We send out ecards, evites, emails and maybe even text messages to our family, co-workers, friends and service providers. We try our best to make sure nothing is forgotten and all our year-end tasks are completed so that we might get a few moments of solitude. Only then can we soak up all the things we’re grateful for and experience the joy of the season.
When we’re appreciative, we’re filled with a sense of well-being and swept up by a feeling of joy. This joy is the simplest form of gratitude. The decorations we hang heighten the senses we feel around this time of year. The food we prepare expresses that joy, and when people rave about it, we feel appreciated. When people open our gifts and we hear “I love this! It’s exactly what I wished for!” we feel that all the effort we put into shopping and wrapping was worth it. And then we clean up and reset for the next year, and that sense of joy dulls within hours.
We all feel grateful, but oftentimes we don’t express it outwardly. Thankfulness is far more powerful and meaningful when you deliver it verbally, yet many of us don’t practice “the attitude of gratitude”: stopping during our busy days and telling people that we appreciate them and the things they do.