Gratitude

"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 Beady

It's well established that it's not possible for our conscious mind to focus on two different things at the exact same time. The more we focus on things we're grateful for, the less we focus on other things.

It's also well established that when we focus on things we're grateful for, on those things that are good and right and beautiful in our lives, our mood lifts. When our mood lifts, our soul becomes more beautiful --- and that affects everything and everyone around us. In short, it affects our very experience of life itself.

Author Sarah Ban Breathnach encourages us to start a "Gratitude Journal" in which, each day, we record just a few things we're grateful for. Why? "Because you simply will not be the same person two months from now after consciously giving thanks each day for the abundance that exists in your life. And you have set in motion an ancient spiritual law; the more you have and are grateful for, the more you will be given," she says.

I know by experience, this exercise does, indeed, help shift my focus to the better things in my life. Give it a try. One thing is sure, it won't hurt.