Keeping a gratitude diary to thank God/Universe/Nature/our good karma, for big and small things in our lives has been advocated by more people than I care to remember. There are groups, blog hops and more, to encourage this habit, which helps people to feel positive about life, especially when it deals a bad hand. While we smugly credit ourselves for our good fortune, we don’t think twice about blaming someone or something for our misfortunes. It is obviously an unhealthy way to deal with things.

If we were to make it a habit, we are sure to be overwhelmed by the things we are blessed with but blithely take for granted. It takes but a few moments to pause and take stock of things in our lives – a sort of mindfulness exercise by itself. Though I don’t keep a diary, I do pause from time to time to ‘count my blessings’ naming them as I go.

I am not one to keep a gratitude diary or make it a sharing activity in a community. This may be necessary as a supplement to psychological counselling. But I feel it can be done as a way of mindfulness practice through the day, whenever dissatisfaction, hankering after some unattainable thing or other negative thoughts pull us down. Remembering some big or small thing to be grateful for acts like an instant perk-me-up.

I remember reading an article about two friends who did it a bit differently. They kept a record of things – ‘I noticed that….’ around them. It could be the sunrise, the dew on the grass, the smell of coffee and more. They found it so rewarding that they have continued it for several years now and have even made it a movement. I am not able to find the link to that wonderful article to share. We simply fail to notice things around us, which can be extremely calming and rewarding. It is the simplest form of mindfulness. While we might particularly note a glorious sunrise if we are lucky enough to be able to witness one, in the concrete jungles we live in, we certainly might pass by the bush of purple blossoms in the vacant lot on our way to the market, or the way the cooker whistles – so cheerfully! The ‘I notice’ notes these two friends kept were a tribute to mindfulness and gratitude.

We need not express gratitude only if we have something huge to be grateful for – like landing a good job, getting an award or something similar. For starters, it can be as simple as pausing to feel grateful for being able to stay indoors on a hot day, being even more grateful to be able to switch on the fan or AC. And while we are at it, we can feel grateful for uninterrupted power supply in most states today, unlike in the past when we suffered from frequent and regular power cuts. Not too difficult, is it?

For better results, this habit should be inculcated in childhood itself. Teaching them to be grateful for what they do have – whether a toy, a good friend, loving family, or anything else – instead of crying for something that they cannot have. This will greatly reduce tantrums and the tendency to take things for granted.

To be noted is that when we begin the gratitude exercise and keep at it doggedly, it has a humbling effect on us, even making us feel ashamed about cribbing for what we lack, or wish we had. It is somewhat like seeing the glass as half empty, when we could as well see it as half full. I had blogged about how everything is comparative in life and how, by coming to realise that things could have been worse, we can deal with most adverse situations. Read it here. Another research study found that along with counselling, keeping a gratitude journal helped those struggling with mental health issues fare better.

I remember one such humbling occasion, when I was travelling alone by train to the southern Tamil Nadu to visit my sister, and needed to change trains to reach my destination. Those were early days of my loss of vision in my right eye, with the other eye barely functioning due to some complication. The train stopped at the small station where I needed to change, only for a couple of minutes. My co-passengers helped me get off with my luggage. I waited on the platform for my escorts.

I was told to expect two young men, both visually impaired, to meet and escort me to the passenger train on another platform. I hazily saw the two young men — holding hands and running from compartment to compartment, asking people the coach number. I called out to them when they were within earshot and their faces broke into wide smiles followed by solicitous enquiries about my welfare.

Here I was, feeling sorry for myself, and here were the two almost totally blind men, bursting with importance at being entrusted the task of escorting me safely! At that moment I felt small and completely humbled, and my self-pity vanished. If this is not a humbling experience, I don’t know what is.

My escorts, though highly visually impaired, lead normal lives — well as normal as the world around them will let them. They are both teachers and one of them since has got a Doctorate in Tamil Literature, though at that time he was still an undergraduate. It would come as a shock to know that people can sometimes be unsympathetic, even rude and cruel to disabled persons. Would you believe that they are at times deliberately misled, even by the bus conductors, and guided into the wrong buses, with the result that they have to sometimes spend hours retracing their way. Why, even at the station, they were not guided to the right compartment even though they had my coach details. But they are neither bitter not recriminatory.

In the two decades since I lost vision in one eye and the better part of it in the other, I have had to face a lot of adverse situations, many of them involving people who have been curt, rude and sometimes indifferent. Fortunately, the good people have far outnumbered the former category, and I am very grateful to them. See? Gratitude is as easy as that!  

There are hundreds of little things I am grateful for, especially related to my vision. The gratitude exercise has helped me navigate my daily routine, including going out alone, even travelling by train and flight, when needed. I thank my keen sense of smell that helps me know when something I am roasting is ‘done’ without having to check if the ‘golden brown’ shade has been reached! Or my sharpened sense of hearing that lets me know when someone comes from my blind side; or again, my being able to read and write freely, albeit only on the computer or the Kindle. Instead of feeling frustrated and apprehensive about losing the vision slowly and wondering when it will go fully, I try to do all the things that I can, now! These are just related to my vision. There are hundreds of others that I keep calling up and being grateful for, through the day.

While not being one for ‘toxic positivity’, which involves ignoring even practical problems, I do believe that the gratitude exercise helps me maximise my productivity within the limitations.

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