How many initiatives that make you happy did you start working on yesterday? I hope you started three… or at least one of them. It is such a liberating feeling. If you haven’t yet, stop thinking and start doing. Today, we move to talking about gratefulness and forgiveness.
Gratefulness is a very basic concept. From childhood, we are thought to say, “Thank You” when we get something. Or in the morning as part of our morning prayers we are thankful for a brand new day bringing fresh hope and anticipation of good things to come.
Yet, as we get older, and more jaded (yes?), gratefulness gets relegated to lip service. Nothing more. But, it can get worse. For some, we seem to complain and focus more on what’s lacking than what’s there.
I am not suggesting to turn a blind eye on what’s going wrong or what’s there for us to fix. Rather, to not miss out on and be grateful for those that are going well in our lives, for God’s gifts and blessings to us.
The more we know and appreciate what we have, the more confident we become.
Day 29 Challenge 1: Be Grateful
Today, we will be thankful. But like I said earlier, as adults, we seem to have lost our grateful spirit. We will get this back today and onwards.
For folks who would be doing this for the first time, they may have a hard time. If you realized from your day 2 analysis that your thought patterns gravitate more towards negativity, this is not going to be a walk in the park for you. That’s okay.
To help you, I’ll put in some structure. A guide just to help you get started.
For those who are used to gratefulness, pls write down 30 things you are thankful for. When you’re done, head on to the bottom of this article.
Give 3 (Or More) Things You Are Grateful For In Each Of The Following Areas Of Your Life:
- physical features, those that you like and serve you well
- traits, characteristics
- talents and strengths
- house and how it serves you, e.g. accessibility, house as home, etc.
- family and friends
- work or cause
- teammates, boss, colleagues, everyone or anyone you work with
- improvements in the past days
- God’s creations that you absolutely adore
- any other area or specific something you are grateful for
Can you believe that? In just a few minutes, you were able to express gratefulness for at least 30 things. How good did that make you feel? Imagine if you did that more often, like everyday? How much confidence would it bring you?
Done with gratefulness, now, moving on to forgiveness. Very fitting, too, that today is Holy Monday.
Day 29 Challenge 2: Forgive
I am not here to preach. But now, reflect upon things that are blocking you from feeling completely confident. Was it something from your childhood? From your soci0-economic background? Or from work experiences? Listen, most of us have dark sides or something we’ve done in the past that we regret. What you have to do now is to go back and think about all these. It may take more time. Just take your time.
Hopefully, you learned your lessons from these life experiences. Whether it happened on your volition or because of circumstances you’re not responsible for, I hope you learned what you had to.
Now, take a deep breath… and forgive yourself. And release everyone else from your anger or any other negative emotion you’re holding on.
Sounds easier said than done. Like I said, take your time. But do it. It is such a liberating feeling!
Gratefulness and forgiveness. Probably the heaviest challenge in the entire 30 days, but the most important, I would say.
I think I learned to be greatfull later. When young I paid more attention to the grievances, I think…I had so much fun also but couldn’t be as greatfull of it as I would be now. Surely the life lived has gradually changed views. Only now can I properly appreciate what I had then…
On the other hand when child EVERYTHING was pretty much easy. I couldn’t thank even then because I had no experience of anything else, so I took it for granted but it was the best time of my life!!!