Give Yourself the Gift of Gratitude

This time of year, we’re a lot more aware of what we do have, and what we don’t have. Whether it’s family, friends, money, stability, career, fulfilment, health…for one month the focus on each one is heightened.  Scrutinised by not only yourself, but others too.

The weight of expectation around this season can be heavy, and easily make us lose a sense of perspective. That is why for entire cultures, December is recognised as both the most joyful and most difficult time of year. According to YouGov, over two in five Britons have felt stressed during the festive season.

This is on top of approaching deadlines, a cost of living crisis and the usual pressure a new year brings. It doesn’t take much for stress to take a snowball effect, and when that happens our past experiences create a negativity bias which can cause us to start catastrophising. We start adding more weight to certain situations or seeing neutral events in a negative light.

That is why the easiest- and cheapest- act of self-care you can do for yourself this season is to practice gratitude.

Gratitude grounds us. It stops us from over-focusing on disaster scenarios or punishing ourselves with comparisons.  Adopting an attitude of gratitude helps improve our mood, energy, motivation and relationships. The happier we are, the better we are at persevering, growing and caring for others.

Being thankful is not intended to trivialise hardships, but to increase resilience by putting ourselves in charge of them.

This is all good stuff. But simply knowing you should be grateful, often does not work.

Shift your thinking in three steps

Hyrum Smith, FranklinCovey co-founder and one of the most influential thinkers on modern time management, explains that the basic principles which make a human more effective have not changed for 6,000 years.

Time management may not immediately seem relevant to gratitude, but bear with.

We all have three key motivators that impact how we do things, or rather how we feel about doing things. These motivators underpin how we perceive our reality and our place in it: that is where the link between effectiveness and happiness lies.

Hyrum sums this up in one deceptively simple phrase: I have to, I ought to, I get to.

Have to: 

The lowest emotion that motivates activity, Hyrum says, is fear. This is the feeling that we have to do something, or something bad will happen. We have to go to work because if we don’t we will face financial ruin. Fear is a powerful motivator, but it is also a powerful stressor.

Ought to: 

A higher emotion that motivates activity is a sense of duty, or doing the right thing, or following the rules. We ought to go to work, because people are relying on us and it’s the right thing to do. Feeling obligated to do something is also a powerful motivator, but it can breed resentment.

Get to:

Smith explains there is an even higher emotion that motivates activity. The emotion of love and gratitude. I get to do this. I’m lucky to be able to do this. I have the privilege of doing this. It’s an honour to do this. This can look like “I get to put my child to bed”, “I get to laugh with my colleagues at work” or “I get to furnish a new house”.

In the words of Hyrum smith, “The secret to achieving inner peace lies in understanding our inner core values – those things in our lives that are most important to us – and then seeing that they are reflected in the daily events of our lives.”

Try starting each month, week, day, or whenever you feel a little astray, by categorising your life according to what you have to, ought to, and get to do. It will save you a lot of time otherwise lost being anxious.

Great leaders model gratitude

Bouncing off the old adage “if you can’t love yourself, how are you supposed to love anyone else?”, if you don’t possess your own sense of self-worth, how are you going to care about anyone else’s?

Just as gratitude is the easiest and cheapest act of individual self-care, it is likewise one of the easiest, cheapest and most impactful ways to increase employee engagement, connection and productivity.

When a leader shares a sincere expression of gratitude for an individual’s unique contribution or efforts, they immediately multiply the level of psychological safety and emotional commitment that person feels. Work moves from being viewed as a chore, to something meaningful. Something filled with ‘get to’ moments.

Essentially, how valued we feel at work is critical to which motivator (fear, duty, love) we choose, or see open to us, to embrace. When passion, purpose and unique human fulfilment are side-lined in day to day organisational culture, the burden of fear and duty employees face becomes insurmountable, and stress overwhelms. Negative impact for the business inevitably follows.

Sadly, a recent survey revealed 59% of people have never had a boss who truly appreciates them.  We break down four ways you can change this in our blog on creating a culture of recognition.

Gratitude creates a constant  in change

Appreciation acts as an anchor. When practiced authentically and consistently, it has the power to create a sense of self and purpose which stays strong and pushes forward in the face of adversity- both individually and collectively.

Ultimately, the ability to proactively identify your ‘get to’s’ is a game-changer, for you as a person, a leader, or an organisation.

Give it a go, by yourself or with your team. What do you get to do today?