Think & Give Thanks: Living a Life of Gratitude

"Make your thinking about giving thanks, because gratitude brings joy, peace and abundance into your life." Robert Betz is one of Germany's best-known coaches for personal development and transformation. He is convinced that only a life of gratitude can be a truly happy and fulfilled life. Because if you are grateful for yourself, your fellow human beings and all the unlimited opportunities and possibilities that life offers, you create abundance and contentment.

Robert Betz knows: "Many people have an infinite amount - far more than they actually need. Yet they focus on the lack and can't really enjoy what they have with gratitude." Those who always strive for higher, better and faster, instead of being grateful for what they already have, are always in a state of lack.

Gratitude comes with the Fullness

What matters is not so much whether you actually lack something, but whether you feel a state of lack or abundance. Even wealthy people can always be in a state of lack, whereas people who are financially poor can feel a very lead a fulfilled life can. It is not your account balance that determines whether you live in scarcity or abundance, but your thoughts and your inner attitude.

Speaking of thoughts. Robert Betz knows: "With our thoughts we create our reality. That's why we should examine our thoughts very carefully. We have learned to think unconsciously. Hardly anyone makes a point of looking at what they are actually thinking. What am I thinking about myself, about life, about my fellow human beings, and about my past?" Are you already directing your thoughts to radiate gratitude and positively impact your life?

Living gratefully

Maybe you've caught yourself thinking in "If..., then..." sentences? These sentences are predestined to make you permanently unhappy to make. Because they suggest that you have to achieve, create or experience something before you can be happy. Nonsense! Be grateful today for what you have already achieved, created and experienced. Do not wait for tomorrow! Your happiness is not in the future, but in the here and now. According to Robert Betz, we humans have been given three essential gifts for which we may feel gratitude every day:

1. Our great creative power
2. Our infinite capacity for love
3. The freedom of choice

The expert explains: "You always choose. Choose to live gratefully and think gratefully. Give thanks in advance in the morning for all the gifts of the new day and the opportunities to love. Make your thinking about giving thanks. For giving thanks is an act of love."

Exercises for more gratitude

Did you notice that only one letter changes in the words "think" and "thank"? Robert Betz: "The words have a lot of similarity. They have the same root. Just like the words 'live' and 'love.' To live is to love. To think is to give thanks."

But how can we become more grateful in everyday life? How do we succeed in appreciating and consciously enjoying the fact that we are allowed to live? We have a few ideas - so in the following lines you will find our three best instant tips with which you can lead your life in gratitude and thus contribute to your happiness within a very short time.

3 Gratitude Exercises

1. Write a gratitude list: What are you grateful for in your life? Write down at least 100 points for which you are grateful. This could be certain skills ("I am good at analytical thinking") or conditions ("I am healthy and can get up every day without pain"). We're sure you can think of far more than 100 points.
2. Keep a gratitude journal: Every evening, write down what you received today and what you were grateful for that day. Write a diary of gratitude in this way for four weeks. In this way you create a completely new awareness for all the small and large moments of happiness that you are allowed to experience every day.
3. Share your gratitude: Gratitude also means sharing the love you receive. Multiply it and carry it further into the world. For example, do something good for your loved ones or strangers. Your Smile will become greater - and so will that of your fellow human beings.