Gratitude is associated with wellbeing and happiness. If you don’t believe me, there is an entire field in psychology dedicated just to positive psychology and look up Sonja Lyubomirsky, who is one of the pioneers in happiness research and may be check this one article. If you are like me with high intellectual curiosity (LOL) or simply love reading, there is a lot more work and research out there indicating a positive correlation between gratitude and well-being.  

Well, the point of me writing this is not simply to repeat what research and google are already yelling at you, but to share something that I have come to realize. I have been maintaining a gratitude journal for over a year at this point. Every morning (that is days I don’t feel out of control crazy) I would journal 4 things that I am thankful for. It can be anything from being thankful for no snow and having sunshine to something bigger that I am thankful for all my education and my job etc. When I am good and in a great mood already, I have plenty of energy and writing in the gratitude journal would feel amazing because I would be able to find more than 4 things to be thankful for everyday. The challenge though is journaling when I feel low and slightly more on the depressed side. During these times, writing in the gratitude journal becomes way harder. I have come to realize two things. Firstly, it is more important to journal your gratitude when you feel low than when you feel high. Secondly, just simply writing about things you are thankful for does not give you as much benefit as writing about things you are thankful for and truly feeling thankful for those things.

The first thing I said I think is quite obvious and common sense (or may be not). When you feel depressed or low, you need to count your blessings and be glad that even though you feel like you are losing your shit, but shit hasn’t hit the fan yet. This would help you get a perspective and feel better that life doesn’t suck as much as you think it does. Now I am not asking you to sugarcoat reality, but there is always some little thing you can be thankful for because in this giant world with 7 billion people, surely there would be atleast one person who is yearning for something you have.

Now the second thing, being grateful and meaning it – this is really important. There have been days when I have felt low and would just write in my gratitude journal just for the heck of it and feeling lame about writing on it because I would feel like my life sucks anyway I am not really thankful for any of the things I am writing about. Feeling truly grateful is easier (obviously only if you make the effort in the first place) when things are going well for you and when you are in a happy and positive mood. But the challenge and the true benefit is in doing this when you feel low and depressed. It takes a little extra effort to push your brain to truly open its eyes to something that you are thankful for. But trust me, this is worth the effort. We take most things in life for granted but it is when you are depressed that it is easy to take things even more for granted or to not even notice things in the first place. Be thankful for the simple pleasures in life, life is too short to be spent whining or complaining