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Living in a state of thanksgiving touches and transforms every area of our lives. Although this state is a profoundly powerful way to be joyful and content, create abundance, and enhance our spiritual connection and health, it can be a difficult habit to cultivate. Eric Hoffer writes, “The hardest arithmetic to master is that which enables us to count our blessings.” The good news is that it’s never too late to learn.

Let’s close our eyes for 1 minute and let everything that we’re most grateful for fill our minds. If a stray thought comes up, gently refocus on the people, events and things that we’re genuinely thankful to have had at some point in our lives. After 1 minute our emotional state is lighter and we’re consciously aware of how blessed we are. After 5 minutes we have a big smile, feel relaxed, refreshed, happy and heart-centered. We also raise our energy’s vibrational rate, which not only allows healing to take place, it allows for an easier connection with our guides and angels. Manifesting with this higher vibrational rate naturally attracts our heart’s desires because we’re now a vibrational match to the things that make us happy. In order to maintain this state of mental, physical and spiritual abundance throughout the day, we need learn how to have the majority of our thoughts be centered on gratitude.

The Majority Rules

Our habitual thoughts create our emotions. If we’re in the habit of finding fault in others and ourselves or tend to focus on the downside of things, then our dominant emotional state will not be one of happiness or of gratitude. According to studies in mind-body medicine, habitual negative thoughts impact our physical bodies by suppressing the immune system and also lead to cardiovascular diseases. We not only create our states of emotions and health, but we create the abundance in our lives with our habitual thoughts.

Often in my practice people tell me that their lives are still a messy or painful experience even though they spend at least 5 minutes a day faithfully doing the gratitude exercise or positive affirmations. This is because spending 5 minutes a day in gratitude does not create what we seek if we’re spending the rest of the 960 minutes entertaining negative thoughts. It’s the thoughts we give the majority of our energy to that does the majority of the creating.

Being thankful becomes a habit through choosing to perceive our life and the world around us as positive. A good example is when Buddha said, “Let us rise up and be thankful, for if we didn't learn a lot today, at least we learned a little, and if we didn't learn a little, at least we didn't get sick, and if we got sick, at least we didn't die; so, let us all be thankful.”

Realize that most things in life fit the analogy of the glass being both half full and half empty. When we focus on the fullness of the glass we experience the fullness of life. Conversely if we focus on the emptiness of the glass then our experience is one of emptiness. There are always negative things around us but when we choose to focus on them we bring them into our lives and we expand it by giving our energy to it. So let go of the negatives including judging them. We aren’t being naïve people in this act; we’re being empowered people who choose to find and to focus on the positive and being thankful for them.

Constantly reaping the benefits of living in a state of thankfulness occurs once our dominant thoughts are about gratitude. Setting out reminders, keeping a journal of all that we’re grateful for, memorizing quotes about giving thanks and gratitude or leaving ourselves little notes are all wonderful ways to keep us mindful of thankfulness. There also some inspirational quotes to use at the end of this article.

Thankfulness is a Shortcut

Choosing to be thankful stops a negative thought cold and brings us out of negative emotions. We consciously shift thoughts about worry, judgment or fear by letting go of those thoughts and choosing to focus on what we’re thankful for instead. When something stressful happens or we feel hurt or angry, we can stop, take a breath and think of things we’re thankful. When we revisit the situation with this attitude of being thankful we’ll find that there’s a quick remedy for the situation or it’s actually not as bad as we initially thought.

Even situations where we simply can’t find anything positive about it we can at least be thankful that it came to us, ultimately, from a place of love. We can choose to trust and be grateful knowing that it would not have come to us if it didn’t serve a higher purpose. We can choose to be grateful for the unconditional love that God and the Universe has for us at all times and be thankful for the power of love to guide us. We can choose to look ahead expecting that we’ll come through it as a more empowered and centered person who now has the added self-esteem of knowing we’ve completed a difficult life lesson.

Thank You, The Magic Words

Our mothers were right, please and thank you are magic words, especially thank you. Make it a habit throughout the day to look for and find things to be grateful for and utter a ‘thank you’ each time we find one. Say it out loud or silently-it doesn’t matter. Nothing is too big or too small. The key is that we’re constantly on the look out for things to be grateful for and then we get to utter those magic words. It’s actually our intention, but we can have some fun with it and image that these magic words are like an incantation that unlocks the power the state of thanksgiving brings.

Although the majority of us were not born into families that taught us the secret power of gratitude we all have the ability to learn the habit of thanksgiving. Give as much time and energy as needed to establish and maintain a state of thanksgiving. Let this season of Thanksgiving launch us all into a life long state of thanksgiving. And while we’re giving thanks, don’t forget to be thankful for yourself and for your wisdom in choosing to unleash the power of thanksgiving.

Inspirational Quotes of Gratitude and Thanksgiving “To speak gratitude is courteous and pleasant, to enact gratitude is generous and noble, but to live gratitude is to touch Heaven.”- Johannes A. Gaertner

“Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos into order, confusion into clarity.... It turns problems into gifts, failures into success, the unexpected into perfect timing, and mistakes into important events. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today and creates a vision for tomorrow.” - Melodie Beattie

"If you want to turn your life around, try thankfulness. It will change your life mightily." - Gerald Good

“Feeling grateful or appreciative of someone or something in your life actually attracts more of the things that you appreciate and value into your life." -Christiane Northrup

"Develop an attitude of gratitude, and give thanks for everything that happens to you, knowing that every step forward is a step toward achieving something bigger and better than your current situation." -Brian Tracy

“Let us rise up and be thankful, for if we didn't learn a lot today, at least we learned a little, and if we didn't learn a little, at least we didn't get sick, and if we got sick, at least we didn't die; so, let us all be thankful.” –Buddha

"Do not under estimate the Power Of Thoughts. Just as water has the power to shift and mold earths landscape, your thoughts have the power to shift and mold the landscape of your life" -Chuck Danes

“Remember, our feelings and thoughts send out a vibration and LOA reciprocates in like kind. Like attracts like. If our feelings and thoughts are positive then the vibration we are sending out is 'positive' or some might say a 'high' vibration.”- By AnaMaria Herrera

“The pilgrims made seven times more graves than huts… nevertheless, set aside a day of thanksgiving.”- H. W. Westermayer

”As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them.” John Fitzgerald Kennedy

”Remember God's bounty in the year. String the pearls of His favor. Hide the dark parts, except so far as they are breaking out in light! Give this one day to thanks, to joy, to gratitude!” - Henry Ward Beecher

”Gratitude is the heart's memory.” - French Proverb

”Grace isn't a little prayer you chant before receiving a meal. It's a way to live.” -Jackie Windspear

”You say, 'If I had a little more, I should be very satisfied.' You make a mistake. If you are not content with what you have, you would not be satisfied if it were doubled.” -Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Katherine Aaron, NMD holds degrees in naturopathic medicine, counseling and religion and works with a group of loving and powerful non-physical healers, teachers, angels, awakeners and ascended masters who collectively call themselves Guidance. She is recognized both internationally and in the U.S. for her Channeled Life Readings (CLR), which allows anyone to speak directly with Guidance. Visit her website for more information at http://www.askguidance.com