With Thanksgiving nearly here and the Holiday season approaching, it's easy to forget the true meaning and purpose of this time of year. For those readers not familiar with Thanksgiving, it originally was a Native American annual feast that honored the bounty of the autumn harvest and celebrated the abundance that nature provides. Eventually the European and Native American traditions merged into what we now know as Thanksgiving. In essence, Thanksgiving is truly much more than an American holiday, as it is a way for anyone to "give thanks" and express gratitude for all that we have in life–our health, abundance, love, family, friends, and, of course, the traditional Thanksgiving feast. In this sense, Thanksgiving can be viewed as a universal celebration that everyone can enjoy and honor regardless of your nationality, spiritual faith, or cultural belief.
However you ultimately choose to mark and honor Thanksgiving and the upcoming Holidays, I invite you to remember their original significance–that is to give thanks and cultivate an attitude of gratitude for all the abundance in your life. In fact, researchers in neuropsychology, who study the intimate connection between the brain and emotions, state that gratitude is one of the easiest and healthiest ways to experience overall wellbeing in brain, body, and being. In the past few years, neuroscientists have now begun to recognize that gratitude and compassion are among the most powerful and healthiest of human emotions. Studies at Stanford University and other universities successfully demonstrate that embodying compassion and remembering to be grateful for what we have in life can greatly outweigh any sadness, stress, or challenges we might currently experience.
The reason why expressing gratitude has such a strong effect is its ability to connect you to other people. Generally, when you express thanks you acknowledge the actions of others. Being grateful enables you momentarily to expand your thoughts away from your own individual concerns so that you remember the joy and happiness that others provide. You can learn more about the Neuroscience of Health & Happiness here. Basically, when you experience gratitude or express compassion you hit the proverbial “pause button” in your mind. You shift away from your repetitive thoughts, your worries, and anxiety and begin to focus on authentic happiness, joy, and love. From the perspective of neuroscience, the part of your brain that fires when you give thanks is the left prefrontal cortex, a region just above your left eye that brain scans appear to correlate with feelings of love, compassion, and self-worth. In addition to boosting your emotional and psychological health, cultivating an attitude of gratitude has physical benefits. As you experience greater levels of gratitude, studies show that neurotransmitters in the brain release chemicals to stave off stress, depression, and anxiety.
One of the easiest ways that I find to generate feelings of gratitude is to make a list of all that you’re grateful for in life. Your list might include your family, spouse, partner, children, pet, or possibly even your health, the beauty of nature, and the very fact of being alive. Make copies of this list and place them by your bed, on your office desk, or on the fridge, or places where they are most visible to you. Every time you look at this list, repeat out loud to yourself one thing on your list that you are grateful for in life. Not only verbalize the statement, but truly feel it! Envision that person, place, or idea in your thoughts and connect to the emotion of gratitude and joy that accompany the memory. Like with your body, neuroscience also states that your brain is also a muscle that can be trained and developed. As you cultivate greater gratitude for what you have in life, you automatically experience a healthy attitude toward life!
As you enjoy and commemorate this Thanksgiving always remember all that you have to be grateful. Never forget that the greatest gift is actually your presence in the world. In the beautiful and timely worrds of Melody Beattie: "Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.”
Keep on Living Your Light® as you enjoy Thanksgiving in gratitude, abundance, joy, and wellbeing.
Dr. Jay Kumar
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