Many are celebrating this important day. But if you are feeling emotionally exhausted, you are not alone. These past two years have been hard on everyone and happiness seems to be in short supply. Why is it so hard to be happy and is there a way to add happiness to your life? Of course, there are many! And the good news is there is one simple thing you can easily do right away.
‘Grateful Remembering’ and Why it Matters
I have found that no matter is going on, I feel better about my life when I choose to see the glass half full rather than half empty. For example, one thing I remember with so much gratitude is my beloved sheepdog Molly. She got me through a diagnosis of cancer a few years back, these past years of the pandemic, a number of stress filled moves around the country and much more. Molly passed away a few months ago and I miss her every day. But each time I remember how much joy she brought to me, I am uplifted. I have 1001 wonderful memories of our walks, her chasing me around our kitchen island, snuggling in the evenings.
‘Grateful remembering’ is a concept that has been studied. Researchers investigated this form of gratitude as a predictor of hope and happiness (1). Specifically, people that practiced a grateful remembering (versus those in the control group who did not) had significant increases in hope and happiness. This group reflected and wrote about a past hope that was fulfilled and their gratitude for that, which in this study showed promise as a way to strengthen happiness.
The Gratitude Questionnaire (CQ-6)
Did you ever wonder how your gratitude measures up? There is a Gratitude Questionnaire that only has 6 questions on it to answer (2). See below and give it a try. If your scores fall in the category of someone with low levels of gratitude and you would like to up your scores a bit, try this.
Gratitude Journaling
Buy yourself a blank journal and do some grateful remembering once a week. Choose 10 things you are grateful for in your life and why and write them down. I’ve been doing this for over 6 years now and swear by it. Whenever I worry about what is going on in the world (and there is so much to worry about), whenever I am feeling a lack of enough in my life, I turn to my gratitude journal and write. When I am really struggling I do that daily. Try it. I hope you benefit from it as much as I do.
Submitted by Dr. Kristine Theurer
The Gratitude Questionnaire (CQ-6)
Using the scale below write a number beside each statement to indicate how much you agree with it.
1 = strongly disagree
2 = disagree
3 – slightly disagree
4 = neutral
5 = slightly agree
6 = agree
7 = strongly agree
_____1. I have so much in life to be thankful for.
_____2. If I had to list everything that I felt grateful for, it would be a very long list.
_____3. When I look at the world, I don’t see much to be grateful for.*
_____4. I am grateful to a wide variety of people.
_____5. As I get older, I find myself more able to appreciate the people, events, and situations that have been part of my life history.
_____6. Long amounts of time can go by before I feel grateful to something or someone.*
Scoring Instructions:
1. Reverse the scores for questions 3 and 6 (i.e., Where your score would be a 1, change it to a 7 etc., 1=7, 2=6, 3=5, 4=4, 5=3, 6=2, 7=1)
2. Then add scores for items 1-6 (be sure to use the ‘reversed scores’ for items 3 and 6).
Scores totaling 6 – 35 Indicate low levels of gratitude
Scores totaling 36-40 Indicate moderate levels of gratitude
Scores totaling 41-42 Indicate high levels of gratitude (2)
References
- Gratitude predicts hope and happiness: A two-study assessment of traits and states: The Journal of Positive Psychology: Vol 14, No 3 (tandfonline.com)
- McCullough, M. E., Emmons, R. A., & Tsang, J. A. (2002). The grateful disposition: A conceptual and empirical topography. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 82(1), 112-127. doi: 10.1.1.337.3704