Gratitude Watch Special: Staying Grateful in Tough Times

If you’re an American (and in a lot of cases if you’re not), things look a lot more grim than they used to out there, don’t they?

Keeping gratitude on in the forefront is a serious challenge for many of us now.

Because of a short email conversation with the gracious and thoughtful Brenda Arnall of It’s a New Day, it became obvious I’ve found a number of resources over the months that I’ve been doing Gratitude Watch and from elsewhere that might be worth a second look with just this in mind.

Today, I’d like to offer these to you. I hope you will find value.

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Some of you have seen this, but for those of you who have not, I highly recommend it. In “Gratitude,” Jason Hall, a quadriplegic (with only limited use of his arms), shared his story of finding gratitude in the face of personal tragedy:

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At eNotAlone.com, Leslie Karen Lobell, M.A., shared a personal story of hardship, and of finding gratitude despite it: “Cultivating an Attitude of Gratitude… Even on a Bad Day.”

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Rosemary Lichtman, Ph.D. (via Content4Reprint.com) gave us some hints on making a gratitude attitude more prevalent: “5 Steps to Gratitude Despite a Tough Economy.”

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From November, shortly after the October “meltdown,” and before a Thanksgiving that threatened to not seem very thank-worthy, Kristin Robertson of The Everyday Mystic offered these hints for keeping our gratitude boat from capsizing: “Practicing Gratitude.”

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David and Esther at Inside Our Box shared some “Gratitude for Sleepless Nights,” and showed some gratitude for being kept awake at night by a healthy, normal infant, and reflected on friends and family who, through tragedy or other issues, wished desperately that they had the same problem.

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Morgana Rae at Abundance and Prosperity gave us a personal story of fighting back and winning against multiple challenges with “Gratitude.”

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Possibly relevant to some situations: Christopher R. Edgar (posted at AuthorsDen.com) told us how he gave himself a gratitude adjustment with his personal thorns in the side with: “Five Reasons To Be Grateful For Difficult People In Your Life.”

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From just last Monday, Positive Psychologist Dr. John Schinnerer of Shrunken Mind – Making the Mind Understandable gave us “How to Deal With the Constant Stress of a Battered Economy – More Than 80% of US Stressed About Finances.” In this, Dr. Schinnerer suggested his book as a resource: Guide To Self: The Beginner’s Guide to Managing Emotion and Thought.

(Shhh …. maybe it’s in the library. Don’t tell anyone I said that.)

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Another piece that may be relevant in some circumstances. This has some “law of attraction” undercurrents, but/and is well worth a look, in my humble opinion. From Steve Pavlina: “Overcoming Depression.”

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And lastly, a couple I’d like to offer.

• Some thoughts about on reframing bad situations in gratitude in order to better cope: “What Part of ‘Grateful’ Don’t You Understand?”

• Inspired in part by Jason Hall’s video above, in “Why Don’t We “Get” Gratitude?” I offered my own story of finding gratitude through perspective, and some reflections on why we as a society haven’t understood its value.

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Thank you for reading this special edition of Gratitude Watch.

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If you have a substantive original posting about gratitude (please see my “About Gratitude Watch” page) feel free to email me a link through my contact page, or “tweet” me on Twitter.

© 2009, by Daniel Brenton. All Rights Reserved.

Tagged as: Brenda Arnall, Christopher R. Edgar, Daniel Brenton, danielbrenton.com, grateful, Gratitude, Gratitude Watch, Inside our Box, It’s a New Day, Jason Hall, John Schinnerer, Kristin Robertson, Leslie Karen Lobell, Morgana Rae, Rosemary Lichtman, Steve Pavlina, thankful, thankfulness

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