After being single for 25 years, I remarried this January. Two weeks later, my husband, Denny, got transferred to the East Coast (we had both lived in Seattle for 35 years). I quit my job, we loaded our furniture on a moving van and boarded a flight to DC.
Denny's company was relocating him to lead 300 engineers in a new transportation project from Bethesda to New Carrollton, Maryland. For the first few months, the position required him to work 14 hour days, so I found myself alone in an empty apartment with no furniture. On top of that, I broke my glasses so couldn’t read or write anything serious.
But I considered myself resilient. I raised three children as a single mom, while working full time and going back to college. In the long roll of history, I had done some difficult things in my life. Yet, one morning, I sat on the hardwood floor and started to cry uncontrollably. I missed my friends, my daughters, my grandkids.
Then I remembered the work of Fred Luskin. During his graduate studies at Stanford University in Clinical Psychology he felt that he was being trained to encourage people to wallow in their woe rather than move onto a joyful existence. Abandoning his academic paradigm, he began to research: What creates a happy life? He discovered attributes that, across the globe, joyful people shared.
The number one quality: Gratitude.
Today, Luskin teaches Happiness classes at Stanford and tells his students that if they are always seeking some new high or possession, they can easily end up dissatisfied. Even in their abundance, they can find life lacking. He suggests that the next time they are standing in line at Starbucks thinking, “I’m waiting too long for my camel macchiato!” instead they contemplate what a luxury it is to have 30 drinks to choose from and enough money to buy a $5 coffee.
I started to consider all I had to be grateful for:
- I had a wealth of food, compared to the 950 million people on earth who don’t have enough to eat, right at this moment.
- I lived in the US with freedoms and opportunities that many in the world did not have.
- I had clean water to drink and a roof over my head—a roof that was not being bombed.
My mind continued the list:
- I loved and adored my wonderful husband.
- My family, and Denny’s family, were happy and healthy.
- I was living in a fascinating new city.
- This was a chance to seek out new adventures and make new friends.
It was time to stop contemplating my woe, and, as Luskin suggests, be relentlessly grateful, constantly reminding myself of what I have.
I got my sorry butt up and took a cab to the Washington Monument.
EXERCISES:
Visualize
--Close your eyes and take a deep breath. Think of something that you are grateful for: your parents, children, friends, fish tacos in San Diego, Wallace Falls on Stevens Pass.
How does it feel to be grateful?
Research shows, in that moment, your system literally “rebooted”. Your heart rate went down your muscle tension decreased, your internal organs relaxed. This thankfulness has affected your nervous system. In contrast, when we are in fight or flight mode, or angry or resentful, our bodies never truly rest or reset.
Keep a Gratitude Journal
--Keep a daily gratitude journal, listing items for which you feel grateful, large and small. Spend five minutes at the end of each day writing down what made you thankful in the last 24 hours. In addition to the more obvious blessings, include simple things, such as seeing a sunset or your child’s smile.
Say Thank You
--Make it a habit to thank people you appreciate.