While Thanksgiving is designed to be a day that we set aside to pause, reflect, and express our gratitude, it can be a stressful time as well. Travel issues, family concerns, and the ever-present potential of family conflict can reduce our thankfulness to a rushed prayer before we indulge in too much food.
Rather than use this article to encourage you to slow down, express thanks, and enjoy this day, let’s take a deeper look into the benefits to thankfulness.
I am a firm believer in the assertion that thankfulness and anxiety cannot co-exist. I’m so convinced of this fact that I start every day expressing thankfulness. I do it in my prayer walk prior to my early morning workout. The setting is totally up to you. The key is to start early and focus on expressing thankfulness.
The mere expression of gratitude and naming those items, people, or blessings will refocus thinking and reset your perspective. As you reset and focus on gratitude, your circumstances don’t change, but your perspective and thinking change.
The anxiety, stress, and worry that so many of us struggle with in life are often associated with things outside of our control. We needlessly waste valuable hours of our lives dwelling on possible outcomes that we don’t control.
Intentionally expressing gratitude, taking thankful walks, and setting aside time every day to pause and reflect on life’s blessings, provide a framework to renew our minds and not allow anxious thoughts to take root. We essentially fill our minds with thankfulness so that there is no room for anxiety and worry to dwell.
While doing a lot of one-to-one coaching over the years, I have learned the primary enemies of thankfulness are:
Comparing: We see what others have, experience, or achieve and totally lose sight of what’s in front of us while we are looking at them. There is never a win in comparison. Comparing has robbed many of us of joy, contentment, and peace. We oftentimes forget about thankfulness when we are wrapped in comparison.
Expectations: When we look at outcomes, responses, and results that are outside our control, we set ourselves up for disappointment and almost always rob ourselves of joy. We oftentimes forget about thankfulness when we are consumed with expectations.
Margin: As we get busier and continue to fill our lives with more commitments, more aspirations, and sometimes more distractions, we make mental compromises. Those compromises are neglecting to recognize daily blessings, subtle moments of importance, and the small things in life that can easily be taken for granted (until they are lost). We oftentimes forget about thankfulness in the busyness of doing “good” things.
So, I challenge us to live a life of thanksgiving rather than be thankful one day a year.
-
Don’t get caught in the comparison trap but rather start each day with a thankful walk.
-
Don’t allow expectations to dominate your day but rather look to express gratitude regularly to renew your thinking.
-
Don’t get so wrapped up in creating a great life that you miss the life in front of you today.
I Thessalonians 5:18: “Give thanks in all things…”.
Thanksgiving week is a great week to start those thankful walks!
Doug provides professional speaking and coaching services to organizations and individuals. Whether you are looking for a speaker for your next event or a leadership coach to develop people and build a team culture, feel free to reach out to Doug at doug.strickel@gmail.com and learn more about PLUS.
For the latest local news, subscribe FOR FREE to the Lincoln Parish Journal and receive an email each weekday morning at 6:55 right to your inbox. Just CLICK HERE to sign up.
