A Practice that Always Keeps Me in High Energy
ByWhen I went through a post-partem depression after my daughter was born, I felt God gave me a prescription to do three things:
- walk every day
- write three pages of longhand first thing in the morning (“morning pages” ala Julia Cameron)
- keep a “gifts journal,” writing down at least three things that felt like gifts to me.
I’ve been doing all three directives ever since for 27 years. The “gifts journal” turned into my book, Abundant Gifts.
Recently some serious challenges have been thrown at me (as if what’s been happening in the world over the past three years isn’t enough), and I’m clinging more than ever to keeping my “gifts journal.”
I want to stay in the energy of gratitude, which seems to create a frequency of resilience that allows a lot of stress to bounce off of me.
Or at least it counteracts stress to a great degree.
When I look for at least three gifts a day, I always find at least three. Usually more. Julie Bjelland strongly encourages us to keep a “positives journal,” citing the brain statistic that it takes eight positives to overcome one negative, because of our brain’s “negativity bias.” (We’re wired to look for the negative, for danger.)
How about you? Are you up for a challenge? Will you commit yourself, for the next seven days at least, to writing down, in one place, at least three things per day that feel like gifts?
Post your gifts, if you are open to it, as a comment below. Let’s share what we’re receiving. That will open us up to seeing and receiving more.
If you want a pointer on how to keep a gifts journal, plus a free place to do it, go here.
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from Anne, after she’d been keeping her gifts journal for a few weeks:
“I have been working on the gifts journal. I was at first writing down what I’m grateful for, but thinking about it in the light of, ‘wow I was really frustrated when I sat in traffic, what do I think the Lord was doing with that and did anything good come out of it?’ is a new way of looking at the negative in a more positive light. I love this. Sometimes I don’t know, but I can get curious and say, ‘ok, I wonder what the Lord will do with this. I’ll just be patient.’” –Anne M., California
I love this! This is the kind of perspective shift that’s possible.
