LILY Letter 82: Giving Thanks This Month & All Year Long

​Remember to be grateful. It will make you happy. The end.

Just kidding! We have a bit more to say about the magical subject of gratitude and giving thanks.

After several years of financial poverty in Jeff's mid-single years, he finally start to turn things around. While living in Texas that summer, he needed a vehicle with air conditioning so he purchased a nice used car that served him well. Having driven a clunker before that, he very much appreciated the comfort and performance of his new, used vehicle. He never got behind the wheel without feeling grateful for it. He enjoyed that car more than any other he has ever owned—even cars that would be considered nicer. Why? Because of how much he appreciated it. We can only enjoy something to the extent that we appreciate it. Thus, gratitude is not merely good manners, it is the key to joy and happiness. All that is required is us being open to realizing the precious value of what we already have.

This month of giving thanks is an excellent time to get in the habit of thinking, feeling, and expressing gratitude. It can actually rewire our neural pathways to create a brain that is more able to recognize and take joy from the good in life. Our primitive brain is wired to pay attention to what is wrong in life so this practice of paying attention to what is right requires intentional action and pays joyful dividends.

We will be focusing on giving thanks all month long, starting with this week's podcast that shares the very intriguing history of the hymn "Now Thank All Now our God," the lyrics of which were written by a man with seemingly no reason to be thankful. If you happen to be in such dire straits, this can lift your spirits. In our weekly video, we discuss the important and often all to overlooked topic of "Being Grateful for our Bodies" (which, as a society, we far too often criticize and get down about). Our short of the week is "Intentional Courtship for Divorce Recovery," which explains why our Amazon best-selling book isn’t just for those who are ready to date but also for those who are still healing from relationship loss.