We need to realize that it’s not happiness that makes us grateful, but gratefulness that makes us happy.
If wanting a new year of greater abundance is one of your New Year’s Resolutions, you must first acknowledge and appreciate the abundance you already have. Gratitude is what starts the receiving process.
If you are thinking about what you lack, you’ll continue to produce outcomes to match it. To turn this around, you must start thinking and feeling the great abundance you already possess. This attitude, mindset, and energy will now attract more of itself into your life. Your external life will mirror your internal one.
The following exercise will help you with this, but it’s important to understand that this is not a once-a-year activity. It’s an everyday activity you need to incorporate into your routine. It’s as important as brushing your teeth or taking a breath, and it should be just as automatic.
Look over the many blessings in your life and you’ll be able to turn toward the future with arms wide open—ready and willing to receive all of the blessings yet to come.
Start your New Year’s goal-writing by first reminding yourself of what you’re already grateful for.
Ask yourself these…
What are my current assets?
(personal contacts, career, education, experience, time-management skills)
What is great in my life right now?
(family, friends, finances, health, resources, community)
What’s great about me?
(specific skills, personality, passion, ambition, desire, willingness)
Try this activity
This January, why not start the new year with an empty jar and fill it with notes about good things that happen. Then next New Year’s Eve, empty it and see what awesome stuff happened that year.
Are you feeling blessed and abundant yet? You should. You are blessed, and it’s just that mindset and expectation that will refocus your orientation to what’s possible and what you CAN accomplish versus what you lack and what you have failed to get thus far.
