Gratitude Is Part of Achieving Your Goals and Dreams

I am a big believer that an attitude of gratitude goes a long way in helping you realize your hopes and dreams, and enjoy your life's journey along the way. Gratitude helps you fully enjoy the experience of attaining that which you desire. By being grateful for that which you have, you pause to reflect on the happiness, joy, love, peace and other positive things that what you are grateful for bring to your life. This allows you to be present for your own happiness, instead of letting challenges and unimportant distractions steal your experience of these positive things away from you.

I also subscribe to the philosophy that what we focus on expands. So, if I spend my time focused on what is wrong in my life, that which I am focused on by default takes a larger role in my daily experience, simply because it is where I put my attention. I also believe that if I spend most of my time thinking about what I don't have, I will be reinforcing that who I am is the person that lacks these things that I want or need. The more I define myself as that person who is lacking, the more I become that person.

Instead, I practice one of many gratitude exercises I have learned over the years that helps remind me of all I have to be thankful for in this life. The main point of all of these gratitude exercises are to move you to the emotional place where you can be present for the happiness, love, joy, peace or other positive emotion that these people, places, things or concepts brings to you.

Gratitude Exercises Some people will write down in their journal everything they are grateful for as it happens throughout their day, so that they pause and become present for that special moment.

Some people will write what they are most grateful for in a journal at the beginning of the day, to start their day off in a positive way and remind them that no matter what challenges life sends, they have many things to be grateful for.

Others replay in their minds what happened in their day right before they go to sleep and relive the feelings and express their gratitude in the form of a prayer, or they capture it in a journal.

I am sure there are many other methods, as well. People need to choose the one that works the best for them. I just suggest taking time to cultivate some sort of gratitude practice. It will help you bring more into your life to be grateful for and help you enjoy that which is already going so well, even more!

By Blair Singer