Cultivating Gratitude and Joy

Cultivating Gratitude & Joy ~ Letting Go of Scarcity & Fear of the Dark

I’m excited to talk about the fourth Guidepost in Dr. Brene Brown’s 10 Guideposts to Wholehearted Living, which is Cultivating Gratitude and Joy and Letting Go Of Scarcity and Fear of the Dark. We can all use a little more joy and a little less fear!

In order to implement this for yourself, it’s important to be aware of what we need to let go of first. It’s easy to start focusing on all the things that can go wrong in any situation, instead of narrowing your focus to all the things that can go right. Sometimes, we feel like we need to worry and plan for the worst. We feel like that will keep us safe and ensure that we always have enough. Instead, we end up feeling more insecure and vulnerable. Not exactly the feelings we were hoping to have. Dr. Brown calls this practice of expecting bad things to happen “dress rehearsing for tragedy” and it blocks our abilities to feel joy.

When we live out of a place of scarcity, we are not practicing gratitude and therefore not able to experience joy. Instead of focusing on what is lacking, it’s important to shine your light on the gratefulness and satisfaction you feel for what you do have. Putting all our efforts into thinking about what could go wrong increases fear and shame. It doesn’t increase our feelings of safety and gratitude. In order to do that, we need to focus on gratitude, embrace the vulnerability, and consciously replace the feelings of fear with joy.

Dr. Brown suggests that practicing gratitude could look like keeping a gratitude journal, meditating daily on the things you are thankful for, creating gratitude art, or taking a few moments throughout a busy day to remind yourself of the things you are grateful for. Remember to shine the light on the things you appreciate, and when you notice yourself dress rehearsing for tragedy, acknowledge the feelings but replace them with your new way of thinking.

Again, this isn’t an overnight process. If you’d like a little more support working through these guideposts, please reach out HERE and schedule a FREE Breakthrough Call today! I’d love to take this journey together. If you’d like to read about the previous guideposts, you can find them on my blog at https://lorilandercoaching.com/blog

Are you noticing any differences as you implement these Wholehearted Life guideposts?

xo,
Lori