Episode 21 Final
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[00:00:00] Welcome to the Extraordinary Life Podcast from the creator of the Extraordinary Life Tribe, Crystal Obregon, the self-development podcast propelling you forward toward your goals. Using science backed high performance habits. Reach the next level in your physical and mental health. See new heights in your relationships.
[00:00:18] Gain clarity on your purpose and live your extraordinary. Welcome your host writer,speaker and coach Crystal Obregon. Hi there. This is Crystal from Crystal Obregon Coaching with episode number 20, one of the Extraordinary Life Podcast. If you're in the United States, this is the time of year when you focus on giving thanks for all that you have. I wasn't going to do another post slash podcast on gratitude for Thanksgiving, but then I really thought this is something that has changed my life. [00:01:00] So I'd like you just to take a minute right now, if you can, and think about being grateful for your family, your friends. All the love in your life.
[00:01:13] Think about being grateful for the work you do think about looking for the silver linings in any difficult situations and feel grateful for the opportunity to learn from them. And just take a moment. If you can pause this, if you want, and really let all that sink in. And then notice how abundant you felt, how good you felt when you're feeling all that gratitude.
[00:01:42] That's because gratitude is powerful when you're looking to create more in your life. Why? Because as you focus on everything, you're grateful for, you begin to feel like you already have more in your life. And when you [00:02:00] feel like you have abundance in your life, you attract even more. So what you focus on grows and like attracts, like that's why you won't increase what you have in your life.
[00:02:13] By focusing on all that you don't have basically focusing on what you do have you create more of it. So focus on joy. You'll create more joy, focus on love. You'll create more, less. And when you create from that place of loving intention, your life does become more joyous and richer than you expected. And that's just from changing your thoughts.
[00:02:39] Gratitude really does start a positive momentum in your life that changes it forever. And this is a great time to focus on. The question is, is yes, it's Thanksgiving. And so we're thinking about being grateful, but shouldn't, we be practicing gratitude all the time. And the answer is [00:03:00] yes, especially if you want to create more joy, peace and prosperity in your life, I'm going to share six ways that you can integrate gratitude in your daily life.
[00:03:16] First of all, look for what you want to see versus what you don't want to see too often, we go about our day waiting and even expecting awful things to happen, or we expect to be disappointed. What we're doing when we do that is we're trying to protect ourselves from that disappointment or from things not going our way.
[00:03:38] What we're really doing is we're attracting what we don't want into our lives. We walk around looking for things that need changing. So instead shift your perception of your world by focusing on what you do want to see. For example, I like this, or I love [00:04:00] that really practice saying it out loud and you'll notice right away that it feels different.
[00:04:07] Next appreciate and be grateful for something about yourself. Be grateful that you have a nice smile or you have a heart of gold or that you attract nice friendships, be grateful that you're a savvy business person or that you're inventive or intuitive or creative. Be grateful that you're a wonderful parent or even be grateful.
[00:04:33] You're not perfect because honestly, how boring would it be to be perfect. If it's hard to find something, to be grateful about yourself, just try for one thing and practice saying it to yourself often, and it will get easier. This is why they call it a practice, a gratitude practice, a yoga practice meditation practice.
[00:04:56] We're practicing or not. Perfect. [00:05:00] Number three, look at your environment and appreciate things about that. And this is often what I do when I'm doing my morning. Gratitude is it could be the snow, the leaves, the sun look for beauty in your life. So focus on the penny you have versus the penny that you don't have.
[00:05:22] Even if there are things like I talked about in an earlier podcast. That I can hear traffic noise instead of focusing on the traffic noise, I focus on the view from my deck and that when it's sunny, it's warm, even in the winter. So just look around and you'll notice more and more as you do this practice.
[00:05:48] And then number four, keep track of all the good things that happen to you in your calendar or your daily journal. Even the little things like I've said, I write [00:06:00] down five things I'm grateful for every morning in my journal. Plus my 10 goals and dreams. And that's it. I'm not a big journaler actually do write in my high-performance planner.
[00:06:11] That has a journaling section that I do before I start the day. I'm trying to get in the habit of also journaling at the end of the day. There's another section for that. And I know that that would help me, but I'm not a night person. So that's my excuse for that. But just thinking about those five things, I can go back and look in the last two years of journaling and it does, it does read like a record of the good things that have been happening.
[00:06:43] Just writing those things down, actually writing them down in pen or pencil or whatever, not just thinking them. It does affirm that good things do come your way and you begin to trust that they will continue to come [00:07:00] your way and remember, they don't have to be big things. Often mine might be a beautiful sunrise rain after dry summer.
[00:07:09] Or just a nice time watching a movie or bike races on the couch with my family. Remember, I do talk about that more way back in episode one, where I shared lessons, I learned during 591 days of gratitude practice. So pop on back there as well. And then number five, if you want to see some really fast results, then for the next 30 days, set aside time to write.
[00:07:39] Morning or afternoon, evening doesn't matter, but schedule it for 10 minutes and spend 10 minutes writing down all the positive things that you can about your life, your relationships, your body, your work, your home, et cetera. I promise you that you will not be the same after those 30 days of [00:08:00] doing.
[00:08:01] Number six is sharing your gratitude or appreciation. So verbally share with your friends, your loved ones, or even stranger as you pass on the path. If you're watching. You can even do it in written form. So text a friend or a family member or colleague, and just express your gratitude or appreciation whether it's about that person or something else.
[00:08:27] About the day I do this all the time. When I'm walking in the open space, near my home, it used to embarrass my kids. But now I really noticed that they do it too. Even my daughter that's in college all the way across the country. Sometimes she'll be on the phone with me and she'll go into grab a coffee.
[00:08:48] And she usually says something pleasant to the person that's helping her or anybody that she greets along the way. Now that change that gratitude is [00:09:00] radiating out from you. So you can even make more change, not just for yourself. So that's it for today. If you are in the United States, have a terrific Thanksgiving.
[00:09:15] If you're not in the United States, have a terrific rest of your week. And if you want a written version of this, it is also in blog forums. So the link to the blog will be in the show notes and also be sure to check out the dates for the Design Your Decade Workshop that I have coming up in a couple of weeks.
[00:09:40] It will get you focused for the new year so that you can relax and enjoy the holidays. Bye for now. Thank you for listening to the Extraordinary Life Podcast with writer and coach Crystal Obregon. We'd love to connect with you outside of the podcast, too. To find more helpful insights, show notes and more about [00:10:00] Crystal.
[00:10:00] Go to Crystal Obregon.com that's O B R E G O N. Where you will also find info for the Design Your Decade Workshop. This workshop will help you to stop drifting and start creating until next week. Be extraordinary.
