Category Archives: academic search

Your Choice: Gratitude Zero, Gratitude Lite, or Gratitude Ultra

This is my 32nd post on gratitude, and we have learned so much. To the extent to which you want to practice gratitude, I invite you to consider the various pathways from which you may select your “state of gratitude”. I borrow labels for your choices from current soft drinks, political strategists, podcasts, and traditional print literatures.

Gratitude may be expressed at any point along a continuum. In my post “What Money Can’t Buy”, I discussed intentional acts from sporadically grateful to always grateful. Thus, imagine a horizontal line from left to right with little markings (like on a ruler) to indicate your “extent of gratitude”.

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Nature Gives Us Joy and Renews

This morning I woke to bright sunshine. It surprised me so early in the morning as typically the sun begins to shine around 10 a.m. As my morning routine began with a glance at my computer, I found something perfect for today!

Nature Deficit Disorder

What made this phrase so perfect is because I suspect that many of you in Texas, on the East coast, and Canada are experiencing this disorder just about this time of year (February) with the tough winter you have had. The dark, gloomy, cold, chilling winter has given you all a “nature deficit disorder”.

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What Money Can’t Buy

I like to think about gratitude as a “state of being”, but I am searching to learn how to keep myself in that “state” throughout the days and weeks. On tennessean.com I found an opinion piece by Bishop Joseph W. Walker III about gratitude. One particular point he made was:

Add up the things in your life that money cannot buy.

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Personality Traits Along the Road to Gratitude

I just watched the movie Nomadland (2020), about a woman living as a van-dwelling modern-day nomad, traveling through the American West after she loses everything in a recession. It was an interesting snapshot with persons I have met, especially during this pandemic. It seems that we are all managing our daily joys and problems, as best we can according to our personalities and temperaments.

I love water. I love the ocean, so when I came across an article on the Big Five personality traits from Wikipedia, known as the OCEAN model, I took a closer look. The model identifies five traits:

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Through Gratitude Expand

Last year I made a YouTube video titled “Through” on my YouTube Channel, Aspiring through healing to health and wellness, and learned the mighty power of one little word “THROUGH“. I had forgotten about that video until this morning when I came across an article titled, “9 Eye-Opening Ways to Expand Your Empathy and Gratitude” by Chris Holder. Hence, I am reminded of the power of words and when attached to images, change is amazingly possible. Through our words and images, especially on social media today, we motivate others to action.

Dr. Holder describes 9 actions we may each choose to keep us in a “State of Grace”. When I got to his number 4, I paused:

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Empathy and Gratitude – How?

Yesterday was a beautiful day, full of sunshine, so I went to the ocean. The sunset was lovely, families were on the beach, and all seemed well. When I returned home, I flipped on the TV and watched the terrible news about the freezing crisis in Texas, the power outages, the burst water pipes, and I felt awful watching those suffering families.

I wonder how can I feel two emotions, gratitude and empathy, in a matter of moments? Is it ok to feel blessed by the weather near my home while feeling horror watching the weather just a few States away? The suffering of the children in Texas is difficult to watch against the joy of the children on the beaches in California.

Najma Khorrami, in Psychology Today, described how empathy and gratitude are linked to each other through an explanation of neuroscience.

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Gratitude: Random or Purposeful?

People are so meaningful in our lives. It is interesting for me to listen to others’ impressions and expectations for these posts. Some of you love “the photos” in each post; others love “the written words”. You are building a community of “gratitude expressers”daily, and my sincere appreciation to each of you for your kindness. In response, my intention is to be a stimulus for our community. But, my questions for today, include:

Should we deliberately find an event, or act about which to express gratitude today? Or

Should we randomly go about the action of “everyday responsibilities” and wait to see if we see or feel gratitude?

Look at this bird, freely flying through the air. Do you think the bird flight is purposeful or random? Maybe the bird enjoys both. Maybe the bird doesn’t care where he is going; he is just hanging around.

My friend “Siri” tells us that to be purposeful is to be determined, intentional, or to have a useful resolve. She notes that random is made without “conscious decision”, unspecified, unfamiliar, having an equal chance to happen, unusual, unexpected, or unknown.

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What is Your Life’s Light?

As I examined the wooded setting of Airy the RV in the photo above, I found pleasure in the breaking of dawn through the trees, as well as in the lit underbelly of the coach. Both types of lighting touched my mind’s eye and I asked why? One light protected me near the the RV, while the other protected my early morning drive from deer leaping, or hikers walking.

One light is man-made and artificial; the other is God made and natural. Jill Harness noted on hunker.com that there are several differences between natural and artificial light, between firelight and candle light, and fluorescent bulbs, flashlights, or sunlight. There are a surprising number of differences between light sources found in nature versus electronic sources.

The intensity of light, the duration of light, and

the amount of light is only under your control with artificial lighting.

I made a note to myself to ask “Do I have control of my life’s light?”

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Gratitude Circles

It is happening, now… Gratitude Squared is multiplying… Oh Happy Day!

Friends, peers, colleagues, strangers, and family are talking about “Gratitude”. They are sharing their own stories about being grateful, and/or joyous about various experiences in their life.

There is “positivity in the air”!

As the author of these blogs, I am watching the radius of circles rolling out as these “posts” are thrown out into the world, similar to dropping a pebble into a pond and being mesmerized by the perfect circles formed after the entry of the stone, falling into the deep waters.

People need each other so often form various groups, for friendship, for play, for spiritual blessings…

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Airy’s Journey to Gratitude

Given the snow and ice across the country today, I thought I might select a contrasting photo for our discussion as, at least to me, this photo conveys peacefulness, calm, sunshine and beauty. But, remember the old adage, “You can’t tell a book by its cover”? This is Airy the Airstream, a new touring coach.

What you do NOT see in the photo are the zip ties holding the awning on so that it does not open out while driving on the freeways and injure someone, and you do NOT see all the duck tape on the side of the coach holding the panels and badging from flapping in the wind and maybe blowing off the frame to expose the metal chassis. You also would NEVER know that the radio was not properly connected so that there is no music to enhance the drive. The bed in the back does NOT go down but rather pulls the entire frame out and rips the mattress, and there is more that is wrong, currently with Airy.

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