The Grateful Three

The Grateful Three: A Gratitude Practice for Change

Sandy and I unknowingly created our gratitude practice, which we now call the grateful three, on one very hard morning when I woke up in more pain than usual with my Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA). Mornings can be difficult for me, which means they are also difficult for her. When I wake up in pain, I immediately start to doubt my ability to make it through the very active and physically challenging day ahead of me. Starting my early morning in a lot of physical pain can also dissolve my hope and enthusiasm, which is incredibly sad because those are two feelings that I really value and like to hold onto.

I bet many of you have had a similar experience of waking up to things that keep you feeling down or make it nearly impossible to feel optimistic. We wake up with fear and anxiety about money, our relationships, our unfulfilling jobs, and parenting our children. We wake up feeling hopeless or overwhelmed, and it usurps our energy. We get stuck inside a continual loop of exhaustion and defeatism. Not the best way to start our day.

But how can we change these feelings when there are so many things in our lives that we can’t actually change? This, in and of itself, feels hopeless, and that is exactly where I was with the painful mornings and the RA that won’t ever leave my life. I can’t change those things, but I can divert my attention to the things that are making me happy in the moment because you can always find something, even when it is hard.

The Grateful Three was born

On that difficult morning, we agreed to each say three things we were grateful for, and Sandy asked me to go first.

I’m pretty sure it was a ploy.

I was in a lot of pain, nervous about my seven-and-a-half-hour shift at Starbucks, and convinced my disease was progressing. My immediate thought in that moment was that I didn’t have anything to be grateful for. That sounded too bratty to say out loud, so I sat there in silence for a moment and gave it some more thought.

I was sitting cross-legged in my jammies on our other-worldly couch. We have the kind of couch that sucks you in so perfectly that nothing bad can get you there. It is a safe haven from all things.

There it is.

1. I am grateful for the couch.

Sandy and I were both drinking our first cup of coffee. Holding the cup of coffee in my hand was both warm and comforting. As a Starbucks employee, I am gifted a new pound of coffee every week. I have access to the most delicious, freshly ground coffee beans in the world, which means we always have the most divine and satisfying coffee.

And there it is again.

2. I am grateful for this cup of coffee.

As I sat on our magic couch, enveloped in my favorite fleece blankets, our chihuahua daughter Vivian had curled herself into a teeny tiny round ball on my lap. She looked so little that I had to cover her in fleece. In the early morning quiet of our apartment, we could both hear Vivian breathing heavily like the overachieving lap dog that she is.

It made my heart soar.

Yup, that’s it.

3. I am grateful for Vivian.

And just like that, the grateful three began. I had taken three fairly mundane things and turned them into extraordinary sparks of joy in what felt like a joyless morning. The negative energy I had woken up with had shifted while I was identifying my three things. Thinking about something else for even a few minutes got me out of my head, and that was helpful.

Sandy went next. Listening to her share three things that she was grateful for gave me a totally different perspective on the day we were starting together. The lift in her voice as she talked about three things that she was grateful for made me feel lighter and less burdened.

It made me happy too.

We started doing it every morning without fail. We did it on good mornings, and we did it on the hardest mornings. We did it while we were sick and when we were well, while sitting in hotels and cruise ships, on our magic couch and in the car.

We named our practice The Grateful Three and have allowed it to become a non-negotiable part of our morning, like brushing our teeth.

Gratitude shifts your focus

Since that very first morning when we searched for something to be grateful for, I have come to understand that gratitude can change the trajectory of your day. When you go looking for things to be grateful for, you actually start to see them everywhere. When you stop pointing out and looking for the things in your life that are going wrong, you will begin to see the small places where things are going right.

I know how difficult it can be to find something to be grateful for when everything feels like it is falling apart. But it is doable when you look for the little things. Allow your Grateful Three to be easy to reach, and do not limit yourself or correct yourself for anything that comes to mind.

I said three of the most obvious things in the room:

Vivian in fleece

1. The couch

2. My coffee

3. The dog

They all felt kind of mundane in the moment, but what I was really expressing was how I felt safe—the couch—abundant—a surplus of delicious Starbucks coffee—and still capable of feeling love even while hurting—Vivian.

The three small, seemingly insignificant things that I came up with were actually pretty profound once they were identified. It made me feel lighter just thinking about them and saying them out loud.

It made a difference in how I was feeling.

Some mornings will be more difficult than others, and that is okay. When you have to dig deep because it’s harder than it was yesterday, I want you to do it anyway because it is still helping.

When you are drowning in a sea of negativity, any small amount of positivity will feel like a life preserver, giving you a moment of reprieve from the struggle.

You deserve to feel positive and hopeful.

I believe in the power of gratitude, and I absolutely believe in you. You have the ability to realign the energy of your day with thoughts that feel more encouraging and supportive.

I know it won’t cure my RA or fix your finances, but it will help us step into our day feeling more centered, hopeful, and optimistic than we were.

And that has tremendous value.

–Sherry Duquet  Yoga Instructor, Author

This post was written in acknowledgement of World Gratitude Day that takes place on September 21st each year.  The inspiration behind the movement is to share a global day of thanks.

Sherry is co-owner of Madeira Beach Yoga and teaches twice weekly on the class schedule, plus many special events.