When it comes to personal development, gratefulness is nowadays largely encouraged: practices range from adding entries in an app, journaling daily and/ or starting and finishing the day with positive affirmation starting with "thank you for ...".
Studies proved that feeling grateful can improve sleep, immunity, reduce stress and depression.
With a bit of training, we can quickly start to see wonderful reasons to be grateful even on a difficult day, and it is often about the little thing - like a warm cup of coffee, a roof, clothes, etc.
But is it possible to be truly grateful for hard times, especially when things keep going worse and worse? Grateful for losing a job, for a breakup, a storm that took away a home, an illness, etc.?
When we go through difficulties, it is already so painful to know we are experiencing them that simply reflecting on them can seem too challenging. What comes first is pain, anger, sadness, and then sometimes a terrible permanent feeling of being powerless. "Thankful for losing my main source of income? the love of my life? my home?": that gratefulness practice doesn't sound inspiring.
As Epictetus said, some things are under our control, others not: we can choose our thoughts, our behaviours, how we shape the present moment, but we can't have control on other people, storms, a health diagnosis or the past.
Yes, those difficulties became a part of our lives often at our greatest despair.
But they also shaped us, through our adjustments, our trials/ errors to change the situations, our coping mechanisms, etc. We deserve to go beyond them, to own them.
Ask yourself: what did a specific difficulty revealed about your personality? What did you learned? Would you do things differently next time? Being able to reflect on a situation and appreciate its positive qualities is like admiring a view from a belvedere dominating everything.
When you find reasons to be grateful in (really) everything, you are looking at the global picture: you are not a victim anymore, you are the amazing person stepping back and reflecting on how you managed. You own the narrative and no negative emotions or thoughts can dominate you anymore.
Maybe you discovered your vulnerabilities, or how important it is for you to listen more to your intuition or feelings, maybe you discovered how you found new energy to move on when you thought you couldn’t handle anything anymore, maybe it helped you grow your empathy and understanding of others around you, etc.
Try and list 10 positive reasons to be grateful for a difficult experience or someone you didn't like and see how you feel… and don’t forget to be grateful for yourself and for doing it!
#confiself#innervoice#personaldevelopment#focusonthegood#confidence#mindful#grateful#selfempowerment#selfawareness
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