Gratitude Index: Being Thankful in 2010

Since the year is coming to an end, it's natural that there's enough to evaluate before ringing in the year 2011, and looking back on what the world was thankful for in 2010 sounds like just the right thing to me!

A while back I randomly came across a website called ThankfulFor, which positions itself as "an online gratitude journal and gratitude sharing community focused on the pursuit of happiness". Not only did I like it because it's obviously a great idea and I felt ideologically connected, but I was also drawn to it upon doscovering some coincidences and similarities: the main coincidence being the fact that both our thankful projects were started in September 2009, and the similarity being the projects' grateful outcomes - namely, gratitude indexes.

ThankfulFor.com was operating for a little over a year when thankful people behind it decided to analyze the data from a percentage of the journal's public posts to see what their community was most thankful for in 2010, and here's the infographic they came up with:

(view full report here)

When I first saw it, I realized I was seeing a noticeably similar thankful trend among the people taking my survey. Here's the pie chart of the things the survey respondents have been reporting feeling most thankful for so far:

The percentage of people thankful for people in both our infographics is strikingly similar - 45,2% and 44%! I thought this was just too good not to share. I then decided to take another look at my own thanksgiving year and I could still see a certain pattern - mostly I was thankful for various life givens and episodes, followed by all things I labelled inspiration, with people coming in third. Then there were health, nature, personal growth, trips/vacations, all things food and beverage, closing in with looks and beautiful things. Personally, I am very satisfied with all of the data - I love the values I see people expressing! 

Where do you think your thankfulness would rank? And what do you think about these findings, are the results any close to what you'd expect to see?

What a Year of Gratitude Did to Me: Raw Facts, Pt. 1





There are enough of skeptics out there, and even though I've completed my '365 Thanks' self-challenge 3 months ago I am still asked what it gave me and whether it was worth it at all. Instead of rolling my eyes at what seemed so obvious to me, I decided to calm down, sit down and make a list of things that I observed changing in me. Below are the facts, part 1 of raw facts, for all of the wandering souls out there who doubt the worthiness of my thankful efforts. So, let's see:

1. I don’t really get upset that much any more.
2. I feel much more comfortable when it comes to making distant future plans.
3. I’ve became a much more cheerful person and this is something other people actually now notice about me. Just recently someone told me the first thing they noticed about me and would never forget was my broad smile upon saying hello to them... I would never forget them saying it either, because this might as well be the first time someone told me something like that. And I honestly believe such thing would have never be applied to me if it wasn’t for my year of gratitude that did this magic to me.
4. I get up in the morning and I look forward to every day. This hadn't quite happened since I was a child, so definately feels positively new. I think it’s because I now know that no matter what the day ahead holds for me, I will be able to remain positive through whatever.
5. Not only my year of gratitude showed me what my true passions were, it totally showed me all the ways I could try to pursue my hopes and dreams. How is that not good?
6. My thankful project linked me to some truly amazing people I would have never known or talked to otherwise. And I am definately thankful to have all of you here - you are now a huge part of my mental re-birth, if I can put it this way!

Image via

If Life Handed You Lemons, What Would You Do?

If life hands us lemons, we're told to make lemonade... But, in my opinion, sculptor and writer Bridgette Mongeon offers a much better scenario, suggesting that a true winner might as well just take it all. She says:

"If life wanted to hand me lemons, I'd not only make lemonade, but I'd use the zest for cookies, plant seeds for future fruit and turn the rind into compost to grow flowers, all the while giving thanks for lemons."

Now how about that? With such attitude, anything is possible! If we translate the lemon talk to human language and take a look at Bridgette, it's no wonder she's just as many things as she suggets - a portrait artist, sculptor, writer, educator, wife and mom and a public speaker on topics such as marketing, social media, business of art, creativity, progressive education and spirituality. Food Lemons for thought, anyone? 


Image via

Travel & Thank: Day 14. The Day When I Was Supposed to Leave Country C.

As my neighbor here put it, “be scared of your heart’s desires”. Did I want to leave? No. Did I actually leave? No! I’m still here.

It’s just another case of silver lining in my life. Or another case of things going a certain way if it’s just written that they have to go a certain way. Everything happens for a reason, I believe in that.

So, what happened is, a few hours before leaving the house for the airport, I got a huge allergic reaction to something in my smoothie - I am yet to find out what that was. It started off normally but over the course of an hour and a half it grew into something terrifying – my face swelled, became tomato-red and increased in size, making every mimic wrinkle and every little skin imperfection I had stand out and thus making me look like an old ugly lady. My chest started itching crazily and, just like my face, it got red and was on fire, as if I was badly sunburned. Then it started spreading to my body and I started getting random white and red spots on my back, stomach and even underarms. The palms of my hands were burning and covered with weird white spider web like pattern, my wrists swelled, turned red, the veins also became more visible and got darker in color. Then the redness from the wrists started spreading further to my arms and all of my body started itching... And that’s how I arrived at the airport.

To make a long story short, I was taken to the doctor there and even though by that time I was getting much, much better, he still said he wouldn’t recommend I took the flight that night, but the final decision in my case was up to the plane captain. They contacted the plane crew and the captain refused to take me on board. My luggage was taken off,  I as taken to a few more airport offices and saw some more people, then I received back my ticket and was let go an hour or so later.

It all sounds pretty bad, but let me tell you – it could’ve been so much worse. At least I’m feeling well and I’m alive, at least I have a place to stay at, I have the money, I have food, my visa is still valid and I’m working on putting me on some other flight back home. Me and my family are really thankful it happened in this country, where I feel at home enough and can both take care of myself and be taken care of.

I’m thankful to the airport crew too, who had all been really kind, helpful and supportive, and I am thankful to my neighbor here, who has also been amazing and so willing to help out.

Needless to say, I am feeling super lucky. Not only did I not die, but my wish to stay here in country C. longer came true too. Oh thank you!

P.S. Next morning when I woke up at aunt's house that became such a dear place already, I was greeted with a plethora of rose colored flower petals by the front door... Beautiful.

Disclaimer: Travel & Thank™ is a mini-project within and is part of The ‘Thank You’ Project blog ©2009-2010. Travel & Thank™ updates are featured twice a week, are pre-written and not made in real time - each post was created during the author’s actual vacation in the mid-fall of 2010. For privacy reasons the names of the persons, places and geographical locations may have been shortened, abbreviated or changed and are not subject to disclosure.

Stay Tuned: the Story Behind the Change of Travel Plans

Do you remember the traveling update from a while back where I mentioned a "certain circumstance that wasn't planned" and due to which my first trip abroad after the thanksgiving year had to be prolonged by almost twice as much?

Well, the mysterious "circumstance" is to be revealed tomorrow - in a Friday's final Travel&Thank post! Stay tuned and gather all your gratitude... That is, if you want to feel the amount of thankfulness I felt that day too!

Travel & Thank: Day 13. Don't Worry, Be Happy

Today is the first day when I really had a nice, deep, uninterrupted night sleep. Aalways takes for me a while to get used to a new place and be able to sleep comfortably and “at ease”. I’m thankful it finally happened here.

I’m also thankful for meeting this super cool iguana-like dude (I'm convinced it was a he) by the beach today – there are enough of them there, but this one was the biggest I’ve seen so far and he clearly seemed to enjoy my company as he kept running around my sunbed all day long. I liked him because he totally posed for all of my pictures.

And one more thing, although I still really don't want to go back to the home country, I’m amazingly fine with having to go back there now. I'm relaxed and I'm ready, no worries on my part any more. I’m also feeling very very thankful that this vacation didn’t become an exception to the general rule of mine where I come back from one being a different person, having learnt something new and valuable about myself. So yep, I guess I’m ready to come back and get down to making all the inevitable things happen.

Disclaimer: Travel & Thank™ is a mini-project within and is part of The ‘Thank You’ Project blog ©2009-2010. Travel & Thank™ updates are featured twice a week, are pre-written and not made in real time - each post was created during the author’s actual vacation in the mid-fall of 2010. For privacy reasons the names of the persons, places and geographical locations may have been shortened, abbreviated or changed and are not subject to disclosure.

Travel & Thank: Day 12. Frustration and Gratitude

I made some calls to see what I could do about changing my return flight date – I’m really not ready to leave just yet – and there is an option I would have gladly accepted. However, not everything is this easy when it comes to a certain familiar circumstance – something I will not be mentioning on the internet. Now this thing is exactly what got me upset, and the mood change is all the more striking taking into consideration how I’ve been failing to get upset lately.

While here, I’m beginning to think, I sort of created a “home” around me. It’s a new place, new everything, and I’m establishing my own “rules”, my own contacts, my own way of living. And this new world just works for me. I’ve always used to say that home was not a place, but a feeling, a person. Now I realize that this person might as well be yourself. Maybe when we’re in our more or less ideal surroundings we’re more inclined to be truer to ourselves, and that’s when we start feeling more comfortable and more at ease with both our inner and outer worlds - when we start feeling the sense of belonging, even if to our own selves, and that’s when the feeling of home plants its roots and starts to grow...

Lots of thoughts ran through my head from the first second of me getting upset up to the moment when I sat down to type the above. This sudden change in mood totally brought me back to reality and to the things I originally intended to think through while being here. What I know for sure now, is some of those things are now inevitable. And, surprisingly enough, seeing the inevitability of those things suddenly made me feel all the more confident and determined to succeed. Or, at the very least, to take action. That, I can be thankful for!

P.S. (4 hours later) You know what is inevitable? The power of gratitude is inevitable! Just when I found something good in my frustration and thanked for it, my whole day turned around and I had an absolutely fantastic end to it! Great food and amazing staff at one of the chicest spots here kept me dining out for almost 3 hours, and if the exceptional experience wasn’t enough in itself I got treated to a dessert that was on the house AND to a ride back to my place… Thank you, D. and M.!! And how can you not be thankful for being thankful in a situation like that? Gratitude is simply amazing, and it’s amazingly simple too. Wow.

Disclaimer: Travel & Thank™ is a mini-project within and is part of The ‘Thank You’ Project blog ©2009-2010. Travel & Thank™ updates are featured twice a week, are pre-written and not made in real time - each post was created during the author’s actual vacation in the mid-fall of 2010. For privacy reasons the names of the persons, places and geographical locations may have been shortened, abbreviated or changed and are not subject to disclosure.