In my latest Sunday blogvotional "See Your Blessings" I decided to challenge myself to write down 7 things each day for which I am thankful for or blessed with. I'm doing this for two main reasons. One is to open my eyes and see the blessings around me and the second is to create a habit of looking for and seeing those blessings. (They say it takes 21 days to create a habit.)
It's so easy to get caught up in our wants and desires. We see more quickly what we don't have and what we still want that we become discontented. I believe that by training ourselves to see the truth in how blessed we truly are - the more content we will be. I would rather live a thankful and contented life than one of ungratefulness and discontentment.
I began my 21 days challenge in hopes of changing my outlook. Before bed I have been writing out my 7 things. At first this seemed pretty easy. A few days into it, sadly, I started to struggle. I can't write the same things every night. That kind of defeats the purpose. And I'm trying hard to stay away from the standard blessings (my family, Jesus, salvation). The reason is because my goal is to look closely at my daily life and see the blessings I tend to overlook.
So as I struggled I realized that not thinking about my blessings until the end of the day was making it harder for me to see them (or remember them). My new strategy is to consciously be on the lookout throughout the day for my blessings. That way when I notice them, I can immediately give thanks for them. The more I notice, the more thankful I'll become. The more thankful, the more grateful. The more grateful, the more joyful. And then I'm right back to receiving another huge blessing from God - a thankful, grateful, joyful, contented life. Sounds good to me.
Join me on the challenge and let me know what you discover!
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