Sunday, November 1, 2009

Using Gratitude to Change the Mood

One recent morning as my husband and I were loading the children into the car for school, I was feeling stressed out and overwhelmed. I was trying to talk to my husband, and the kids kept interrupting. We couldn’t even get a sentence out before one of them had something to tell us. I felt very frustrated and firmly asked the kids to “give us a minute.”


Of course, that made me feel worse.

As we started driving to school, the energy in the car was negative and heavy. I didn’t want the day to start like this, so I tried to think of what I could do to change the mood. I remembered my life coach taught me that gratitude can do just that.

I asked the kids to tell me what they were grateful for. This is an exercise we do almost daily – but I’ve never purposefully used it to change the mood.

Alyssa said she was grateful for school, the playground, her friends and trees. Tyler mentioned his family, school and his teachers. I told them I was thankful for a car to get us to and from school, for their health, for Paul’s help getting them ready for school that morning and for a beautiful sunrise.

We continued to talk about the things that made us feel grateful most of the way to school. I noticed the mood in the car literally lifted and turned into positive energy.

It felt great to give Tyler a kiss and see his big, sweet smile as he got out of the car to go into school that morning. I knew I had started his day off on the right foot…and for that, I am grateful!

1 comment:

  1. Been there done that, as well as acted, which is of course more fulfilling! Sometimes our precious schedules don't let us act, but if we do somehow it works out. Great article! Sincerely Evy

    ReplyDelete