Write a Gratitude Poem
If you’ve been practicing writing gratitudes for awhile, you’re probably pretty good at thinking of things to be grateful for. The next step you might want to take, especially if you’re creative (or want to be) is to explore new ways to express, store, and share your gratitude.
I’ve already shown you a the Notecard method, how to use a Gratitude Journal, and how to use a Monthly Calendar to record your gratitudes.1 My friend Jim (writer of Thursday!), whom I’ve mentioned on other occasions in this blog, gave me another, even more creative example: a Gratitude Poem!
Here’s the poem that Jim wrote for me:
Today, I am grateful for you.
Yesterday, the same was true.
This trend will hold right through
Tomorrow and the day after, too.
Isn’t that a wonderful poem!?! :)
Besides the content, what I found so interesting about the poem is how Jim took something that he’s good at and that that he enjoys doing and used it in his gratitude practice. Jim doesn’t just trudge through his gratitude practice — he finds ways to make it fun.
What do you love doing that you could integrate into your gratitude practice? (Tell me about it by replying to this newsletter!)
I’d like to point out one other amazing thing that Jim did without me having mentioned it here at Primrose Ponderings (yet!). Jim understood instinctively that sharing a gratitude with someone else can bring them joy. In fact, I’ll go out on a limb2 and say that when we share our gratitude with someone else, not only does it make both of us happier, but it also multiplies the value of the gratitude to create happiness for both giver and receiver by creating or renewing a connection between them.3
Are you a poet? Could you write a Gratitude Poem? Even if you don’t consider yourself a poet, you can give it a try. You don’t have to share it with anyone else if you don’t want to.
I couldn’t end this post without giving this a try myself! So here’s a Gratitude Poem for my friend Jim:
You caught my attention with that clarinet.
We became friends without missing a beat.
We tried singing and dancing, laughing, and smiles.
Our times together were sweet.
The decades passed and sometimes we lost touch,
But we always found ways to re-meet.
I’m grateful because you are still my friend,
Even though I wouldn’t take that repeat. ;)4
I will often use the word “gratitude” to describe a tangible thing that is produced when you do a gratitude practice. You might have captured a word, a phrase, or a sentence and it may be written down, spoken, or exist only as a thought. Whatever the case, I will use the word “gratitude” to describe the thing that was produced by your action. It is in this sense that I’ve used the plural “gratitudes.”
It’s not a high limb, so this is pretty safe to say. ;)
I’ll talk more in future posts about how creating connections to others can increase our happiness, but for now, just know that when you reach out and connect to others in a healthy way, it has great potential for increasing your happiness.
This is an inside joke between Jim and me: Once we collaborated musically and Jim discovered unexpectedly that I don’t like taking repeats in music sometimes. LOL.