Hello and welcome.
My name is Nat and I am here to take you through a guided gratitude practice.
Perhaps you've already noticed this.
I certainly have felt it myself.
Positive emotions like joy,
Happiness,
Peace and ease.
They tend to wear off quickly.
They don't linger as long as we would like them to.
Our emotional systems,
They prefer novelty and newness,
Constant change.
Have you ever noticed before the new car,
The new house,
The new outfit,
The new partner,
They just don't feel as good as they first did when we acquired them.
They don't feel so new or as exciting as they once did.
It's our human nature.
It's very normal to adapt to positive life circumstances.
Before too long,
New doesn't bring us positive emotions like it used to.
So we continue to search for the next best thing.
This cycle of searching can be exhausting.
Here is why I love the practice that is gratitude.
I don't believe that gratitude is an emotion.
I believe that gratitude is an intention that incites positive emotions.
It is an intention that allows us to appreciate the value in something.
When we appreciate the value in our life circumstances,
We are able to extract more benefits from it.
Most importantly,
We are less likely to take it for granted.
I believe this can be repeated.
I believe it warrants being repeated.
Gratitude is an intention.
Gratitude allows us to appreciate the value in something or someone.
It allows us to linger in the positive emotion a little longer than usual.
Because gratitude,
It magnifies.
It allows us to remember to our merses ourselves once more in the pleasures offered to us.
Instead of adapting to goodness,
Gratitude offers us the opportunity to continue celebrating goodness.
Wherever you are,
It's from here that we settle into a comfortable position and begin our practice of gratitude together.
It is from here that I ask you to take what you need.
What could you do in this moment that would allow you to feel a little more settled,
A lot more relaxed,
A sense of ease and calm throughout the entire body?
For me,
That begins with breath.
Together,
Empty your breath wherever we are.
Together,
United,
We breathe in.
Open to empty.
Breathe in and empty.
Soften the eyes,
Maybe close them entirely.
Allow the chin to drop slightly to the chest.
Feel the length at the back of the neck as you do.
As you continue to breathe,
Let it be a natural rhythm with just a little more length,
Just a little more conscious awareness and a permission to slow down.
We begin our practice of gratitude by taking ourselves somewhere we are deeply grateful for.
A place on earth that has brought us a tremendous amount of joy.
It can be created or it can be real.
But will you take yourself there in the mind's eye now?
Begin to look around in this imaginary place that you create in your mind real or not.
What do you see?
See all the colors vividly.
Each one so bright that you can't help but think you're there now.
And then breathe in.
What smells do you notice in this wonderful place?
This place where you feel safe,
Where you feel connected?
What do you smell?
As you look around,
As you smell,
What else is available to you?
What do you taste?
What lingering sensations in the mouth can you observe?
Continue to take this wondrous space in.
What do you hear there?
All of your senses alive.
What do you see?
What do you smell?
What do you taste?
What do you hear?
Magnify it as if you were there in person now.
And how does this place as you sense it as you explore it as you reimagine it?
How does it make you feel?
Notice the physical sensations,
The lightness in the heart,
The ease through the chest,
The fluttering in the belly,
The softness behind the eyes.
How does this space make you feel?
The physical sensations first.
Notice them,
Amplify them.
And then in full appreciation,
In gratitude for this space and everything it brings you,
How does it make you feel beyond the physical?
But how would you claim this space to make you feel?
Do you feel safe and feel safe?
Does it make you feel calm?
Feel the emotion that is calm?
Does it make you feel happy?
Linger in the sensation that is happiness.
And now I ask you in this very special place where you exist in this moment,
Will you invite energetically invite someone you greatly admire someone that you value to sit beside you in this space?
Feel their presence first.
What is their presence invoke in you?
How do they make you feel?
Physical sensations,
Explore them.
They make you feel at ease.
Do they make you feel loved?
Feel at ease.
Feel that love.
Let it blossom within you.
Energetically feel them right beside you.
What do they bring you?
What gifts do they offer?
And then maybe turn to look at them.
Let their whole presence bring a small smile to your face and openness through the heart.
What do you feel for them?
Whether you know them or not,
Whether they exist on this realm with us still or not.
Why did you bring them into your energetic field?
What is it you value about them so much?
Feel each and every positive emotion that they evoke in you the physical sensations,
Name the feeling and then feel it from the tips of your toes all the way up through the heart to the crown of the head.
Feel their presence.
And then will you tell them in the mind's eye,
Will you tell them what it is you are so grateful for about them?
How they make you feel,
The value they bring into your life,
The qualities about them that you admire.
Share with this person why you have an immense amount of gratitude for them.
And then smile at them.
Wish them well as you untether yourself from them and give them permission to leave your energetic field for now.
And then look around your space one more time,
This beautiful safe space that brings you joy that you brought yourself to untether yourself from it,
Let it go from the mind's eye.
Slowly land into the physical sensations that exist in your body as this moment in front of you unfolds the here and the now what do you feel what do you notice?
And then begin to very slowly open your eyes looking around the room feeling the lingering sensations of the positive positive emotions that you just created in your body.
Feel them linger in them.
Welcome them to stay.
Carry them with you as you continue your day wherever it may take you this practice always available to you.
This effort of gratitude and intention that allows us to linger in all of the goodness that already exists in our life.
The goodness,
The value,
The love that already exists.
It is enough.
Together we breathe in.
Open the mouth side out.
Breathe in.
As you breathe out soften.
I thank you for the opportunity to create this practice and absolute privilege to serve you today.
