It's good to give thanks, in more ways than you'd think. Those who adopt the attitude of gratitude may very well lead to healthier, happier lives. Read on to find out how.
It’ll Help You Sleep at Night
It Keeps Depression at Bay
Giving thanks is no substitute for therapy or medication, but it does make a difference. Study after study shows that gratitude helps mitigate many depressive symptoms, through positive reframing of depressive thoughts and by generating positive emotions.
It Gives You a More Positive Outlook on Life
Happiness experts Michelle Gielan and Shawn Achor suggest that being grateful for just three simple things a day, over the course of 21 days, can help change your entire worldview. (You must say or write them down, and you can't repeat any of them).
"Doing this trains your brain to see more positives in the world," they told "Today." "Your brain actually gets better at being more positive."
It Helps Strengthen Your Relationships
In the words of psychologist and gratitude expert Robert Emmons, of the University of California, Davis, "I see [gratitude] as a relationship-strengthening emotion because it requires us to see how we've been supported and affirmed by other people."
It Boosts Your Memory
In older adults, aged 60-plus, a gratitude intervention helped improve anxiety and depression, which we might expect, but also led to an increase in specific memories.
It Helps You Forgive
As director of the Stanford University Forgiveness Projects, Fred Luskin teaches about forgiveness. And at the heart of our inability to forgive, he says, is a huge deficit in gratitude. It follows, then, that with increased gratitude and compassion comes the increased ability to truly forgive.
It Makes You More Patient
David DeSteno, a professor of psychology at Northeastern University, designed a study to look at which emotions had an effect on patience—and gratitude topped the list. "We found that gratitude increases people's self-control, and it increases their ability to wait," DeSteno says. "[When] you cultivate gratitude in your life, it's like a self-control buffer. It helps you more frequently be ready to resist temptation and do the right thing, whatever that right thing may be."
