Why Is Genuine Gratitude Always Positive?
Tangible or intangible, big or small, gratitude is always empowering.
There is no such thing as negative gratitude. Sure, there’s false gratitude, but that’s not gratitude. Genuine, true, real gratitude is always positive.
Genuine gratitude is an expression of appreciation. Appreciation is a direct pathway to kindness, compassion, and empathy. Everyone, everywhere, desires kindness, compassion, and empathy (sometimes inappropriately jealously, which is how we get so many who want it but refuse to give it. But I digress).
Kindness, compassion, and empathy are strengths, not weaknesses. Contrary to the narrative of certain demagogues, kindness, compassion, and empathy build strength, connectivity, and make us all better, not weaker. They are also in abundant supply, with more than enough to go around for everyone, everywhere, and more.
Saying thank you, giving thanks, and offering gratitude are all positive, empowering acts. What’s more, they are just as powerful when given as when received.
Gratitude can do no harm in and of itself. It’s only harmful when people demand or expect it, abuse those who give it, or it’s not genuine gratitude.
The reason why genuine gratitude is always positive is because it’s so intimately connected with all things positive, no matter their size, shape, construction, type, tangibility, or intangibility.
Why does gratitude being positive matter?
The short answer is that we live in a fear-based society. The long answer is that our fear-based society is just the tip of the iceberg.
Because ours is a consumer-driven, capitalistic society, a major driving force of that is the creation of artificial lack, scarcity, and insufficiency. Brand “X” tells you their product is in limited supply. If you don’t rush to the store RIGHT THE HELL NOW and buy it, you won’t get it. When you don’t get the product, you will suffer, be lacking, humiliated, and shamed. Also, you not getting the product will make you less than your next-door neighbor, less than the rich guy who owns the brand, and worst of all, less than the “other” who will not only show off the product you didn’t get, they will keep you from ever getting it or any other. Are you suffering yet or are you on your way to the store to buy it now?!?
Does this look familiar? Brand “X” and their product might be Apple and the iPhone, DeBeers and diamonds, Exxon and gasoline, or the like. All are sold as being can’t-live-without products, tangibles that will make your life better somehow.
Meeting tangible desires is all well and good and can be worthwhile. However, they’re not our true desire. Sure, we might believe that having a 64” OLED TV and a big house to put it in will make us feel good. Yet realistically, any such feeling they produce is fleeting.
That’s because it’s really all about the intangibles. Modern consumerism prefers us all too distracted to give proper due. That’s what frequently trips us up, and why applied gratitude being a source of positivity matters. We have an infinite number of intangibles we can be genuinely grateful for.
Tangibles versus intangibles
Are kindness, compassion, and empathy tangibles? No. Neither are any other thoughts, feelings, emotions, or other internal processes tied to our mental, emotional, and/or spiritual selves.
What most people desire, more than things, is experiences. We desire to create memories, have inspiring thoughts, and good feelings. That’s why we buy tangible things that we think will lead to that.
Everyone does have basic needs. We all need food, clothing, shelter, and connection. In this modern world, we also need running water, electricity, a means of connectivity, transportation, and currency to pay for everything.
There are other things that we like to have. Sometimes, the basic food, shelter, and clothing are too basic. Given the choice between a mobile phone that can only make calls versus a phone that can call and text versus a smartphone, most people now opt for the latter.
The tangibles are sold to us as being the creators of our joy, peace, prosperity, contentment, and so on. Hence, they’ll sell you on the iPhone making you more content and happier than the Samsung phone. Ah, but which carrier? And how bad will you miss out and feel shame if you choose wrong?
The above, however, emphasizes how the intangibles matter more than the tangibles. That’s because the tangibles are manifestations or reflections of the intangibles that we truly desire.
The beyond-abundant intangibles
Our truest desires are for intangibles like joy, contentment, excitement, happiness, and other positive sensations. This is why every guru, self-help aficionado, and therapist tells us that gratitude for what we have is the key to getting more. This, however, doesn’t need to be about tangibles or even big things.
You have, right where you are, all kinds of things for which you can be genuinely grateful. Right now. Most are completely intangible, or if not, are often taken for granted,
What am I writing about? Here are examples of all kinds of things you can be grateful for, right now.
- Your beating heart
- Breathing
- The eyes to read these words
- Clouds
- Sunlight
- Moonlight
- Rain
- The smell of freshly baked cookies
- The purr of a cat
- The unrestrained laughter of a child
This should give you a pretty good idea of how inexhaustible the things for which we can be grateful are. They are everywhere, unbelievably abundant, and thoroughly empowering.
Everything you can be grateful for, tangible and/or intangible, empowers you. Both giving and receiving gratitude is an act of empowerment. The more you’re empowered, the more control you have over your life experience.
How can you recognize this? Via active conscious awareness, i.e., mindfulness.
Mindfulness and gratitude
How can you recognize and apply genuine gratitude? By using mindfulness.
This form of mindfulness is active conscious awareness. It’s not recognizing the world without via your six senses, though that is a factor. It’s more about knowing your inner being. This is about connecting, here and now, to your mindset/psyche/headspace inner being. Your self.
To do that requires active conscious awareness. This is a matter of recognizing, here and now, in the present, what you’re thinking, what and how you’re feeling, what your intent is, if your approach is one of positivity or negativity, and what your actions are or aren’t.
When you are present and actively consciously aware, you recognize who, what, where, how, and why you are. That in turn lets you see genuine gratitude, which you can further recognize as the empowering force that it is.
When you’re feeling empowered, you can give more back. Empowered people recognize the almost incalculable value of kindness, compassion, and empathy (as well as how they make you stronger, not weaker).
More people empowered and in control means more people who can break the cycle and start to shift ours from being a fear-based society to a reason-based society. It starts small, it starts with each of us. We can flex this muscle, give more gratitude, and do our part to improve and change the world for the better of all.
Tangible or intangible, big or small, gratitude is always empowering and always positive.
That written, I am truly grateful for you. Thank you for reading. Thank you for being.
Knowing that genuine gratitude is always positive isn’t hard
It’s all about practicing mindfulness of your thoughts, feelings, intentions, and approach to direct your actions.
When you recognize and acknowledge that you get what you give to the world, you can choose via active conscious awareness to give more genuine gratitude for things both tangible and intangible. Knowing that gratitude is always positive, you can put more into the world to feel better, stronger, wiser, and to spread more kindness, compassion, and empathy.
This empowers you, and your empowerment can empower others around you.
Consciously choosing your approach to life towards positivity or negativity – from the vast cylinder that exists between them – shifts life in a way that opens more dialogue. With a broader dialogue, you can explore and share where you are between the extremes and how that impacts you here and now.
Choosing thoughts, feelings, actions, and intentions for yourself employs an approach and attitude of positivity for realizing amazing potential and possibilities for your life.
The better aware you are of yourself in the now, the more you can do to choose and decide how your life experiences will be. When that empowers you, it can spread to those around you to their empowerment.
Thank you for coming along on this journey.
This is the five-hundred and twenty-eighth (528) entry of my Positivity series. I hope that these weekly messages might help spread positive energies for everyone. Feel free to share, re-blog, and spread the positivity.
Please visit here to explore all my published works – both fiction and non-fiction.
Follow me here!
