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This month we will discuss "The Power of Gratitude" and ...

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Article

The Power of Gratitude
by Linder Chong

I love this topic because it makes me think in a different way, about the people, my home, friends and experiences I have enjoyed and endured. Gratitude is more than the things we like and love in our lives. For me it encompasses the things we take for granted such as freedom of choice - being able to live and work where we choose. We live in a society that provides us with an abundance of options and alternatives for education, travel and whatever takes our fancy for pleasure and leisure.

Some people are grateful when they compare themselves with others who are less fortunate than them. I feel this is less empowering than actually being grateful for what you have accomplished for yourself and your family.

My grandfather came to NZ in the early 1900’s when the country opened its borders to Asian immigrants. Many Chinese like my grandfather, took the plunge to make a new life for themselves and the next generations, in a land that had the potential to provide opportunity and a better quality of life than their homeland. This was not without its hardships. Many Chinese immigrants endured racial prejudice and were treated like criminals by the government, such as having to report their whereabouts each week; fingerprinting by the police; children born here weren’t allowed to stay and they had to pay a substantial sum to live here.

Inspite of all this, they managed to build a home and make a living. There were no English language schools or organisations to help settle new immigrants. It was a matter of survival and going home was not an option. This is still very much in my mind when I think of what I have to be grateful for. If my grandfather didn’t have the foresight to come here I would not enjoy what I have today. My parents feel the same way, they embrace NZ and have created opportunities for themselves and those have filtered down to us, their children.

Gratitude isn’t just about the good that’s happened to you. I’m also grateful for the ‘not so good’ experiences I’ve had in my life. These are the things that have taught me about myself and what’s important to me. We can also use the power of gratitude to help others. We have gifts and talents we can use more effectively. Would you find it more rewarding to be grateful for what you can give with what you have? This, to me is where the real power of gratitude is. I am forever grateful to my grandfather for the power of his gratitude for having made it to NZ. And what is the power of my gratitude? – the opportunity to learn, coach, share and communicate.

“Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos into order, confusion into clarity.... It turns problems into gifts, failures into success, the unexpected into perfect timing, and mistakes into important events. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today and creates a vision for tomorrow.” ~ Melodie Beattie ~

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BELL Resource Corner

Gratitude - The Daily Practice of being Present to What You Already Have
by Leone Kennedy

In The Soul of Money, written by author Lynn Twist, a reference is made to beliefs about abundance and how our beliefs are collective. Lynn writes about rewriting our beliefs, and consciously re-scripting our responses to ground ourselves in new inspirations and perspectives. The following quotes spoke to me clearly and simply – ‘what you appreciate appreciates’, ‘when you make a difference with what you have it expands’ and ‘true abundance flows from enough, never from more’.

Lynn also talks of creating a legacy of enough. The life you live is the legacy you leave. The Soul of Money references Buckminster Fuller who describes a vision of a new world, a world based on You AND Me, the shift from You OR Me is currently happening. The challenge is to recreate global systems and structures from scarcity (you or me) to ‘there is enough’ (you and me). Buckminster predicted this in the 1970’s and states that this transformation will take up to 50 years.

As 2007 approaches, a new global focus shifts to our greatest asset of all, the planet we live on, it seems possible that Buckminster’s prediction could be true. We are turning inward to look at ourselves and our environment.

Coming from a place of gratitude takes courage and trust. We can truly and collectively benefit from letting go of scarcity and embracing ‘enough’. I sincerely hope these resources help you on your journey to this new awareness and new state of present-ness.

Resource # 1: ‘The greatest gratitude is that we have this very moment to imagine’. ‘When we come home to the self as creator, we experience first hand that gratitude is really about identity, not about conditions or things.’ This article on Deliberate Creating, Gratitude and Abundance by Philip Golabuck is full of new perspectives. Guaranteed to open your mind.
http://www.fieldcenter.org/deliberate_creating.pdf

Resource # 2: Carol Tuttle uses EFT and a Gratitude Diet (love it) to help us explore gratitude as ‘one of the highest states of emotion we can experience’. Using a combination of Statements and EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique) we can begin to re-script our inner dialogue about gratitude. My favourite is ‘I am grateful for all I have learned this year’.
http://www.emofree.com/articles/gratitude-diet.htm

Resource # 3: Gratitude Transforms, Monica Myklebust MD practices Body Gratitude. Reconnect with the beauty and abundance of your body.
http://www.bodygratitude.com/bodygratitude.html

Resource # 4: Humour, Gratitude and Sweetness – EPR ™ (energetic personal resuscitation) uses an energy saving technique to improve the energy of any situation. According to Albert Einstein everything is energy. The technique by Sue Frederick is based around gratitude as an emotion, one of the highest vibrations we can tap into. Note the right hand archived articles are also a great resource.
http://www.brilliantwork.com/brilliantwork/article0305.html

One thing we have recently introduced into our daily practice is saying grace before we eat our evening meal. Taking a moment to be grateful for the healthy food available to us has had a profound and humbling affect which in turn has taken our present awareness to a whole new level.

Thank you for reading our resources, one final point to ponder … The phrase "thank you" has the power to open the consciousness and to awaken into true wealth.

 

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BELL Alliance is a collective force of four independent coaching businesses that have joined in a common vision -- To expand global consciousness based on authenticity, contribution, positive transformation and peace.

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