10. An Attitude of Gratitude 'Live Up To You' Challenge
Gratitude Jar
The most reliable method according to researchers to increase happiness and life satisfaction is practicing gratitude. It has the added relationship benefit of making people feel valued and appreciated. The method I experimented with was keeping a gratitude jar. Each day the boys and I wrote down one thing in our day that we were grateful for and popped it in the jar. It could be a big thing or a little thing but each day it had to be something different. At the end of the 19 day challenge we read them outloud to each other. It was a pretty neat challenge and easy to do, but by the end we started to get a little bored with it as if felt like a bit of a chore. Keeping your gratitude practice fresh is important so it doesn’t become a token gesture. There are lots of other gratitude ideas to explore such as: making an appreciation wall (appreciation station), writing down three good things from the day, writing a letter to someone who has helped you. I’m a big fan of a good old fashioned ‘thank you’ after someone has helped you. Gratitude helps us see and notice the good things in our lives. Here is a link to a GRATITUDE QUIZ you can take. It is from the Greater Good Science Website which is my all time favourite website for wellbeing.
“It is an affirmation of goodness. We affirm that there are good things in the world, gifts and benefits we have received. We recognise the source of goodness is outside of ourselves.”