It is that time of the year when you are looking forward to starting the New Year with full spirit. Besides the holiday decoration and parties, there is something more than you are keeping an eye on – something up close and personal, and that is your New Year’s resolution.
Are you wondering what is your New Year’s Resolution going to be? Have you made a long list of different things to do in your mind? Well, there is something quite valuable when it comes to that: Gratitude. Make sure it comes at the top of the list of your New Year’s Resolutions for the upcoming year.
What Is Gratitude?
Gratitude or thankfulness is simply the state of inner satisfaction and acknowledgment of all that you have and all that you are. It is sometimes also a state of contentment about everything that is not present as well. It also includes thankful prayers. One can say it is the art of staying complacent in your current state without getting uneasy about it. One who is able to attain this state is better able to achieve a persistent state of happiness throughout their life. It is best for positive motivation.
It has been found that people who practice gratitude at all times are likelier to stay happier than people who are not grateful. So, if you want to “pursue happiness” in life, it is important that you take care of how grateful you are for everything.
Why Put Gratitude at the Top of Your List?
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You Become Aware of Your Achievements
Preferring gratitude makes you more appreciative of even the little things you achieved during the year. No matter how tiny it may seem, thankfulness helps you actually recognize every little thing you were able to achieve in the year. So, no matter how long your list is for the coming year, it wouldn’t make much difference if you cannot acknowledge the importance of those things in life. You can call it achievement motivation as well.
You will stay hungry for more and what happens is that your motivation and inner confidence becomes low. It is, therefore, significant to make sure you are aware of your achievements year-round. When you are able to recognize all that you have achieved by the end of the year, you are able to work towards more stuff positively and confidently in the coming times. That brings a layer of confidence in you that helps you to push more towards growth.
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You Feel Proud to Move Forward
We are all humans and have some limitations, which is perfectly fine. It is hard to attain all the successes we anticipate because of things in and out of our control, which is perfectly normal. If you don’t practice gratitude in your life, it is possible that you get frustrated and even dismayed at the end of the year with all the things that you haven’t been able to achieve.
However, gratitude helps you see through things, feel motivated, and take pride in the things that you could get done. Instead of regretting or feeling sad about your loss or failure, gratitude allows you to look forward to the future and keep your chin up by the end of the year. So, if you want to move forward in life, putting gratitude first is one of the essential things you need to do this New Year.
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You Experience Self-Love
One of the key ingredients to get ahead in life and feel at your fullest is self-love. The one who is able to realize its power knows how important it is to include self-love in your thought process to get things done. When you practice gratitude, you automatically fuel your flame of self-love in your life.
Gratitude gives you the power to actually feel proud of even the tiny little things you do or even plan to do. For example, the first way to practice gratitude is to actually recognize how you are able to plan your projects for the upcoming year. Make it a self-celebration that you can take pride in – it will bring you feelings of self-love instead of self-hatred. Also, being grateful and content with life makes you feel good about yourself, which also improves your level of self-love.
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You Know What You Actually Want
One of the most important things gratitude brings to the table is an elevated sense of self-awareness. You know what you want to get in life. Gratitude actually helps you to explore what makes you happy with yourself. This is true because gratitude grows on you with time, and it makes you want to work towards things that bring contentment to you. Also, it takes you away from goals that fuel negative feelings in you.
So, when you practice gratitude as the top thing on your to-do list for the year, you begin to realize all the important things that you want to do in the year. You cut and remove any goal that is not right for your sense of peace and is harmful to your mental health. This is the power that practicing gratitude as a priority gives to you. You actually have the power to see what you want to really do, keep doing, and what is it that you don’t want in your life, and that is in itself very satisfying.
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You Become More Patient
One of the main concerns that come into the minds of people who make resolutions is that they want instant results and outcomes. It makes them rather impatient and even unhappy when they cannot achieve that goal within the set frame of time. When you practice gratitude first, you don’t stay in a state of impatience anymore. You begin to realize that what you already have or what you are is enough, and for betterment, there is no rush.
When you are able to see through that, you eventually become a more patient version of yourself that helps you stay in control. It enables you to become more resilient and more adaptive to sudden changes in your life. So, whenever something happens that you didn’t want or weren’t expecting, you become able to look at the bigger picture and stay focus no matter how challenging the situation.
Gratitude brings resilience and patience in you in miraculous ways that you wouldn’t even be aware of in the first place until you are given a situation.
How to Practice Gratitude? How to be Grateful?
Here is a short note on how you can practice thankfulness to follow your New Year Resolution:
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Acknowledge through Mindfulness
We stay mostly unaware of all the things around us in our lives. That leads to us being oblivious of all the positive things happening in our lives and can make us feel ungrateful. To practice gratitude in its full state, it is vital that we deeply recognize every little thing happening within and around our environment so that we can feel gratitude to its core.
For that, we can practice mindfulness. Notice how each of your breaths helps to provide oxygen and nutrients all over the body. Start with noticing your body and acknowledge that you are alive and have plenty of opportunities around you.
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Begin with the End
Death is seen as a taboo subject in a lot of communities. Not many people want to talk about it as they fear it brings feelings of hopelessness and misery. However, there is another perspective to it that, when practiced, can add a lot of meaning to life. When we acknowledge that we have limited time on this earth, we begin to appreciate the things we usually take for granted.
You can note this thing in a terminally ill patient. They will be seen appreciating life much more than us. Talk to someone who has lost a loved one; they will also tell you the same about being grateful. Therefore, try realizing the reality of death and learn to appreciate the people, relationships, and things that are for you in this limited span.
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Start a Gratitude Journal for Yourself
One of the most helpful things you can do to keep feeling grateful is to write about everything you are grateful for. Begin with a list every day and notice how small things help you make grateful. You will eventually note that there is an endless stream of things to be thankful for. So, when you realize that you have plenty of those things, you will be able to see the reality and practice gratitude meaningfully. It will also make you acknowledgeable of everything that brings you peace and makes your life better.
Final Words
Without a doubt, gratitude is one of the best magical tools that can bring massive changes to your life and emotional wellbeing. When you are able to manifest that power gratitude gives you, you are able to stay happy and complacent. What’s more, you are also able to achieve more success.
So, this New Year, make a gratitude list your priority to work hard for it to make it the main part of your life, and you will see a huge positive change in your life.