I feel like gratitude is missing from our day-to-day. Similar to how common sense is not so common anymore [this will need to be an entirely new post]. Don’t get me wrong – I’m just as guilty as the next person. We get so caught up in what’s wrong that we fail to see what’s right. Or we are just too busy and on the go all the time. We forget to show thanks and return favors. I’ve decided that I want to make gratitude more important in my life. It’s about good juju. My family and I have been blessed so, so many ways that it’s hard to not want to show appreciation, to return that kindness, to show it to someone else, to continue the flow of good karma.

Naturally – I turned to the Googler for advice. I found that there are all kinds of awesome  tools to help! I like that idea of journalling my gratitude. I’ve been journaling for as long as I can remember so I feel like this is just in my nature. I like the old school pen to paper approach however find what works for you! Electronic journals, blogs, or even apps! Gratitude is a private mobile app that allows you to write five positive things in your life daily. And it’s completely private – BONUS! There are milestones and rewards as you go. Pretty nifty! I might give this one a try if pen and paper fail me.

I also found that there are lots of guides to gratitude – like Unstuck. Unstuck is a digital coach that helps you focus on positive things in you life and not those that have you stuck. While browsing their site I found 9 Ways to Cultivate Gratitude – which I thought offered some pretty helpful tips. They have tons more this was just one that stood out to me.

Lastly I found The Gratitude Jar – an awesome site that lets you share you gratitude with the inter webs. You can browse by location or tag and see what others around you are grateful for. I read through several pages. Really provides some perspective, if I do say so myself. I have something kind of similar to this on my nightstand called a Happiness Jar that I learned from one of my favorite authors, Elizabeth Gilbert. She explains it here but you essentially write down the happiest moment of your day, each day and put it a jar, basket or whatever you want. I use different color post-it notes so it’s very bright and fun to have right by my bed. I am not as good as I should be about doing this daily. I find that I do it a lot when I have epic parenting moments. Apparently that’s often when I’m the happiest. 🙂

Frankly – I think we all struggle with this process. Even Oprah does and she’s super human! Life gets the best of us and we lose sight of what’s important. This just means we need to refocus. Just know that you are not the only one. My goal is to incorporate gratitude into my life daily. I’ll start with a daily journal – a few bullets a day – and go from there. One day at a time. I think that’s doable.

How will you show gratitude?