Podcast Episode #69
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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 life. Welcome your host, writer, speaker and coach, Crystal Obregon.
[00:00:29] Hi there. This is Crystal of Crystal Obregon Coaching with Episode Number 69 of the Extraordinary Life Podcast. Here in the United States it's the day before Thanksgiving and I think it's always valuable to revisit the benefits of practicing gratitude.
[00:00:51] Almost every day we say thank you. We tell it to the grocery store checkout clerk, and the barista at our [00:01:00] local coffee shop. But are these sincere expressions of gratitude or merely conditioned responses? What exactly is gratitude? Is it different than saying thank you or is the thank you a component of gratitude?
[00:01:18] A simple thank you can have a powerful impact on both the person communicating their appreciation and the person receiving it, especially when the genuine emotion of gratitude backs the words. Gratitude can be a quality of being and an emotion. It's something that we can feel deep in our hearts. We can feel it when we're expressing it towards someone, when someone is grateful to us, or even when we see it being expressed.
[00:01:52] Gratitude is an emotion and experience and a conscious choice for awareness. Connections in your [00:02:00] relationships are both strengthened and fostered with gratitude. You can experience a real sense of overall wellbeing when you practice the intentional cultivation of gratitude into your life.
[00:02:16] The other day I listened to a podcast talking about complaining and how when we complain, not only are we not solving a problem, but we're actually focusing on what's not right in our lives, whether it's for the moment or it's become a habitual thought pattern. Gratitude, on the other hand, can help you keep things in perspective and keep you from getting stuck in those negative emotions.
[00:02:40] Practicing gratitude is one way to transform your experiences toward more positive emotions and improving your relationships. If you work with appreciation, you'll begin to shift your experiences toward the positive. Gratitude has also been [00:03:00] proven to increase our capacity for experiencing other positive emotions.
[00:03:05] Often gratitude is described with the same feelings connected to it like love, compassion, humility, comfort, passion, and confidence. Cultivating gratitude can be a direct way to enhance these other emotions in your life. Another benefit of gratitude that has been supported by several studies is that grateful people are more resilient and resistant to stress.
[00:03:34] When you find the ability to be thankful for the things or people or experiences you have in your life, you find yourself able to move through challenges and difficulties in your lifetime. Gratitude helps us see our strength and open our hearts and experience the fullness in our lives. One of my favorite things about [00:04:00] gratitude is that it's completely up to us.
[00:04:02] Gratitude comes from within and no one can take it away from you. It doesn't matter what the circumstances are in your life. It's an opportunity to have a different perspective, and it's waiting for you every day. Gratitude can be learned, and with practice it can become a choice, an intentional way of viewing the world.
[00:04:26] That's not to say that you should discount or make light of difficulties or painful experiences in your life. Your experiences are your experiences and you still need to find a way through, but you should choose not to let yourself become overwhelmed in these times and with gratitude, you can find a way to see beyond them.
[00:04:50] You can look with gratitude at what you learn about others and yourself when you're moving through hardships. On a psychological level, [00:05:00] practicing gratitude allows us to become happier, more positive, and more amenable to finding joy and pleasure in everything we do, even the little things. Showing gratitude for the things that we have, and those around us also has a social advantage as well because we become more generous and compassionate in our dealing with the world.
[00:05:23] Studies have shown that gratitude helps us on both psychological and physical levels. Physically, when we practice gratitude in our lives, it can boost our immunity levels, which in turn can lead to living a more healthy and energetic life. Gratitude can empower you to understand better that life is all about the moments lived rather than continually looking out for the good or bad moments.
[00:05:50] Gratitude teaches us to be grateful for all the moments that make up our lives. Gratitude can help you develop an [00:06:00] optimistic and positive perspective about life, even with all its ups and downs. We all have ups and downs, it doesn't matter who you. But living a life with gratitude will enable you to understand and appreciate that taking the rough with unruffled patience is the key to your happiness, contentment and peace.
[00:06:23] If you have children, instilling gratitude at an early age will help them value the blessings they have, leading them away from the current plague of the sense of entitlement that affects so many today. But don't worry if you've missed that window. A teen or a young adult is old enough to see and learn from your transformation. It's never too late.
[00:06:49] When children and adults take what they have for granted, it can put them on a path that's difficult for them to find peace and contentment and which could [00:07:00] impact their ability to have meaningful relationships in their lives, both at work and at home. The best thing about the empowering nature of gratitude is the fact that it makes you view your own self in a new light.
[00:07:13] The more thankful you are for everything that is good in your life, the less you'll dwell on those aspects of your life that fall short. Gratitude will also make you a more empathetic person who can appreciate the achievements of others without feeling envious. This frees you up to focus on doing the things in your life that work for you.
[00:07:36] Another way that gratitude can empower your life is the way that it energizes your being. The very act of embracing the positive and letting go of the negative can make you view your life with hope and optimism, which provides you with the enthusiasm to give your best in everything you do. Gratitude puts you on the path of self [00:08:00] realization, allowing you to have contentment as a constant part of your life, as well as enables you to reach out to those who may need your help.
[00:08:10] So how do you start a gratitude practice? It's easy. Nearly every morning I write down five things I'm grateful for. It can be as simple as a beautiful sunrise or enjoying a nutritious home cooked meal with my family. More often than not, what I've realized is that it's people and experiences that I'm grateful for.
[00:08:33] It's helped me to realize how important connection is to me, whether it's my immediate family, my friends, or my yoga teacher or swim coach. Other people prefer to do their gratitude practice at the end of the day. And that can help you go to sleep with those positive feelings. But I do think it's important to write it down.
[00:08:57] It gives you that second way [00:09:00] of cementing it into your being. Sometimes even if I'm going into some difficult emotions or I'm experiencing some difficult emotions or stress, Sometimes I'll just stop myself and then write down just in that moment, five things I'm grateful for, however long it takes me, and then I'm able to come into the situation, being able to maybe see solutions I didn't see before.
[00:09:28] If you're like me, once you get into this practice for a while, you'll start throughout the day looking for things to be grateful for, so that when it's your time, whether it's in the evening or in the morning, that you'll have things to write down. It really does change how you start to look at your life, and it's a whole lot better than complaining, which gets you in the idea of focusing on what's not right in your life.
[00:09:57] Give it a try and let me [00:10:00] know how it goes. Try it for five days, make that commitment and I think you'll see the change. Please DM or email me with how it goes. I really do think that you'll find as you begin to formally notice the good that is surrounding your life and show gratitude for what you have,
[00:10:21] you'll become happier and more content with your life. You'll also see, and this is a big one, that as your appreciation for the people in your life grows, your relationships will also improve, and that's without asking them to do a thing or a change a thing. It just happens. So have a terrific Thanksgiving, and again, I do have some Design Your Decade workshops scheduled right now for the very end of November and beginning of December, and I'll probably have some more throughout December and maybe into January.[00:11:00]
[00:11:00] We will spend time evaluating 2022, clarifying your big goals and dreams and deciding what you want to focus on for 2023. They're held on Zoom so you can join from anywhere and they're completely interactive, so you'll learn from the other participants too. This is two hours of your life that will set the stage for moving forward in your life.
[00:11:24] I'll have the link to the workshops in the show notes along with the link to the information page for my group coaching program that's starting in January. If you join now, you get $500 off as an early bird and a free registration for one of the upcoming Design Your Decade workshops. That's it for now.
[00:11:46] Have a great rest of your day and I will see you in here next week. Bye for now.
[00:11:52] 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 [00:12:00] too. To find more helpful insights, show notes, and more about Crystal, go to Crystal Obregon.com.
[00:12:06] O B R E G O N, where you'll also find info for the Design Your decade workshop. This workshop will help you to stop drifting and start creating. Until next time, be extraordinary.
