Gratitude Stories

October 2021

I have been practicing gratitude on a daily basis since January of 2018, and on August 13, 2021 I started posting what I am grateful for on social media as well. Sharing this side of myself has been wonderful because it gives me an opportunity to think about what I’m grateful for in a deeper, more meaningful way, and there’s the making art side of it; which, is more inspiring than sentences inside my journal 😊.

I believe that everyone should engage with gratitude on a daily basis. In my own practice of self-awareness I found out that I was mostly aware of what I did not like and did not want in life. This knowledge made me sad because intellectually I knew that a negative perspective in life means a negative experience of life. So I decided to change that, to change my perspective from a negative one into a positive one that brings me joy and supports me when I have doubts. My daily gratitude practice was born on this day.

Being grateful brings joy into our lives because the act of articulating gratitude into words is the act of defining something beautiful inside and outside of us, and it creates a good feeling that would otherwise not have the opportunity to manifest itself.

For me, gratitude creates a feeling of joy because the very act of counting blessings fosters a positive perspective of myself and of my life. Like an eternal virtuous loop of being grateful, embracing positivity, and staying joyful.

My gratitude practice has also made my perspective more positive and supportive. Positive because thinking about what I’m grateful for makes me think about the goodness that’s manifesting in my life. Supportive because it reminds me that I can cope with life in a gracious way. Besides, when trials and difficulties arise, a positive perspective often reveals a gem of wisdom out of the chaos and once this gem is found, it becomes an opportunity for change, a chance to right a wrong or simply grow up.

Being grateful feels good and I would like to invite you to try it out for yourself. If you’d like, you can visit my Instagram @AbileneHarper to see what I’m grateful for, I post a new #GratitudePractice story everyday and archive all of them inside the GRATITUDE sticker on my profile.

I hope they inspire you to start your own gratitude practice.

Cheers and much love 😘