Why expressing gratitude is our best bet at winning life?
When I was a little girl, my grandmother while oiling my hair, would often tell me why saying Thank you to everyone including kind strangers was extremely important. My childish impish attitude didn’t give much heed to her words. Though I never had those #hairgoals kind of cascading long hair, but I am forever thankful to my grandmother for being who she was in my life. She was a simple and straightforward woman, but she was stronger than most people I know. Due to family issues she was never able to study as much as she wanted to, but she always supported me for all my endeavours. When a news daily had to published my name for good performance in Board Exams, she was the happiest person to hear this news, and encouraged me to always educate myself and be self-dependant. It has been years since she has left for her heavenly abode, but her excited squeals of encouragement has never left my ears. Thank you Maa, for making me realise the importance of education, and making me love it a little more!
My mentor reiterated my grandmother’s words, of course, not while oiling my hair, but while helping me understand the depths of life, the people we encounter, and how we should have empathy, and even go beyond empathy to show compassion not just to others but to self as well. His kind words have helped me through a lot in life, and at times, I cannot believe my luck favoring me so well in life to be able to interact with him. Thank you for everything Sir, you make me want to be a better person everyday, along with helping me keep my calm.
At this point, Dear Readers, try to imagine everyone who made life a little better for you at some point, and thank them out loud. Merely saying this out loud, will make your day better, I promise.
So why exactly is saying Thank you so important? But above all, meaning that Thanks from the bottom of your heart the most important!
It has been observed and stated by many a successful people (successful in different aspects of life) that when one practices the Art of Gratitude, one not only realises how blessed one is, and the importance of the people in one’s life, but also, it fills our aura with positivity. When we are humble enough to admit that people around us, our friends, and family, make life easier for us, and how we are thankful for them being present in our lives, we appreciate them more. Whether we are able to tell them or not, but our behaviour towards them becomes more appreciative, and when we are able to show someone that they are important, it makes the bond stronger.
In his famous book ‘The Last Lecture’, Randy Pausch says, “Showing gratitude is one of the simplest yet most powerful things humans can do for each other.” He says how it not just opens up new opportunities for you, but also it tells people how much they mean to us. Humans survive not in competition with each other, but in complement with each other, and when someone shows how we mean to them, it is the most powerful form of encouragement.
It is rather ironical how one of the most powerful ways to keeping people around us costs us nothing more than truth; truth on how they make life good. The power that words carry are often undermined; People always remember how you make them feel, and when they feel appreciated, they will automatically do more. Whether it is about employee morale, household dynamics, or your inner circle, telling people how amazing they are, will automatically increase their dedication towards you.
Most importantly however, I feel practicing gratitude is personally benefiting because it physically puts in a wave of positivity. We fail to realise sometimes how incredibly blessed we are, and at a time of distress, we especially tend to focus on negatives (which is just basic human psychology). But when we take a bit of time to count our blessings: the people in our lives, our home, our occupation, our comfortable life, and so on, we realise that life isn't so bad afterall. We realise that we came so far in life basis our potential, our people, and a little good fortune, so the crisis at hand will also be dealt with like all other before it. We are able to appreciate and enjoy even the little things in life, which makes us aware of our potential, our strength and our ability to achieve anything we set our eyes to. It gives us hope, and peace and brings us joy that we never knew we had experienced.
If we aren't thankful for what we got, how would our goals make us any happier than we already are?
