Can Gratitude for What You Have Get You What You Desire?
Yes. But it also alters what you genuinely desire in important, positive ways.
Overall, I have an amazing life.
I’m deeply grateful for all that I have. This begins with the basic necessities. This includes ample food, more than adequate shelter, and enough clothing that I need to donate things I seldom or never wear to a worthwhile charity.
Beyond the basic necessities of life – food, clothing, shelter – I am incredibly grateful for the other “needs” that are fulfilled. I have a phenomenal wife, great friends, family, cats, and tons of love and support. When it comes to material things, I have a great car, my home office equipment, a smartphone, books, and various tchotchkes collected and gifted to me over the years.
I have an amazing life. And for that, I have tremendous gratitude.
Gratitude is something we easily take for granted. That’s not anyone’s fault, per se. But when you live in a mass-consumption, consumer-driven, fear-based society, gratitude is easy to shunt away and take for granted.
By having gratitude for what you already have, you can get what you desire. However, having and expressing gratitude for all you already have alters your desire in positive ways.
Do you really need that?
Advertising bombards you everywhere you turn. From billboards to vehicle wraps to TV and the internet, someone’s selling you something from every angle.
The hype and hoopla can utterly draw you in. Nearly subconsciously, you believe that driving the Acura over the Honda equivalent vehicle will improve your status. If the tech you have isn’t up to date, you’ll look bad, be mistreated by others, and suffer.
Every year, Apple releases a new iPhone. Don’t get me wrong – I’m a huge fan and love my iPhone. But I don’t feel the need to upgrade annually or biannually. Overall, I’ve only upgraded when my existing smartphone started to run out of memory, not hold a charge, and its functionality was increasingly slipping away.
The point is – I don’t need to upgrade my phone just because a newer and “better” iPhone has been released.
When it comes to what you desire – especially the tangible – it’s easy to fall prey to this. Do you really need that car, watch, home, designer outfit, or the like? Will what you desire have genuine, real meaning for your life experience?
This can also be applied to the intangible. Do you really need that person, experience, validation, release of endorphins? Or do you think you need it to be better, happier, healthier – because you genuinely desire it, or you believe that you should?
The best way to answer if you really need that is mindfulness.
Gratitude and mindfulness
Mindfulness – as I define it – is active conscious awareness of your inner being. It’s achieved by a combination of sensory input (via your 6 senses) and knowing – in the present, here and now:
- What you’re thinking
- How and what you’re feeling
- What your intentions are
- What actions you are or aren’t taking
Being consciously aware of these makes you mindful. And it tells you, right now, who, what, where, how, and why you are.
When you’re present and actively consciously aware, you can recognize what you do have. Material and immaterial, mindfulness opens the door to look and see what you have for your life.
With this awareness, you can offer thanks and practice gratitude for those things.
Why is that important? Because if you’re not grateful, how do you expect to change anything or get anything new?
For example – as a child, you probably got things from your parents. With a few exceptions, I suspect they told you that saying “thank you” for what you received strengthened bonds and made them more willing to give you other things. And when you didn’t give gratitude for what you got, they were less inclined to give you more.
Unfortunately, this also sometimes gets expressed in the immaterial. Conditional love instead of unconditional love can do a lot of harm.
Even when it comes to the impersonal – the powers that be, God, the supreme being, the Universe, or just the random ethers – gratitude gets you more, too. But more importantly, genuine gratitude is never negative, and this positive action empowers when both given and received.
Thinking, feeling, and saying “thank you” builds bridges
Often, we believe that we desire something that we don’t truly desire. Advertising sells us a product we believe we need – tangible or intangible – to better our life experiences.
This can be both blatant and subtle – sometimes both. They tell you without item “X” you’ll suffer. That suffering might be physical, mental, emotional, spiritual – or all the above. But they will do everything they can to convince you to buy their goods and/or services because without them you’re lesser.
When you practice mindfulness, you’re creating inner self-awareness of your thoughts, feelings, actions, and intentions. That active, conscious self-awareness in the now makes you wholly present. Once you gain mindfulness within, you can look at the intangibles you have. Your emotions become clearer.
Then, you can turn your head, heart, and soul to your outer world. With a clear perception, you can see the things you have, the people in your life, and the good therein. When you see this from such a clear, mindful perspective, it’s apparent the good you have.
Sure, it might be imperfect. Guess what? Everyone is perfectly imperfect. Room for improvement is part of life’s experience. This is how we grow, evolve, and gain greater knowledge and wisdom – both individually and collectively.
When you express gratitude by thinking, feeling, and saying “thank you”, you open your heart. This is a positive frequency elevator that raises your frequency. Higher frequency energetic vibration is positive. Since like attracts like, you invite more of what you desire to you.
Gratitude also shows you – and the Universe – if your desire is genuine or based on consumerism. When you’re grateful for what you have, what you need – really need – becomes clearer and easier to get. Ergo – yes, gratitude for what you have can get you what you genuinely desire.
Expressing gratitude for what you have to get what you genuinely desire isn’t hard
It’s all about working with mindfulness of your thoughts, feelings, and intentions to direct your actions.
When you recognize and acknowledge that you have things in your life to express gratitude for, you can better recognize if what you think you desire is something you genuinely desire. Knowing that gratitude for what you already have opens the way to draw more good to your life, you recognize if your desire for anything tangible or intangible is genuine, necessary, and worth your time and effort.
This empowers you – and in turn, your empowerment can empower others around you.
Taking an approach to positivity and 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 sixth (506) 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.
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