Keeping a Gratitude Journal

I have often found January a tough month with the anti-climax after all the busyness and festivities of Christmas.  January can be the worst month of the year for me: it is cold, dark, with short days and there is nothing special to look forward to in the near future.

Giving myself Reiki on a daily basis has improved my health, including my mental and spiritual health.  I have also found other practices that help me and I would like to share one of them with you as a gift to welcome the New Year...

Keeping a Gratitude Journal

All you need to do is find a lovely notebook that gives you pleasure to handle and a good pen or pencil you enjoy writing with.  A simple notebook will do, but if it is a thing of beauty it will encourage you to pick it up each day.  Then simply write down in the book, at the end of each day, 5 things that you are grateful for.  You need to write 5 different things, but you can write the same things again the next day if you want to.

You could write down people you are grateful to have in your life, your home, your animal friends or the food you eat.  You could write about something of beauty you have seen or experienced during the day, such as waking up after a good sleep, being free from pain or meeting an old friend.

I made a commitment to keeping a Gratitude Journal for a year and ended up doing it every day for 2 years.  As I didn’t find it easy to practice anything on a daily basis this was truly amazing!  After a bad day it was often difficult to think of 5 things; but on those days it helped me to refocus on the blessings in my life.  Then I was able to go to sleep with those positive thoughts in my head, instead of staying awake and worrying about the bad things.  Also I was able to look back at previous days and see how much good there is in my life.

Sometimes I had more than 5 things to write and this brought home to me the wonderful abundance of my life.  Writing the gratitude journal each day seemed to allow more abundance to come into my life too.  I attended a workshop on the Reiki Principles only 6 months after starting this practice and we were asked to spend a 10 minutes writing down things we were grateful for. I wrote for the whole time without stopping and still could have written more, thanks to being so much in touch with gratitude in my life.  And I noted that the Reiki Principles encourage us to SHOW gratitude, in other words make it an action, not just a thought.  Keeping a gratitude journal does just that!

So why not make it a resolve for this year to keep a gratitude journal?  It is a simple thing to do that will help to improve the quality of your life.

From an article in my 2007 January newsletter

Thank You Letter

After Christmas, as a child, I was encouraged to write thank-you letters for the gifts I received.  At the time it seemed a chore, but I’m grateful to my parents for teaching me the importance of gratitude.  So as the New Year begins I am writing this letter of thanks for some of the Reiki gifts received in the past year.

Thank you to everyone who chose to come for Reiki treatments: for some it was a new experience, for others a continuation of the Reiki journey.  To those who decided to try Reiki for the first time I’m grateful you overcame any reservations you may have had and gave it a go!  Thank you to those who continued to receive healing for your faith in Reiki.

Thank you to all the new students who learned Reiki last year.  You have given yourselves a great gift, and it was also a joy and an honour for me to be able to teach you.  I’m also grateful to those students who decided to deepen their Reiki learning by doing Second Degree.  It’s always exciting for me to open up even more potential with Reiki, so thank you for your commitment and dedication to the practice that led you to move forwards.

Thank you to all my existing students who have supported the Reiki Shares and other classes over the past year.  Whether you came to several or just one, it’s always good to see you, hear the stories you have to share and how you are integrating Reiki in your life.  I always enjoy receiving Reiki from my students – I am often moved by the feeling of your Reiki hands, knowing that I helped you to have this healing gift.

Thank you to the Second Degree students who sent me Reiki recently when I hurt my back, rescuing a sheep.  I was touched to receive so many messages of support and it was wonderful feeling the waves of warmth soothing my back.  Asking for help isn’t easy, so this experience was a good learning experience too, showing me that help is forthcoming in abundance when needed if I just ask!

I’m grateful for the opportunity to work with Phyllis Furumoto this year in various ways, helping to support her teaching in the UK and other countries.  I was honoured to be invited to be a ‘docent’ at the retreat in Spain, helping to facilitate the process of the group.  It was also wonderful to be asked to teach some songs to what I realised later was the biggest ‘choir’ I’d ever led!

I’m grateful to my friends and colleagues in The Reiki Association and Reiki Council.  I am constantly excited and surprised by where Reiki is taking us and delighted with the growing connections between Reiki people.

Thank you to Jenny Bracelin who has been my business coach over the past year.  I’m grateful for her help and encouragement through what has not been an easy year to be in a small business.  I know that many small businesses have not been able to survive, so I’m grateful that I have been financially supported so that I was able to continue to offer the gift of Reiki for my living over the past year.

I'm grateful to my Reiki master Martha Sylvester for teaching me Reiki and lastly (for now) I’m grateful to Reiki for the healing, growth and comfort I’ve received this year.  Thank you, Thank you, Thank you.