A Grateful Heart

"Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today and creates a vision for tomorrow."
-Melody Beattie


I was encouraged by someone in my life to start a "Gratitude Journal." I now know that it has the power to change the quality of my life beyond belief. I have a beautiful blank book and each night before I go to bed, I write down five things that I can be grateful about that day. Some days my list will be filled with amazing things, most days just simple joys.

Other days--rough ones--I might think that I don't have five things to be grateful for, so I'll write down my basics: my health, my husband and daughter, their health, my sweet dog, my home, my friends, and the comfortable bed that I'm about to get into, as well as the fact that the day's over. That's okay too. Gratitude is gratitude. Real life isn't always going to be perfect or go my way, but the recurring acknowledgment of what is working in my life can help me not only survive, but surmount my difficulties.

The gratitude journal is a tangible reminder of what God is doing in my life and how many positive elements of my life that I can see everyday. I want to find simple abundance in my life and a gratitude journal is the first step to that. Simplicity, order, harmony, beauty, and joy--all the other principles that can transform my life will not blossom and flourish without gratitude.

Why? Because I simply will not be the same person two months from now after consciously giving thanks each day for the abundance that exists in my life. And I have set in motion an ancient spiritual law; the more you have and are grateful for, the more will be given to you. I yearn to weave this principle into the fabric of my daily life.

So are you interested in starting a gratitude journal? Select the prettiest, most inviting blank book you can find for your gratitude journal. Make a pleasant outing for its selection. Note the fabric or design of the cover. The look and feel of the paper. Do you prefer ruled pages or blank? Perhaps you can find a book with a ribbon clasp. I found a dainty little blue paisley book that I have deemed my Gratitude Journal. It may sound silly to go through a ritual of finding "the book", but I believe that it is in the smallest details that the flavor of life is savored.

As the months pass and you fill your journal with blessings, an inner shift in your reality will occur. Soon you will be delighted to discover how content and hopeful you are feeling. As you focus on the abundance rather than on the lack in your life, you will be designing a wonderful new blueprint for the future. This sense of fulfillment is gratitude at work, transforming your dreams into reality.

A French proverb reminds me that "Gratitude is the heart's memory." Begin this day to explore and integrate this beautiful, life-affirming principle into your life, and the miracle you have been seeking will unfold to your wonder and amazement. How awesome is that, right?