all these things that you do for me or you've made my life better because of this, and that can change someone's whole outlook and whole way of how they look at life. Now let's look at gratitude beyond the good times. Now we can still practice gratitude even when things are tough. It's easy to focus on what we have, not what we lack, and we can build resilience. Now.
Speaker 1:
This week I challenged you to choose one gratitude practice that we just talked about and incorporate it into your daily routine, and then I'd love for you to be able to let me know how this change in perspective changed your outlook. So if you have a success story based on how you started gratitude journal and next thing, you know you were able to do these things because of the way you changed your outlook on life, I'd love to hear about that. So I'd love to hear some success stories that you have and you're a share with those with me. I would really appreciate it. Now I'll give you a couple of things that I'm grateful for. I just mentioned that recently I became a grandparent for the first time and I'm just excited to be able to say wow, look at Bonnie, she is the most beautiful thing that I've seen, and her facial expressions, the way she moves her hands and just the way she takes in the world is just to me. It's just incredible and it just makes your heart feel good to see that your children are able to have their own kids and watch them grow as well. And then I look at my daughter, emily, and I'm very thankful for the life she's lived.
Speaker 1:
She's actually lived in a foreign country. She lived in Poland for four years. She knew no Polish at all when she went there. She taught kindergarten and first grade kids to speak English as their second language and did a great job. And then she moved on to working in a corporate environment in Poland and then eventually, after four years, she decided she wanted to return to the United States, and recently she moved to Philadelphia, where her friends are, and she secured a job at a large law firm, knowing being the marketing manager, and she's excelling at that and she's doing a great job and it's great to see her excel and use the talents and skills that she has as well, and that makes my heart grateful to see that as well.
Speaker 1:
That is being grateful. Now, in terms of being thankful, thankful is when you say to somebody hey, I want to thank you for what you've done for me. So a lot of times, being thankful is short term. Gratitude can be more long term. As a way to look at it, you think, wow, is gratitude really as important as you say it is? Is it really going to have that big an effect on my life? Well, I'm glad you asked that question because there are a number of studies out there that looked at Parkinson's and gratitude.
Speaker 1:
The first one is gratitude, self-efficacy and health related quality life in individuals with Parkinson's disease, and the aim of this cross-sectional study was to examine the relationship among gratitude, self-efficacy. So this is people that talked about gratitude amongst themselves and health related quality of life questions by gender and individuals with Parkinson's. So what they essentially did is they brought people in and they're going to ask them to self assess themselves on how grateful they are, and then they're also going to fill out a health related quality of life questionnaire. So there were 102 individuals with Parkinson's that started. There were 55 women and 42 men. You're saying, well, that doesn't add up to 102. Well, five people didn't report a gender. And then they completed questionnaires on gratitude, self-efficacy and the health related quality of life problems. And although there were no gender differences between gratitude so no differences between men and women self-efficacy or health related quality of life problems, there were key gender differences in how those variables were related. Gratitude was associated with more health related quality of life problems for women than men, so women tended to look at more of the problems that were health related, that were going to have an effect on their quality of life, than men were, and self-efficacy was associated with more quality of life issue problems for men than women. And then self-efficacy this is how they saw themselves emerged as a more important predictor of problems for women and men than the gratitude. So the research could lead to targeted interventions by gender aimed at improving the quality of life in individuals with PD, particularly building self-efficacy, and that's how people view each other.
Speaker 1:
There was another study, the effects of gratitude on health related quality of life in Parkinson's disease, and that research has consistently shown that individuals who take the time to focus on things for which they are grateful or likely to have increased well-being. However, individuals who have been diagnosed with a chronic health condition, such as PD, may not be as likely to experience gratitude. What they found was is that people that were diagnosed with chronic diseases like Parkinson's may not be able to show gratitude the way other groups do that. So it's important that you take a step back in terms of gratitude and thankfulness and realize that gratitude is more long-term and the way I look at it in thankfulness is short-term. You can thank somebody for doing a good job or thank somebody for something they did for you, and that's kind of like a one-off experience. Again, like I said, I'm thankful for the people that have listened to this podcast, which is short-term, but I'm also grateful for all the people that continue to tune in, because it's just to me, it's overwhelming and I just have a sense of gratitude that people are continuing to listen to the topics that can help improve their quality of life and hopefully share with others as well. There you have it.
Speaker 1:
Gratitude is a powerful tool for a happier, healthier you. As we close out again, what I'd like you to do is of the three or four things that we talked about gratitude journaling, the gratitude jar and the expression gratitude to others and being thankful and mindfulness is another one that we talked about as well. What are one to two things that you can focus on today to help you become more grateful and appreciate the things that you have in life, because there's a lot of things out there that on a daily basis, that a lot of times we overlook, but if you actually take the time to step back and look at them and be grateful for them, it's gonna really change your mindset in terms of how you approach life. So what I would challenge you to do is to pick two or three of those things and see how that has a positive impact on your life. Now, gratitude goes beyond the good times, which we already talked about, and so, as we close out, I'd appreciate if you would go to fanlistcom slash exceptionallife and that's fanlistcom slash exceptionallife and I would love to hear from you with your success stories or any topics that you would like to hear that are gonna help improve your quality of life, because, ultimately, the goal of this podcast is to help as many people with Parkinson's of a great quality of life as possible, and I wanna be able to target the podcast so that they're pertinent to you on a daily basis and help you live a great quality of life. So if you'd be kind enough to go on to fanlistcom, slash exceptionallife and join the chat room, share your success stories, I'd love to build a great quality community as well. Now I also wanna talk about a.
Speaker 1:
Before we close out, I wanted to share an exciting offer from audiblecom. Who the listeners of this podcast? Now, if you're not familiar with audiblecom, they're your one stop shop for everything audio. They've got thousands of titles of audio books and podcasts that you can choose from, as well as audible originals from celebrities and experts in their field that you can take advantage of as well. Now they're offering listeners of this program a free audio book if you sign up for their free 30 day trial of audiblecom. Two of the books that I recommend that I've read and personally recommend that are on audiblecom are no Time Like the Future. An Optimus considers mortality by Michael J Fox, and Parkinson's treatment 10 Secrets to a Happier Life by Dr Michael Oaken.
Speaker 1:
Now, if you decide not to sign up for the membership to audiblecom, you still get to keep the free audiobook.
Speaker 1:
Now, if you decide to sign up for the free 30-day trial and the free audiobook, I do want to be transparent and because I believe in personal integrity, that if you sign up for the free 30-day trial and the free audiobook, audible pays me a small commission which I use to support this podcast and my website.
Speaker 1:
If you decide to sign up for the free 30-day trial, then I thank you for supporting this podcast, but you're under no obligation to purchase anything. So I thank you for listening and, as we close out this podcast, I want to request that you will visit my YouTube channel, liv Parkinson's live an exceptional life from Earth to Triumph and subscribe. If you like the videos, click on like. And also, if you need additional information about Parkinson's, visit my website, livparkinson'scom, and sign up for the free monthly newsletter. Again, I thank you for listening and I really appreciate you being part of the audience and again, I'm grateful for all the things that you do as listeners and I hope to see you on future podcasts. And as I close out, I want to just say have a spectacular day and thanks again for being a listener.