Week 6: Gratitude

INTRODUCTION TO MINDFULNESS MEDITATION

In our final week, Week 6, we see what it’s like to practice gratitude.

More and more, science is showing how fostering feelings of gratefulness can improve our lives in many different ways.

  • Better relationships – focusing on value over comparison
  • Improved sleep – keeping a gratitude journal can help
  • Improved physical health including fewer illnesses, aches and pains.
  • Improved psychological heath – increases happiness, reduces depression
  • Higher self esteem – reduces social comparisons
  • Resilience – able to better bounce back after tragedy.

This article sums up the benefits really well!

In this meditation we have a go at gratitude by starting with things that have given us joy or success. We then move to things we take for granted, things that have challenged us and lastly, gratitude towards ourselves.

Welcome.

Let’s spend some time dusting off the day’s activities. Thoughts about what has been. Or thoughts about what’s to come.

Taking a deep breath in. Through the nose and into our lungs. And a long exhalation. Letting it all go. Letting it all out.

Relaxing the shoulders and the arms. Raising up our posture until we connect with the aliveness of sitting up straight. Relaxing our belly so that we’re not holding onto anything.

Taking another deep breath in. And a deep breath out.

We are now ready to begin.

GRATITUDE

In the routine of every day life, whether fast-paced and frenetic or slow and carefree, it can be easy to forget what we’re grateful for.

So for this meditation we’re going to spend some time remembering what’s so great to be a human alive on this earth, exploring the mundane – and the magnificent – all as an opportunity to feel thankful and develop that quality of gratefulness.

So let’s first begin by bringing to mind something you truly feel grateful for. Something or someone that’s had a profound impact on your life. Most likely the first thing you think of. Perhaps your parents, a friend or loved one. Perhaps an opportunity or a milestone. Hold this idea in your mind. And connecting with your breath repeat these few simple words.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Noticing how it feels in our body to give thanks to this person or this thing.

Now let’s choose something that we likely take for granted in everyday life. The simplest of things we rarely think to be thankful for. Clean air to breath in. Clear water on demand. That our garbage bins get collected at the same time every week. Think about what this seemingly small thing does for the quality of your life.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Feeling an expansion in our mind and body as we acknowledge the unacknowledged.

Now bring to mind an event or person who’s challenged you. Something that through experiencing hardship, darkness or pain, led to growth, clarity and strength. Something you may not have been thankful for at the time but now, can truly appreciate.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Experiencing the freedom that comes with seeing the positive in the negative.

And finally turning our attention inward to ourselves. Pausing to marvel at all that we are. The magnificence of a body that moves us where we want to be. A mind that can create and solve and love. The breath that is with us every moment of every day.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Feeling the joy that is to be the only one like us, alive on this earth, in this very moment.

The remainder of the meditation is now yours to enjoy in silence, taking this quality of gratitude with you to rest in and apply to whatever experience comes up during the next little while.

Thank you.

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