Practicing Gratitude as Medicine

A post-Thanksgiving reflection on the healing power of gratitude + a simple practice you can do anytime to shift from the shadows back to your light

Shining a little brighter after leaning into GRATITUDE on Thanksgiving morning—after I had woken up in a funk that day.

I'm going to piggyback on yesterday's holiday with a post on gratitude. I've never cared much for Thanksgiving (although the food is wonderful)—it was not the most celebrated holiday in my family, and the "Pilgrims and Indians" falsehoods forced on us as children left a bad taste in my mouth (and heart). But that's not what this post is about.

It's about gratitude. The higher emotion that can—and should—exist, even in the midst of historical/political grievance, stress, familial tension, or, as in my case, chronic illness.

It is easy to feel gratitude when circumstances are fair, health and wealth are in abundance, and the proverbial sun is shining down upon you. Gratitude, in those moments, rises from within with ease and glows like a warm ember. It is effortless.

In more trying moments, gratitude is a willful practice. It's a result of effort—not an effort to conjure up gratitude, but rather to allow it into your heart, where it is always present (if you let it be). It's an effort to move out of the way so gratitude can shine.

A Gratitude Practice to Shift Your Energy

When I awoke on Thanksgiving morning, I did so from a negative dream. Someone from my past was there, and they mistreated me. When I came to, I felt the energy of that dream lingering. I was sad, my energy heavy. I felt like withdrawing into myself, as I often do when I'm upset.

But here I was, on a day that—regardless of the circumstances of its origins—is founded on the concept of gratitude. As I felt my brain drifting down old, familiar alleyways (dark and shrouded in shadows), I made a choice. I decided to take the steering wheel back into my own hands.

First, I took a bath. Because water is magic—a healer and a friend. And while I sat in that soothing water, I practiced the ABCs of Gratitude, a practice I turn to pretty much daily (or nightly).

It's as simple as it sounds. For each letter of the alphabet, I think of at least one (and often several) things that I'm grateful for. (Yes, Q and X get a lot of repeated words.)

I use this practice to help control my thoughts when I'm trying to fall asleep. Or when I feel anxious, sad, or otherwise unwell. I also do it while I'm walking in nature, because it just feels so fitting there. Do it anytime. It's a great alternative to mindless scrolling when you're bored.

How Practicing Gratitude Heals

Taking control of your brain is one of the best ways of taking control of your emotional and energetic state. Our brains rule us, and they are often running on autopilot. Repeating old, outdated, and outright outrageous thoughts you picked up along the way.

When we catch ourselves caught in false thought loops, giving the brain something intentional to do is an effective way of taking back the reins. Rather than rehashing that time you drooled during a speech in front of your sixth-grade class for the thousandth time, decades later, you can occupy your brain with a simple task. You can redirect it.

Gratitude feels good—whether it's the kind that wells up in you on your own, or the gratitude you nudge your brain into while it's on a rampage. There's science behind that. Gratitude changes your brain chemistry. It activates the brain's reward system, releasing dopamine and serotonin, your feel-good chemicals. They improve your mood and reduce stress.

It also signals your body to relax, allowing you to shift into your parasympathetic nervous system—your state of healing and repair. This is the state you need to be in to heal, to detox, to digest, and to rest. It encourages better sleep and allows for optimal immune function in the body.

Evidence This Practice Works

The evidence is in your state, before and after practicing.

When I can't fall asleep at night, and my mind is racing, this practice calms me down. Sometimes I can't even make it past a few letters. Sometimes I have to go through the whole alphabet and start again. But it always puts me to sleep.

When I'm upset, like I was on Thanksgiving morning, it pulls me out of the shadows. I spoke my gratitude into the bath and let the sadness go. I cried—and tears are potent medicine for release, energetically and physically—and then I laughed. And by the time I was done, the state had passed.

I could have spent that whole day in a funk. And I've been guilty of that more times than I'd like to admit. But it's unnecessary. It's a game our brains try to play with us. When we catch them, though, we can win.

We can win with gratitude.

Final Thoughts: Gratitude For the Hard Things

After living with chronic illness for 6+ years, I can say this with certainty. Gratitude is THE supplement we all need. I spent years thinking of EBV (Epstein-Barr Virus) as an evil little alien destroying me from the inside. I lived in fear of it. I felt hatred for it.

Somewhere along the line, I decided to get delusional about it. I decided to love it. To be grateful for it. Because sometimes our best teachers are not the kind ladies who stand in front of our classrooms or the wise old men spewing sagely advice.

Sometimes (All the time?) they're the darkest shadows. The deepest pain. The things we reject and try to run from. And that was the case for me and this illness. It has taught me. It has brought me back into my body after traumas disassociated us. It has shown me what it means to love and care for myself—the kind of love we grow up yearning for from other people. Unconditional love.

One day, back in March of this year, I sat down and wrote a letter of gratitude to EBV. It was long and heartfelt, and I meant every word. It was under a full moon, a lunar eclipse. It was magical.

And when I woke up the next day, the virus was gone. It stayed gone for a full six months. I have no logical explanation for this, but in my heart, I know it was an energetic shift born from gratitude. It was a moment of magic. It was medicine. It was what my soul came here to learn.

I'll leave you with that. And my profound gratitude that you're here with me.

~ Christine

PS - I have two new coloring pages up since I last wrote, and one more on the way. And yes, it's all about GRATITUDE.