Showing posts with label gratitude. Show all posts
Showing posts with label gratitude. Show all posts

Sunday, December 29, 2013

A brief, simple, sample letter of gratitude

The following sample letter of gratitude is written to our Creator. Other words for Creator could be Higher Power, Life Force, Source, Spirit, Divinty, Super Natural Being.

I use the term Creator for this letter of gratitude, but feel free to substitute your favorite word.

Here's one of my most favorite sayings about gratitude:

"There are two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle".---Albert Einstein

I read a few books on gratitude a few years ago and Attitude of Gratitude is my favorite.

Another good book on gratitude is Daily Riches: A Journal of Gratitude and Awareness.

Imagine the character of students and what a valuable education they receive when gratitude is a part of their studies.

Where else besides the family and church can a sample letter of gratitude instruct about character? Education. Gratitude as a part of education builds character.



Sample Letter of Gratitude

Dear Creator,

I'd like to thank you for all the gifts you continue to shower upon me.

Sometimes I may not always recognize Your gifts, i.e., those disguised as challenges and struggles, as gifts, but sooner or later, I come around to accept and appreciate them.

Maybe sometime during an extremely difficult situation, I'd be wise to write not a sample letter of gratitude but a real one. That might help me see in the moment how much I have to be thankful for, regardless of what I may be complaining about.

My life is actually full of lots of love and gratitude, and for this, I'm thankful.

Even though You know all about my life, and I hardly know anything of yours, still, I feel this sample letter of gratitude is important.

The area I want to address in this sample letter of gratitude is my wife's health.

As you well know, my wife has been suffering with debilitating Hepatitis C and cirhossis of the liver for ten years. You made our first meeting so special that I never gave much thought to how serious her illness was.

We experienced magic and we felt Your presence with us, I think it was divinely ordered that our two souls unite as one.

So, You've gotten us through the difficult times and for this I thank you. And I thank You for the gift of Lili-flower, she brightens my day like no one else.

Thank you for the extra strength and courage you've given me all these years that has made me able to hang in there.

So, that's one great reason for addressing this sample letter of gratitude to You. We never would have made it without You!

Now that she is getting healthier and feeling stronger, maybe our lives will take on renewed meaning. Perhaps she and I will get closer and be able to spend more time travelling and doing fun things, like visiting nature spots and meditation retreats.

Maybe she won't have to see so many therapists and doctors. That would be worth writing another sample letter of gratitude, I know!

In closing this sample letter of gratitude, my heartfelt thanks for the wonderful gift of life You give me.

Gratefully,
((Enter your name))

A prayer for gratitude

As a brief writing exercise, you might consider writing out the following prayer for gratitude that follows:
Lord, grant me the ability to be thankful for everything in my life even when I don't like what's happening.

I know You have a plan for me as well as the planet and we're always all right.

So please Lord, help me to appreciate that all I need to do is love myself more so I can love others more.

Once I love more, then maybe I'll be able to Love You more and access more peace daily, not just on the rare days I now pray.

Thank You, Lord for sharing in this prayer of love and gratitude.

Gratefully,

((Enter your name))

If you want to get even more inspired about the affects of gratitude in your life, check out poems of gratitude.
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Thursday, December 5, 2013

Gratitude quotes inspire gratitude and love, keys to abundance

Gratitude quotes have the potential to change your life. The more you read or listen to inspiring words that connect you directly to your higher self, the better you feel (at least for the moment).

The key to taking full advantage of gratitude quotes is to couple them with actions that express your personal love and gratitude for all you have going on at any given moment.

For example, a prayer for gratitude opens your heart and makes you more receptive to receive the abundance that the Universe has in store for you.

Imagine character education: gratitude can play a major role in changing how people view their circumstances. We always can find something to be thankful for, even under the worst imaginable situation.

"Beginning to tune into even the minutest feelings of ...gratitude softens us...If we begin to acknowledge these moments and cherish them...then no matter how fleeting and tiny this good heart may seem, it will gradually, at its own speed, expand." --- Pema Chodron

"I have learned, in whatsoever state I am in, therewith to be content."---Saint Paul

Since our moods and emotions change faster than the weather or stock market, the more you're able to be grateful when things are not quite going the way you desire, the more peace you'll live with.

Each day, in order to build upon your gratitude, you can write a gratitude poem or go for a gratitude walk or gratitude swim.

You'll be amazed at how good you feel after you express gratitude regularly, not just at your favorite place of prayer.

A few gratitude quotes to make you feel good

"This is what binds all people and all creation together- the gratuity of the gift of being." --- Matthew Fox

"God gave burdens, also shoulders."--- Yiddish Proverb

 "It is not that there is no evil, accidents, deformity, pettiness, hatred. It's that there is a broader view. Evils exists in the part. Perfection exists in the whole." ---Hugh Prather




Here's a link to a popular site containing many gratitude quotes from various sources.

There's a famous quote in the self-help movement about seeing the glass as half-full or half-empty. Here's a gratitude quote that expresses it slightly different:

"Some people are always grumbling because roses have thorns. I am thankful that thorns have roses." --- Alphonse Karr

Gratitude quotes light the way to love and gratitude

I've already written about the power of love and gratitude as well as including a sample letter of gratitude.

Some day we will see that we are all one. We will look at the world as Ralph Waldo Emerson did when he stated: "God has delegated himself to a million deputies."

Gratitude quotes help us move closer to that day because when we express our own gratitude quotes or read what others have to say, we are for the time being thankful and not complaining.

One of my friends was once told by a very wise man: "Know it for certain that everything that comes to you is in your own best spiritual interests."

Obviously remembering that gratitude quote when all hell is breaking out around us is not always easy. In fact it's very challenging. But we grow when we can accept those things we least wanted and were least anticipated.

What sometimes gets in the way of accepting ourselves and the events in our lives is our unconscious beliefs and attitudes. That is why as mentioned on previous pages of this web site it is so crucial to clearing limiting beliefs.

It's almost impossible for gratitude quotes to work on the deepest of levels until we begin working on the blocks that imprison us.

Here's a gratitude quote from a very well know man, Norman Vincent Peale.

"...a basic law:
the more you practice the art of thankfulness,
the more you have to be thankful for.
This, of course, is a fact.
Thankfulness does tend to reproduce in kind.
The attitude of gratitude revitalizes the entire mental process
by activating all other attitudes, thus stimulating creativity."
(Norman Vincent Peale, American pastor, Author 1898-1993)

Honesty with Others


Fooling others is simple, its not hard to do;
and over the years, I’ve fooled quite a few.
After life times of deception, I got sick inside,
feeling the anguish of telling untruths and lies.

When I stopped fooling myself, I fooled others less,
My life became more peaceful, I live with less stress.
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Wednesday, December 4, 2013

Poems of Gratitude

Open Your Heart To Receive True, Unlimited Abundance and Success

Reading or writing poems of gratitude opens our hearts to receive abundance in many forms.

They can make you feel better instantly. You cannot express thanks to a friend or the Universe without getting immediate results.



Learning to adopt a gratitude psychology on a regular basis is as important as eating healthy foods or exercising. Practicing gratitude awareness should be a daily, moment by moment experience. We don't have to wait until Thanksgiving to write a poem of gratitude.

Some people express prayers for gratitude right before they go to bed at night. Others express their thanks before each meal. When you live with gratitude, your heart often explodes with joy.

Morsels of Gratefulness by Harvey Rosenburg

When life seems destitute,
and beats you upside down,
morsels of gratefulness loosen,
a smile from a frown.

Being grateful costs nothing,
it's yours for free.
Look all around you
for your Gratefulness Inventory.

You get to choose your grateful ways,
it's up to you to say:
"Do I focus on my meager lacks,
or be thankful one more day?"
If you crave inner peace,
and are fed up with war;
choose gratefulness as the bedrock
of your loving inner core.

How do we make our lives poems of gratitude?

Each of us has the ability to make our life a poem of gratitude. Each moment of the day we choose which thoughts and feelings we focus upon.

Notice I said we choose. No one makes you choose one thought or feeling over another thought, though emotions often get in the way and cloud your attempts at making our lives poems of gratitude.

One way to begin to make your life a poem of gratitude is by not letting your feelings manipulate you all the time.

Feelings come and go; feelings of well being vanish in a moment when a doom and gloom thought passes through your mind.

Then you often feel worse and find yourself beating yourself up for something you did or didn't do. In other words, you make matters worse by how you talk to yourself.

When you become a thought warrior and deepen self-love, you let those low self-esteem thoughts fly on by without believing them and without adding fuel to the fire of the feelings.

When we're able to nurture the attitudes and beliefs in life that empower us and make us loving, kind, compassionate people, then we begin to make our lives poems of gratitude.

According to M.J. Ryan in Attitudes of Gratitude...

"One way to generate gratitude is by a conscious decision to practice looking at what's right in our lives, rather than focusing on what's missing."

The more we follow M.J. Ryan's advice, the more our lives become poems of gratitude. It actually becomes easier to do this after you start noticing the feeling results you get by focusing on what's missing in your life: pain, misery, sadness, loneliness, heartache, jealousy and the like.

A dear friend of mine once stated that his spiritual teacher had told him: "Know it for certain, that everything that comes to you is in your own best spiritual interests."

Not always easy to remember and practice, but expressing love and gratitude regularly make it easier.

 A Poem of Gratitude:
Look Within to Find Gratefulness

Every moment I dance madly
in Your Love and gratitude
You show me Truth: like divine happiness,
all my answers are within.

Not above in the stars and sky,
nor in books and poems,
only in the writings of Your heart
do I get the chance to dance madly in Your Love.

You gift me with gratitude,
You attract me to go within,
to give up what no longer works
and swim in the ocean of Your Grace.

Poems of gratitude need not be masterful works of art. In fact, they don't even have to be poems! The point is to find a way to express your most authentic, heartfelt gratitude for whatever it is that you find significant. Do it in the way that feels the most real for you, like Deb did...

Some Beautiful Words Of Gratitude
Submitted By Deb

To be grateful to me is wanting to thank the universe for all I have and all that I have wished for.

I asked for a healthy and happy family and money to pay bills, and I have that. I wish for my Children to grow up and have happy, healthy and fulfilling lives in what ever they wish and want to do. I wish for my husband to be happy and fulfilled in his everyday life and grateful for the opportunities he has had.

Most of all I am grateful that we have LOVE and PEACE with us always. I know that this is not a poem, but it is what my heart is saying. Thanks for reading.

Uncover and Eliminate Limiting Beliefs

If you want your life to be a poem of gratitude, you must pounce on the negative, life draining, energy sucking thoughts as quickly as you switch channels on your remote. When you focus on what's right in your life, you make an immediate connection to the Creator and feel good instantly.

No other attitude brings inner peace so rapidly and consistently. You can practice being thankful and writing poems of gratitude whenever you wish.

I wish you great success in making your life read like Poems of Gratitude. Being grateful is perhaps the single most important attitude you can live with.
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