At any opportunity you can take time to be grateful for all the learning you have had, regardless of whether there were more bad moments than good. Being grateful is vital to continue on the path. Here we tell you why.
It is important that cLet’s cultivate gratitude so we can focus our attention on those aspects that were positive during the year, or that are currently positive.
Gratitude is the feeling that forces us to estimate the benefit or favor that has been done to us, or that someone has wanted to do to us, and also drives us to action. Through it, we recognize the good things in life, whether tangible or intangible, it leads us to act accordingly, so being a grateful person is equivalent to feeling more satisfied with life.
It is important to understand that gratitude It does not consist of thinking that nothing bad is happening to us, invalidating or minimizing our emotional discomfort.but it is about being able to accept that if unpleasant things happen to us or if we live through a bad time, at the end of all, wonderful things are happening to us that deserve to be contemplated, recognized and valued.
Gratitude has the power to create a more positive and happy state of mind, since it is the most effective practice to stimulate feelings of happiness and when we feel this way, our central nervous system is affected, it literally changes the molecular structure of the brain and keeps gray matter functioning. Therefore, we are healthier, peaceful and resilient, and less reactive and resistant.
People who practice gratitude continuously report benefits associated with improved work and educational performance, and sleep habits; fewer health problems (helps lower blood pressure and have a stronger immune system), greater optimism, happiness and resilience, greater evocation of positive emotions, improved interpersonal relationships, a greater capacity for generosity and compassion , to feel less alone or isolated, and also to have lower anxiety and depression scales.
Likewise, people who write down daily what they are grateful for tend to feel fresher and more renewed every day when they wake up.
What is transformative about gratitude practices is that the process often changes our focus on ourselves and with respect to other people or our environment, and as a result, we often feel more connected to others, to nature, with experiences and even with the global community.
There are several ways to cultivate gratitude:
- Every morning when we get up we can take a few minutes to write the reasons why we are grateful for a new day of life (for example, for having our organs functioning, for having a roof, for having food, for drinking water, for not having diseases, for having a job, for having a family, for being able to see, hear or feel, for being able to walk, for having our hands, etc…).
- Write a thank you letter to someone from our past who has positively influenced our life.
- Praise people whom we do not usually praise (we must do it sincerely).
- Look out the window or go outside and find something to appreciate, such as the way the sun rises or sets, an architectural element of a building, and/or structures in nature.
- Tell someone every day who we love, something we appreciate about them.
- look in the mirror and think about something we have done well recently or that we like about ourselves.
Throughout life, it is important to cultivate the following aspects in ourselves:
- Gratitude: I already talked about her in the previous point. Is It is important that we be grateful for positive, pleasant and good things that happened to us during the year, day by day. To do this, a simple exercise is recommended, which consists Write 5 things for which you feel grateful, it can be at the beginning or end of the day.
- The acceptation: If something painful, frustrating or unpleasant has happened to us, we tend to get stuck in our own mind thinking about different scenarios in which things could have happened differently. However, We do not have the power to go back in time, and the only and healthiest alternative is to accept things as they happened, and understand that the past is already the past.
- Living in the present from a learning perspective: We learn about life as we live. In that sense, it is not necessary to mentally punish ourselves for the mistakes we made or the things we allowed or failed to do. From a learning perspective You reflect on what you have experienced, you are grateful for it, and you look for the things that you need to learn to be able to do better next time.
- Cultivate perspective taking: We must understand that all humans have a mind, and that implies that we have feelings, thoughts, desires and diverse ways of seeing the world as a product of our life experiences and all of this leads us to behave in one way or another. This invites us to try to enter the mental world of the people with whom we interact. (both those we like and those we don’t), and aspire to understand in a realistic and kind way what is happening, both in their lives and in their minds.instead of just interpreting and judging their behaviors in a superficial and malicious way.
- Cultivate compassion and self-compassion: Related to the previous point, it is important to have the motivation to take care of ourselves and others; show sensitivity, validation, understanding and respect for one’s own feelings and those of others; and feel the desire to help, alleviate, reduce, or eliminate one’s own suffering or that of another.
- Cultivate forgiveness: Forgiveness frees us from the past. If someone has hurt us, we can get stuck in our minds thinking and thinking about that bad moment, but we can also use acceptance, empathy, learning perspective, compassion and self-pity to understand that the other person who hurt us wounded is in its process of maturity, and that no one who is emotionally well hurts others, so we can let go of that bad moment and redefine it as an experience that gives us learning.
In addition, By forgiving ourselves for our past mistakes, we can free ourselves from pain, since we will be able to understand ourselves by identifying what we felt, thought and desired in those moments, and we will understand that we are simply learning to live and that falls are learning.
- Start working on ourselves: We must recognize that happiness is not in another person, but in ourselves, and therefore, The new year is an opportunity to build and cultivate ourselves by dedicating time to ourselves, stopping treating ourselves poorly in our minds, having hobbies, strengthening skills and knowledge, and working hard on our dreams. All these things are signs of love for ourselves, and allow us to improve our personal self-worth.
- Have mental health care practices: It is important to have contact in person or by call with family and friends, to find people to whom we can tell what we feel and who allow us to vent. It is ideal to hug someone in those moments of discomfort. It is also important to carry out sports or recreational activities personally, and with our family and friends, since our brain will produce neuro transmitters that regulate pain and generate well-being and happiness.
When we feel bad, it is not advisable to play sad music, since that will reinforce our unpleasant emotional state and keep the focus of attention on what causes us discomfort; It is better to play happy music or music that makes us move our bodies. Finally, it is recommended Start the habit of meditation based on mindfulness, as this technique is a very useful and effective mental training to regulate our thoughts and emotions.
How important is it to have a support network to talk, distract yourself, vent?
These strategies are part of a form of emotional regulation called EMOTIONAL CO REGULATIONThat is, regulating our emotions through the support, relief and comfort that other people can give us. We have done this since we were babies.
To do this, we must seek the support of our family and friends, since By having them and their comfort, our nervous system is regulated, the neuronal fibers that connect the prefrontal lobes with the amygdala are strengthened, our feeling of trust and security towards that or those people increases, and therefore, our emotional bond. it becomes safer (taking into account the foundations of Attachment Theory), and furthermore, By speaking it several times we can create catharsis, and thus our mind can organize and give meaning to our painful experiences, and integrate what happened into our memories, and overcome those bad experiences.