Inspiring Gratitude: Day 10

Inspiring Gratitude: Day 10.
—21 Days of Gratitude: Awakening the Heart

Gratitude is a practice, and when we feel discouraged we turn towards inspiration, asking in prayer for the Spirit to encourage us, so we can be aware of the sacredness of gratitude.

Here are a few quotes to keep close to our hearts:

To be grateful is to recognize the love of God in everything. –Thomas Merton

Whatever we are waiting for—peace of mind, contentment, grace, the inner awareness of simple abundance—it will surely come to us, but only when we are ready to receive it with an open and grateful heart. – Ellen Vaughn

Prayer is sitting in the silence until it silences us, choosing gratitude until we are grateful, and praising God until we ourselves are an act of praise.
–Richard Rohr

It is not happiness that makes us grateful, but gratefulness that makes us happy.
– Gratefulness.org

Gratitude is like a flashlight. If you go out in your yard at night and turn on a flashlight, you suddenly can see what’s there. It was always there, but you couldn’t see it in the dark. – Dawna Markova

Before we can count we are taught to be grateful for what others do. As we are broken open by our experience, we begin to be grateful for what is, and if we live long enough and deep enough and authentically enough, gratitude becomes a way of life. – Mark Nepo

Reflect upon your present blessings of which every person has plenty; not on your misfortunes of which all people have some.– Charles Dickens

In the past I always thought of gratitude as a spontaneous response to the awareness of gifts received, but now I realize that gratitude can also be lived as a discipline. The discipline of gratitude is the explicit effort to acknowledge that all I am and have is given to me as a gift of love, a gift to be celebrated with joy. – Henry Nouwen

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Gratitude Journal for Day 10:

• Pause. Settle into the moment.
• Open your heart in gratitude.
• List 5 or more moments, experiences, or things you are grateful for today.
• List a blessing in your life.
• Amen