#75: Gratitude, the Practice of Being "Blessed"

Blessed can be a sign that you hang on your wall, but isn't really thought of as much more than a decoration for others to see. But what would your life look like if you actually were putting that sign into action?

When you're trying to do all the things and stuck in "doing" mode, it can be real easy to begin to live in a trance of negativity or even blame because life feels so full and heavy.

An intentional gratitude practice can help.  Gratitude is not only the practice of identifying blessings, but also actively honoring them.


Grab the full show notes and resources at www.cairnyogawellness.com/podcast75 and subscribe and listen wherever you catch your podcasts: 

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Resources:
Daily Rhythms Tracker

Book:  Atlas of the Heart - Brene Brown

Counting My Little Blessings Blog


More Episodes Like This One:
#19: Cultivating Gratitude
#52: Intention-setting for Focus in Life, Energetic Rhythms Phase 1
#54: Taking Action and Letting It Go, Energetic Rhythms Phase 4

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Transcript

Cathy: 0:00

Blessed can be a sign that you hang on the wall, but isn't really thought of as more than just a decoration for others to see. But what would your life look like if you actually were putting that sign into action? Hey friends. Welcome to episode 75. Oh, my goodness. I am super pumped and excited that I am bringing you episode 75 today. I. Can't believe it actually. Well, I can. Um, but it's been a lot of episodes and it seems like since I relaunched the podcast back in August, that this time has gone so quickly and to get from episode 38, all the way to episode 75. Is, I can't believe how fast time has gone. It is blowing my mind. Um, so welcome and just a little bit of a celebration for that today. So thanks for being here. Thanks for continuing to listen and continuing to support the podcast. And I'm excited for. Um, what's to come with with my business and what's to come with this podcast. So. Uh, Keep sharing, keep listening. And sending this on to people who, you know, might also benefit from it. So today we are talking. All about. Gratitude and how. So often we see that blessed sign or shirt or whatever it may be wherever that that word is printed. And we don't necessarily always embody it. And the reason I wanted to bring this to attention or talk about gratitude today a little bit more is because gratitude is something that has been directly linked to your. Experience of joy in life. And so when we can express gratitudes, We begin to take action on that saying or that word of being blessed and we start to move into actually embodying it. I bring this up because it's easy to get wrapped up in life when everything is busy around you. When you're trying to do all the things you get stuck in that doing mode, and it can be really easy to begin to live in the trance of negativity or even blame because life might feel so heavy or full. Gratitude is one way to come out of that and to begin to shift your mindset away from that feeling of life, being full of heaviness and instead full of lightness or full of joy. And a way of softening your heart a little bit. Now I started a gratitude practice. Way back. I guess an intentional gratitude practice. I think it must have been around 2011. Um, shortly after my grandma died. My grandma on my dad's side always, always told us whenever we got off the phone with her, whenever we left her house. And she was my grandma that lived only a mile away from us. So we saw her all the time. We were at our house. Um, growing up before school or after school, we mowed her lawn. She was the one that, um, was really there and present. Because we lived so close to her. And it was beautiful. But she always told us and always reminded us whenever we set our goodbyes to count our blessings. We could come to her with, um, being down about something or frustrated about life. And she would always remind us to count our blessings. And so actually it was back then that I started this little, um, counting. I can't even remember what it's called now. Counting your little blessings blog. I think if I can locate it, I will link to it in the show notes. But it was all about beginning to do just that count my blessings. Um, and before I started the blog I, where I was going with this initially was that I actually started, um, a gratitude journal or a blessing journal where every day I would write down three things that I was grateful for or three blessings from the day. They didn't always have to be positive. They weren't always positive because it's sometimes in recognizing the challenges in life that we find them as blessings and they can change our hearts. And soften our hearts and turn our hearts towards joy and gratefulness. Really. So we begin to embody that blessed sign, that it seems everybody has everywhere and I'm not dissing on this. Okay. I don't think that I have a blessed sign anywhere in my presence or anywhere in my house or a shirt or anything. If you do. I'm not being negative on it. I am just extending the invitation to begin to, if you don't already, put that blessed word into action with this podcast. With this practice of gratitude. Now. I have created a beautiful tool to help you do this. Believe it or not. Right in the daily rhythms tracker that you can use to uncover your energetic rhythms, there is a section in there for jotting down your blessings from the day. Now, this daily rhythms tracker, as I've told you about before. Is not just about finding your rhythms, but it's also a little journal of sorts to be able to just kind of be more intentional about your life and to, um, To check in with some of those areas that we might sometimes begin to neglect because life does get busy and full. So the daily rhythms tracker, there's a link to it in the show notes for you. The other thing, as I was planning, this podcast that I came across or remembered is that I have a podcast from way back. The first time I launched the podcast. Um, episode 19, that is all about five ways to cultivate gratitude in your life. Sometimes we only think about gratitude in November, around Thanksgiving. But gratitude is a practice that. Is really beneficial year round. Because, as I said, a moment ago, Gratitude has been scientifically shown to directly correlate with increasing your joy. In life. It's a way of taking stock of what you appreciate in life. What you're thankful for. Without shame or guilt attached to it. Now I say that because. It may be that you were brought up. Or conditioned to Feel guilty about being grateful for something or having something that maybe others don't have. Well being grateful is not just about the things that you have in your life. But it is about something larger than that. It's about not only being grateful for what's in your life. But it's being grateful for what's all around you as well. And how everything is indeed interconnected. It's about being grateful for maybe a warm breeze or the sunshine. Or The simplicity of knowing that you got a message from someone today who was thinking about you and they expressed it. Um, by just sending you a hello in a message. It's. Can be those little things, as well as the big things in life and all of those things. Makeup your blessings. Right so that you truly can hang that blessed sign and feel like it actually means something. Sometimes we hang that the decorations and the things in our lives. Um, on the walls for others to see. But then we forget about them. And we forget to embody them and to truly walk the talk and live them out. And it's super easy to do that. When you're wrapped up in life, when you fall into the negativity spiral, or trance of negativity and blame. And. And so gratitude is a way to help you move out of that. It's about opening your heart. It's easy to get caught up in the busy-ness of the world and say that we're grateful for various opportunities or things in life, but because life can be so full and busy, it can be hard to actually make the time to cultivate a gratitude practice in your life. So you can hang this blessed sign in your house. But it does actually take work to embody that one little word. Blessed is often put in the same breath as being grateful. In a sense they do go together. But as you've heard me say, gratitude is not only the practice of identifying those blessings. But also of actively honoring them. And in order to do that reflection is necessary. Now reflection. When I think of that, it brings to mind your energetic rhythms, right? Because reflection is a key element of, knowing your energetic rhythms and, and of aligning with them. And our reflection comes in in phase four and phase one of your energetic rhythms or productivity cycle. It's the opportunity to pause and consider what there is to celebrate, which is what we do in phase four. And then in phase one, Which comes right after phase four. We reflect so that we can set intentions and begin to move forward. And if you're going all the time and not ever pausing or not ever being intentional about the way you approach life. Then you're likely not actually embodying those gratitudes or blessings within your soul. And therefore not actually honoring them. So when you can pause, reflect and take stock of what your gratitudes are. It spurs something in your spirit, in your soul. To begin to live in a way. That honors, those gratitudes in those blessings. Right so that you can indeed. Celebrate them. And that's phase four of the energetic rhythm cycle. So when we consider creating and living with a grateful heart, It means you're eliminating the shame, blame and trauma around not feeling worthy enough to be grateful for something or to be grateful for what you have or what you receive in this life. If you're someone who has been made to feel like this. Who has been made to feel bad about any good that comes into your life? Or been made to feel like you need to minimize things that happen in your life because it could be worse. Then, it might be hard. To express gratitude. It might be hard to sit down and write down three things that you're grateful for from the day. And that's just one way of expressing gratitude, or cultivating a gratitude practice. There's some others I'm going to touch on. Um, in a moment. Or you can go back to that episode 19 and check that out and see what I said about it in that episode, too. But I want you to know that. No matter who you are, no matter how you were brought up. No matter how you were conditioned. Gratitude is an important part of your life. And if it's not. You might realize that you don't have a lot of joy in your life either. You are indeed worthy enough. You are good enough. To feel grateful and to be grateful for what you have in your life. And for what you receive in your life and for what's around you. As I said at the beginning, it's not always about the things that you have. But perhaps it's about the relationships. Perhaps it's about. The small insights or wisdom. That come to you. So I want to invite you to think creatively on this. Because when you start a gratitude practice, whether it's a journal or something else, it's really an opportunity to reflect on all of those little things in your life. That maybe. You let go unnoticed, maybe it's that you're grateful for that blessed sign that's hanging on your wall, right. Or that you had the money. And the means to purchase that decor for your home. So it's, it's really can be deeper than just the surface level gratitudes that might initially come to mind. And that's what I want to encourage you to do today is to maybe look a little bit deeper at what your gratitudes are. When you're living with a grateful heart. You are accepting. And it's about acceptance because gratitude, nurtures trust and surrender to the natural flow of events in life. And by doing that. It softens your heart. It opens your heart. To see things a little bit differently. I've talked a little bit about my gratitude practice. One of my gratitude practices. Gratitude is a big thing actually in our home. And when I'm planning my week, whether it's at home or at the studio or for work, I consider all four phases of the energetic or them cycle or of the productivity cycle. And where the things that are on my to-do list fall into each of those categories. Well, the final category is celebrations and gratitudes. And so. At our house, we have a whiteboard hanging that has these four categories on them divided up. And the last one is the gratitudes or the celebrations. And so that's an opportunity for anybody throughout the week to write their gratitudes or what they're grateful for on the whiteboard. Sometimes the kids do their own. Sometimes we do it as a family, um, at a meal. But. It's an opportunity to begin to. Keep. That gratitude or that grateful lifestyle in front of you so that you are embodying it. Before we had the whiteboard all set up as it is now. We would just share at the dinner table what our gratitudes were. And this was a way that we could foster connection with our family as well. And we could get to hear just a little bit about the kids and it invites the potential for conversation. So. If you're going through life, feeling disconnected from your family members, feeling disconnected from the people in your life. Just simply asking the one question. Hey. What's one thing you're grateful for. What's one thing you're thankful for today. Or what's one thing that you really appreciate about today. That invites the opportunity for them to. Join the conversation for you to deepen your connection and your relationship with them. And invites them to pause with you. Because. Just moving through life at warp speed, which I have done before in my life. And I still go through phases where sometimes that's what happens and I have to pause and breathe. And step back and take stock. You might feel the same way. Well, remembering to pause for gratitude is a beautiful way to do just that. And it's a beautiful way to invite others into it too. When you ask them that simple question. Now. I've mentioned you could have a gratitude journal or blessings journal, which I keep mine. Um, and I refer back to it. Now I go in and out of phases of writing in it, but, um, it's just simply a journal where I number 1, 2, 3, which each of the blessings that I write down for the day, some days I do more than three, some days I do less than three, but. Pretty much. I average three a day, at least. Now the daily rhythms tracker has space to write at least three, if not more blessings in the margin of that journal. So. If you haven't gotten it yet. Check it out. It's one way that you can keep all of those things together. Okay. And then the final way to be really embodying and living out the blessed sign that might be hanging on your wall or to be embodying or living out gratitude. Is through yoga, meditation and contemplation. Now. We know that. Contemplation, obviously as a way of reflecting or thinking on one particular thing. But yoga and meditation. Also teaches you gratitude. Um, symbolically by allowing you the space to slow down and pause and reflect. And just naturally moving your body and being grateful for the ability that you have to move your body and breathe is one way that yoga can cultivate gratitude just by taking to your mat, which is a beautiful thing. And then. Physically on your mat, you can begin to cultivate gratitude by doing heart opening, postures, postures. That really, um, The focus on opening the chest. And opening this heart space in the center of your body. So. Yoga meditation and contemplation, definitely beautiful ways to enhance a gratitude practice. So my takeaway, I guess, for this episode, Is to just get you thinking a little bit deeper about. How you live out gratitude in your life all year round. Not just in the month that we are always thinking about gratitude, which is. November right Thanksgiving. I almost called the month Thanksgiving, but that's not the month. The month is November. My brain's a little foggy today, friends. Thank you for sticking with me on this. So, this is your invitation or your nudge to see what perhaps one week of being intentional about genuine gratitude in your life might do for you. Now I say genuine because. I'm not talking about just the, Hey, thanks for doing that for me. Or, Hey, thanks for coming in today. Thanks for reading this right. Those things that we throw around now sometimes. And hopefully, always those things are genuine, but I think in today's society, We leave a store, we leave a business and we say, thanks. And we don't really mean it. We're just saying it because it's a closing. And it's a, Hey, I need to finish this up and I need to close out the, the energy of me being here. So I'm going to say, thanks. But I wonder what it would look like if you intentionally really genuinely looked someone in the eye and said, thank you. For allowing me this space. For having this store. Thank you for, you know, whatever it may be. I truly appreciate you and said it and meant it with an open heart. And there's an energy behind things and that's, this is a different podcast episode, but there is an energy that comes when you are genuine and authentic in your communication and how you express the gratitude. So that's part of the invitation is to take just one week out of your life. And if it bleeds over into other weeks, beautiful, but just take one week to be intentional about genuine gratitude in your life and see what it might do for you. My guess is that it's going to slow you down a bit. And on those hard days, it might even prompt you to consider. The smallest of things in your life that you can give. Thanks for. That's all I've got for you today, friends. Again, thanks for being here for 75 episodes. I'm so stoked about that. You have been listening to health, harmony, and happiness with Cathy cheers to cultivating your own version of health, harmony and happiness in your life.