It goes really without saying that 2020 has stretched many of us to our mental limits. Yet, how resilient our bodies are, such that positive emotions have been demonstrated to promote enhanced self-regulation, resilience, and stress levels! Gratitude is an important component of positivity and mental health. Not surprisingly, research studies have shown an attitude of gratitude promotes a positive mindset and reduces stress levels. Gratitude has also been associated with a lower risk for psychiatric disorders, higher life satisfaction, and even wisdom.
In my 2019 Thanksgiving blog post, I wrote about the concept of gratitude in Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM):
While in Traditional Chinese Medicine literature, the concept of gratitude isn’t necessarily spelled out, the opposite of gratitude, ingratitude, which might manifest as self-absorption, entitlement, jealously, and resentment are considered. A colleague of mine summed up this idea of ingratitude as “wanting things to be other than how they are.”
Wanting things to be other than how they are; I think many of us want this right now in these uncertain times. However, when we are busy hoping and praying for a different future, the tension the uncertainty causes against the hopes we have, can lead to frustration and unsettledness. This friction can lead to an energetic pattern of disharmony in the body known in TCM as liver qi stagnation. If you are feeling demotivated, stuck, and unable to get things done, you might be in this type of pattern. While physical movement, therapeutic nutrition, acupuncture and herbal medicine can all help us rebalance – so can our own minds. Our own mind is one of the most powerful tools to optimize our health! And when we purposefully set our intention to ‘flip the switch’ from hoping for better to being grateful for the present, we can get to gratitude and begin reaping the benefits; the present becomes a gift.
An excellent white paper (2018) detailing the science of gratitude from the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkley can be found HERE. This white paper summarizes the many researched benefits of gratitude:
- Improved health
- Improved self-motivation
- Easier adaption healthier habits
- Improved emotional regulation
- Improved relationships
- Increased positivity
- Increased generosity
- Decreased inflammation (inflammatory blood markers actual decreased in cardiac patients who practiced a gratitude exercise!)
- Improved sleep
- Less fatigue
- Reduced stress
- Lower risk of psychiatric disorders
- Improved life satisfaction
- Increased humility, patience, and wisdom
- Lower heart rate
The emotional opposite of gratitude, resentment, seems to reverse some of the health benefits.
A simple and easy exercise to promote gratitude is the three good things. At the end of each day you can do an assessment about three positive things that happened in your day and express gratitude for these. Doing this may not change your current circumstances, but it just might help make it little easier for you to deal with them. Personally, I’ve incorporated the three good things during a difficult and extended period of life difficulty and stress and I do credit this practice as one of the things that helped me to get through that period of time more easily. I am grateful for my family. I am grateful for my vocation and practice, Collective Health Center. I am grateful for my patients. Wishing you a peaceful and Happy Thanksgiving.
