The Power of Gratitude

(Image by John Hain from Pixabay)

In a recent Thanksgiving message Shakti Padmini shared a wonderful saying:

It isn't happiness that creates gratitude,
But gratitude that creates happiness!

Truer words have rarely been spoken. The first time I experienced what can only be described as full-blown enlightenment, I was doing an all-day, every-day "gratitude meditation" as I went about my daily life.

I did it at the direction of none other than Grandmaster Dr. Tae Yun Kim (my Jung SuWon martial arts master). She instructed us to "express gratitude in your heart, every waking moment". I did. It triggered an explosion of insights and a cascade of joy.

The first couple of days were good. The next couple were stellar. And the remaining week and half was nothing more than spectacular. Just thinking about it, I recall the blissful sensation, and am brought back to the goodness that is gratitude!

Be grateful for everything you can think of. Everything! It will be easy at first. But then you'll start repeating yourself. And soon, you'll get bored of the repetition. To keep the practice going, you'll need to go deeper—to everything that lies behind the things you're grateful for, and to the entire history of events that led up to them.

 It's a spectacular meditation that brings a lot of joy. Give it a try! 

And do let me know how it goes…
:__)

Note:
To see how "Advance Gratitude" can lead to enlightenment, check out this post: Meditation 2.0)

eric Armstrong
MeditateBetter.com
author of Bench Yoga (available at Amazon)