Rewire Your Brain for Happiness with Gratitude

May 1

By Amanda Da Silva, B.Hkin, B.Ed, and M.Ed

5-minute read

Practicing gratitude entails building an awareness and appreciation of the good things around us.

Although it sounds quite simple and obvious, feeling gratitude and expressing it to ourselves and others has tremendous benefits for our physical health and mental well-being. We all tend to express our gratitude to other people at certain times, whether it’s to thank them for a favour or to convey the way we feel about them. With that said, there’s much more that you can get out of this practice.

In fact, gratitude has a great impact on many areas of our lives, including our mental and physical health.

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Gratitude improves sleep quality
Gratitude helps improve mental health
Gratitude reduces stress
Practicing gratitude
Conclusion
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Gratitude improves sleep quality

The benefits of gratitude extend far beyond the psychological realm.

When you practice gratitude, you also get to experience a wide array of physiological benefits as well. Studies [1] [2] show that people who have a dominant gratitude mindset tend to sleep better.

They also have a more **positive attitude**, and they feel in touch with their emotions. Grateful people are less **susceptible** to drastic mood swings and many of the detrimental effects of stress.

Keeping a gratitude journal, for instance, helps in processing emotions and coming to terms with any sources of worry and anxiety.

This also helps curb overthinking by clearing up any unresolved issues that would otherwise affect the quality of your sleep.

Gratitude helps improve mental health

Gratitude reduces stress hormones and regulates the autonomic nervous system functions.

As a result, high levels of the gratitude trait have the potential to alleviate numerous symptoms of depression and anxiety. Neurochemically speaking, feelings of gratitude are associated with a substantial boost in the brain region that is responsible for managing negative emotions, namely guilt, shame, violence, and aggression (as stated earlier).

As a result, people who practice **gratitude**, whether via meditation, journaling, or verbal expressions, are more positive-minded by nature. Practicing gratitude can improve your **mental health**, in part because you are more inclined to recognize the good things in your life.

In this way, an attitude of gratitude can promote satisfaction and fulfillment by expanding what we’ve become adjusted to in our environment, as opposed to the excruciating focus we tend to dedicate toward the negatives.

Gratitude reduces stress

A study on the psychophysiology of gratitude and appreciation found that people who felt grateful showed significantly lower levels of cortisol, the stress hormone.

Not only that but they also had healthier cardiac functioning and were much more resilient to negative experiences and setbacks. Over the years, research has established the fact that by making gratitude a regular practice, we set ourselves for more successful stress management compared to others who don’t.

By simply noticing and enjoying the little things in life, we can rewire the brain to manage present circumstances with increased **awareness** and open perception.

Practicing gratitude

Here are a few gratitude practices you can incorporate into your routine to unlock the benefits of this transformative mindset.

To turn gratitude into a habit, take 30 uninterrupted seconds dedicated to yourself and yourself only.

This could be right after you wake up or right before you go to bed. Then make a mental list of all the things that you encountered that day or the day before and identify what you can be grateful for. Make sure you especially focus on the experiences that instilled you with confidence and positivity. If you direct your attention to finding the good in every situation, you will discover just how powerful gratitude is in bringing meaning and purpose to your life, not to mention nurturing your soul. Gratitude is a beautiful practice to implement into your day.

Even if it seems to be elementary at first, the effects it contributes are truly life changing.

Bringing more gratitude and appreciation into our lives with daily practice is a great starting point.

The practice could involve writing in a journal detailing a minimum of three things that you feel blessed to have each day. If you’re struggling to come up with a full list, you can start with the simple things that many of us tend to take for granted, like food, water, and shelter. Eventually, you will be able to embody and exude gratitude so that you’re able to appreciate everything that makes our reality what it is.

Random acts of kindness are an amazing way to spread love and gratitude.

Paying it forward encourages you to appreciate all that you have and inspires others to join in on the movement as well. You never know the impact a small gesture of kindness can have on another person’s life. Gratitude towards those that we love and cherish and generosity towards strangers helps us create a more positive and welcoming environment. This is something our world needs now more than ever!

Conclusion

Gratitude does not invite you to see the world through rose-colored glasses; it rather helps you develop your awareness of the struggles we endure in life but in a way that builds our awareness of the lessons to be learned from each situation. Often, gratitude helps us see the light even in times of darkness.

Keep up the daily gratitude practice—change your mind, and you change your life!

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