Gratitude

Oops.

While I thought it was vitally important to make sure everyone on the Internet knows that cats want cheeseburgers, my lovely wife pointed out that I have a backlog of actual FAMILY stuff to blog about. Sheesh... But as usual, she's right... So here's a cool new FAMILY thing.

Last weekend, Cindy went to a daycare providers' wellness retreat. While there, she attended a class on gratitude, and how important it is to stop and think about how blessed your life is. So on Monday, that was our topic for Family Home Evening. She told us about a study that was done, focusing on the physical effects of gratitude, or of being aware of good things in your life. It was pretty amazing, just spending 15 minutes a day thinking about positive things showed measurable improvement in virtually every system of the body! And then she issued a challenge to the entire family:

We made, and are keeping Gratitude Journals for one week. This is a simple daily template that you fill out at some point - we're choosing to do it at bedtime, so we don't risk missing something great. The template consists of the following items:

• List three things you're grateful for TODAY. (as opposed to generic things)
• List two people you know you can count on to support you.
• List one person who makes your life better.
• Two things in my life that make me say "I'm Blessed!" (these would be things that are personal to you, maybe things you have that most other people don't... not a brag, but a blessing)

Cindy and I have added the additional criteria of trying not to repeat anything for the entire week, and by last night I was struggling on a couple of areas. And then I step back and look at the big picture, and my life is SO full of blessings and cause for gratitude that I can't believe I had trouble thinking of things. It's been a great exercise!

I would like to turn this around and challenge everyone reading this to try it out too! Do it for a week and see what happens when you literally count your blessings!

Kaylee was in charge of snack Monday night, and made a Family Cake of Gratitude. I love Family Cake of Gratitude!!