For the month of September I decided to participate in Janice Tanton’s 5 Daily Gratitudes Challenge. September ended up being a surprisingly challenging month for me and one of the things that ‘worked’ for me and helped me respond more with more grace to some of life’s challenges was the practice of reflecting everyday on 5 things I am grateful for in my life.
I ran into a friend I hadn’t seen in months in November and he mentioned he’d been reading my 5 Daily Gratitudes and enjoyed the juxtaposition of the meaningful and less serious gratitudes I expressed. I really just wrote down the first five things that came to mind at that moment. Sometimes I was surprised by the things for which I was expressing gratitude (a good cry!) and sometimes I found I was finding similarity amongst my posts (community, communication, my dog, the natural world).
What ‘works’ for you in helping navigate challenging times? What process do you return to when you need to center yourself?
I decided that I would take part again in the 5 Daily Gratitudes Challenge on twitter for the month of December. In the past 7 years my father and two close friends have passed away. Although, I feel their presence with me, I tend to think about them more during the holidays. I think daily meditation, yoga and a run or time outside are certainly part of what ‘works’ for me. And perhaps now the process of reflecting (briefly) by noting down 5 Daily Gratitudes.
Here are the first 5 for December.
December 1: snow, new writing opportunities, planning an adventure in India, meeting new people, being able to wax my skis myself
December 2: latte dates, phone dates, climbing dates, ski dates, yoga dates
December 3:early morning writing, spontaneous play-dates with 3 year olds, optimism, holiday lights, fresh snow
December 4: lights on trees, pressing cloves into mandarin oranges, dog walk dates, tea dates, finding dog sitters
December 5: fresh snow, playing in snowbanks with my dog, snow days, ski days, anticipation for a tea date with a friend
