Hey, everyone, This episode is coming out Thanksgiving week 2020. And so, you know, we’re going to talk about the healing power of gratitude. We’re going to have an adventure with gratitude today and we’re gonna dive right in. Today we’re going to talk about the practice of gratitude to nourish yourself as a human, as a woman. I know sometimes some of the listeners invite their hubby’s to listen in. So if you’re a hubby listening in, hey.
We’re going to use gratitude to nourish everyone listening today, to nourish yourself and to use the practice of gratitude to nourish your marriage as well. When I speak to women struggling in their relationships, one of the common themes that I find over and over again, is a complete gratitude deficit. It’s like their relationship gratitude account is empty. Like imagine a savings account, where all you deposit is gratitude. And it’s at zero. And one of the easiest ways to start building in simple wins, if you’re struggling, and if you’re listening to me, you’re struggling right now, pay close attention. One of the easiest ways to start building in simple wins is to start filling up your relationship gratitude account. So we’re going to talk about that today. And why really feeling gratitude deeply in the cells of your body is so so, so powerful. And I like to think about gratitude as my personal rocket fuel. It just helps me fly. And I want you to fly with me. So we can have big parties in the sky together, really on that high of what gratitude can create for us.
So one of the things I like to do when I’m teaching is do whatever I’m telling you to do. Like, I want to know in the cells of my body, not just the theory of how everything I teach feels. I want to know how it feels inside of me. Right? It’s like when you go to Macy’s, I was thinking about this, when you go to Macy’s back in the day, when we could go, I’m on lockdown I don’t know about you guys, but I still can’t go Macy’s. But you try on a perfume, and it smells amazing. But then your bestie tries on the same perfume, and it smells different or like, this was what usually happens to me, is my bestie will try it on and it would smell amazing on her, and then I try it on, it doesn’t smell the same, has that ever happened to you? So the perfume doesn’t smell the same, because the chemicals of your body are different. And I like to think of coaching tools similarly, to perfume just because it’s fun, and why not. And it’s like, all the things I teach work, some of them are gonna smell differently on you than they do on me. Let’s see which ones you love which ones I love. And let’s just make everyone’s life better just by trying all of them and seeing which ones we want to keep. So since we’re talking about gratitude, today, I want to say a huge thank you and feel that in the cells of my body. To everyone who has ever written a review from a book or a review for this podcast.
I am so grateful to each and every single one of you has done that. Sometimes when life feels hard, or I’m having a cloudy day, you know, those cloudy days, you kind of wake up on the wrong side of the bed, I will go to Amazon or to iTunes and I will read the reviews. And even though I don’t know you all personally, you all cheer me up and help me keep going. So thank you. I am going to read two of them to you today that just make my heart sing whenever I read them and here’s what I want you to think about as I’m reading these couple of reviews, is think about someone or something who has helped you this year. Something is giving you faith or hope or inspiration or just helped you get through the day. Can you send them a note? Or if it’s a book that you read? Or if it’s a podcast you listen to or if it’s anything that’s in your life? Is there a way that you can give thanks to that person? If it’s in writing great. If it’s a neighbor or a family member, maybe you just next time you see them you just pour some gratitude on them right? They might look like they have it all together but they have cloudy days too. And that one word from you can completely change their day when they’re not feeling so amazing. So here’s my cloudy day ones that I read. This one is on Amazon for the questions for couples journal if you haven’t checked it out, the holidays are coming, it makes a great gift, books make great gifts.
So this is by AMCH, wherever you are in the world, AMCH, thank you. Here’s what she said best book of questions ever and my boyfriend and I have tried several. The questions are truly thought provoking and lead to deep, interesting conversations and we love this space for each party to write an answer. If you’re buying just one book about questions for couples, this is the one to buy. You guys. She’s not my cousin, we are not related. I do not know AMCH and I’m just assuming it’s a her, maybe it’s a he. But thank you, AMCH. And here’s what feels magical to me. I wrote some words in a Google Doc, that became a book. And now this person that I’ve never met, is having deep, interesting conversations in the relationship that they’re in. What magic is that? Isn’t that amazing? Okay, and then here’s one that really sang to me about the podcast. And I’ll tell you why after I read it. This one comes from AndKCasey. And she said, easy listen with real life application. And if this is the first time you’re listening to the podcast, I want you to know she is correct. Here’s what she said, I’ve listened to a lot of podcasts that give you suggestions or ideas that you can’t really apply for many reasons. But Maggie’s approach is so relatable that you can easily put into practice the things that you are learning about. Her passion for what she does, and the joy she approaches life with comes through and all of her podcasts, hit subscribe right away.
And here is why this made my heart sing. I am not a huge fan of theory, I love the Applied Sciences. Let’s apply them all, right? I’m saying like, let’s take that car and see how far it can take us. Let’s see how fast it can go, right? I don’t want the theory of velocity, I want to go fast, not too fast. So one of my highest intentions for this podcast is always that you can listen today and apply tomorrow. And to see that actually happening in the comments. And in the reviews of the podcast. I really feel like it’s another podcast angel gets her wings every time. And I just get so happy. And that’s the feeling of gratitude, right? That feeling of like, who’s getting their wings right now, right? Imagine now taking a magical shower of gratitude just bathed in someone’s words. How can you be that someone for someone this week?
Okay. As you can see, gratitude for me isn’t just a feeling. It’s an activity. It’s an experience. It’s something that we create. And you know, my love of Oprah, so here’s an Oprah story. You can’t talk about gratitude in Maggie-Land without talking about Oprah. When I was a kid, back in the day, Oprah did a show interviewing the author of a book called Simple Abundance. I’m gonna mess up her name, but it’s Sarah Ban Breathnach, hope I got that right. The book is called Simple Abundance and they talked about the idea of creating a gratitude journal. And I had never heard of such a thing at the time. But my general rule back when I was in high school and beyond is that if it’s good enough for Oprah, and it doesn’t require a billion dollars to do because sometimes, you know, Oprah had like a private jet, but I might not do that. But a gratitude journal is most certainly good enough for me to try. So Oprah would buy t-shirt sheets, I would buy t-shirt sheets. Oprah had frozen hot chocolate while visiting New York City, I had frozen hot chocolate the next time that I went, I literally went to the same restaurant she went to, it was really good, and so on. So when she said to pull out a journal and write three things you’re grateful for, on her beautiful show that I grew up watching. I tried it right and there are worse things a teenager could experiment with, I’m sure.
So the idea behind the journal was that the more you notice and appreciate things and experiences that you’re grateful for, the more of those good things and experiences come into your life. Kind of like the law of attraction, gratitude edition, right? So I tried it, I would say thank you for the three things and I did it for a while. But the truth is, I didn’t keep it up forever. I still journal now, and I journal on myself coaching and a journal in a variety of ways. But I’m not that person who’s gonna do the same thing every time for like 3000 days, that is just not me. However, I did create my own gratitude tradition that I absolutely love. And it was completely inspired by this experience keeping the gratitude journal and every year, sometime around the Thanksgiving holidays, I take some time alone, and I write down 100 things I’m grateful for. It is positively amazing how many details you notice about life when you have set a goal to get to 100. So after immediate loved ones and really lofty, you know, fancy sounding things like health or safety or something like that. You start noticing how grateful you are for little things. And these are the types of things that I write in my journal and I’m gonna tell you what some of them are.
So like paved roads, paved roads. I went to Costa Rica because my husband has family there. And I remember there’s a lot of dirt roads in Costa Rica. It’s an amazing country, lots of dirt roads. When I came back, I just had this huge appreciation every time we were on a paved road of how smooth the road is, how easy it is to travel on it. How wonderful like the fact that we have people who will pave the roads when the road needs updating is, like all the things, so paved roads. Cold Stone Creamery, birthday cake remix ice cream, Haagen Daz rocky road, grateful right? Manicures in this era of COVID lockdown, I miss manicures, and I am very grateful for all the ones I ever had, right? My husband’s laugh whenever we watch TV, we hear something funny, or I say something funny. I am so grateful for his laugh it’s the best laugh ever. Kitkats, British kitkats from the United Kingdom, if you ever have the opportunity to compare a United States kitkat with a British kitkat, British kitkat will win every time. This is the truth. In my opinion, it’s my truth. Right, we all get to have our own truth. It’s different chocolate, it’s mixed differently. It does taste different. It’s amazing. Books, friends, laptops, coffee, tea, podcasts, sappy Hallmark, Christmas movies, Netflix Christmas movies, right. And on and on and on until you get to 100 it is so amazing, how rich you can feel how the richness that you can feel in your life, when you sit down and make a list of 100 things to be grateful for.
And every time I make my list, I notice how much of life there is to love. Like there’s so much to love. A beautiful notebook, a pen that writes like silk. I’m one of those people who loves like great pens, so much to love in life, right? And there’s an infinite amount of tiny things that can bring you huge amounts of joy. It doesn’t have to be the big fancy things, right? It can be the simple, small things. And I love that feeling when I start thinking about and notice how grateful I am for those things. Now, I don’t write them every day, like I mentioned at this very special ceremony where I sit down and I write my 100 things around Thanksgiving time. However, this is something I do do, which is whenever I am paused at a red light or standing in line or waiting for something in some way. And I have you know a few extra moments. Sometimes it’s when I wake up in the morning, sometimes it’s when I go to bed at night, I will name five things I’m grateful for just right off the top of my head. So I’m gonna invite you to do that. Just as you’re listening to me right now, think of five simple, easy things that you’re grateful for. If I look around my office, I’m grateful that I get to record this podcast and that I can do this technology at home like magic, right? I am grateful for Google Docs where I have my notes. I am grateful for really comfortable shoes. I am grateful for caffeine free Coke Zero, which hasn’t been discontinued yet. Thank you, Coca Cola. I am grateful for the sound of my hubby breathing when he’s sleeping, there’s something so soothing to me by just hearing him breathing. Right? Five things you can just sort of look around you or think about your day. Think about the people in your life that you love. And in that moment, just notice the sensations in your body. You notice what gratitude feels like.
I noticed when I was saying these things that I’m grateful for. I just started smiling, just thinking about them. Right, you don’t have to wait to write in a journal you can. And if you love journaling, this is a great thing to put in your journal. But if not, you don’t have to wait. You can just whenever you have a moment, maybe you’re washing the dishes or putting stuff away at home or anything like that. Maybe you’re cooking. Five things that you’re grateful for. Here’s what I have found over the years just like if you’re practicing guitar or you’re practicing piano or anything that you want to get better at, you get better and better at gratitude with practice. It becomes easier and easier. It becomes more natural, and it shifts your mood quicker the more you do it. So it’s almost like taking a vitamin for your heart or for your mind. You connect with gratitude and you start feeling better. And it’s so important in the good times, and especially in the challenging times, right? So here’s the thing, okay. In my opinion, the highest most advanced level of gratitude that you could practice is being able to feel gratitude for your problems.
I totally love feeling gratitude for my blessings, I do find that relatively easy. It’s still important to stop and actually do it to bring awareness to it, right? Whether you write it, you sing it, you share it with your friends on social media. But feeling gratitude for my problems has been the biggest mind-shift ever. One of the biggest that I’ve ever had. And here’s how I do it and how I learned to do it. Many years ago, I attended a training like a workshop, like a mindset workshop, it’s called the landmark forum. And some parts of it I loved sometimes I didn’t care for it at all. But my favorite lesson that I learned there was, one of the workshop leaders said something to this effect, we all want our problems to go away. Problems do not actually go away. Rich people have problems, single people have problems, married people have problems, people who have what you think you want, all of them have problems. The key to problems is not to eliminate them. This is what the workshop leader was saying. The key is to continuously upgrade the quality of your problems. I’m gonna say that again, because the first time I heard that it really shook me. The key is not to eliminate problems. And now think about your marriage, right? Think about the problems you have today in your marriage. What if you continuously were upgrading the quality of your problems? Right?
I was like, what? That idea really, really, really blew me away. And as I pondered that, as I took that to heart, as I started to practice that in my daily life, here’s what would happen. I would look at a situation where I had a problem, and I’d say, well, that’s a great problem to have, right? So for example, let’s say I’ve had times, I’m sure all of you listening have had times where you felt overwhelmed, right? Maybe you had your career or your business, your marriage, family, your friends, the holidays that are coming up, you just have a lot on your plate. And maybe you think I’m not sure how I’m gonna get it all done. And I will think, well, that’s a great problem to have. I think of the alternative. What if I didn’t have any friends or anyone that I wanted to spend the holidays with? Or, you know, what if I had no career, no business, that would be a low grade, low quality problem, I’m want to have a high quality problem, right? So instantly, my perspective shifted, when I thought, Wow, that is a great problem to have. That’s a high quality problem, right? That doesn’t mean we still don’t have to solve them or figure them out or approach them or manage them, right. It’s just a different way to experience the problem, right?
And it doesn’t mean that some problems don’t completely suck, like really bad stuff happens, and I always want to make sure on this podcast, and in any work that I do that I don’t minimize that. And that I’m super clear about that. But the only way that I know how to get through those really dark moments is to train myself to search for the glimpses of light inside those darkest nights of the soul. And I have found over and over again, that gratitude helps me do that. And I really hope that it helps you as well, which is why we’re doing a whole episode on it and we really wanted to share this with you. I also have seen over the years that gratitude is part of the glue that helps hold a marriage together. I would say gratitude is the glue and sex is the duct tape and you need both. So think about the last time you thanked your partner for something if it was today, and that’s awesome. If it wasn’t you can make it today right after you listen. And one of my favorite stories that I tell in detail in The Better Marriage Masterclass is how a friend of mine before I was even a coach started thanking her husband for things and what a tremendous effect that had on her relationship. So we’ll make sure to link to the better marriage masterclass podcast episode on this podcast episode so you can hear me tell that story in depth but it can be so powerful in your marriage. You just start looking for things to be grateful for, that’s where you start.
And to really help you practice that I have an awesome one page PDF you can download on the website, go to MaggieReyes.com/podcast. And it’s a very simple gratitude letter with prompts. So it says, Dear____ you write in the name, and then it says I am grateful for and you write the things and there’s a few little prompts on there. And I invite you to print out one for you and one for someone else and do it on yourself. So you can thank yourself for your resilience and your patience and your love and your sense of humor, and your sexy legs and your cute smile, like thank yourself for your favorite thing about you. That’s one of the prompts is like, I love this about you, this is my favorite thing. And feel what it feels like to give that gratitude to yourself and receive it. To take it and drink it in and really let it wash all over you. I think that will be so amazing. So we’ll have that one page PDF, you can just download and use it on yourself. Use it on someone that you love, really connect with gratitude, this season of gratitude, right? And I want all of you to know, I am so grateful for you. I am so grateful that you listen to the podcast that you tell me your favorite takeaways that you tell me how you apply it. I love hearing all of those stories and this year when the hubby and I sit down at lockdown dinner to give thanks, I will be holding all of you in my heart. With so much love and gratitude.