Gratitude Journal
“There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.” — Albert Einstein
The numerous benefits of positive thinking have been proven by science many a time. You are what you think. It sounds so simple, think right and everything else goes right. However, practically, things are not as effortless as they appear on the surface. It’s not easy to think positive always. We tend to get frustrated by the daily grinds of our life. Our mind is conditioned to blame ourselves for every wrong thing around us. But we definitely don’t want our kids to go through the same. This is possible only by developing positive thinking habits from the beginning.
To imbibe the good habit of thinking positive in my little one, I have habituated them to writing daily a ‘gratitude journal’. Fondly we call it ‘Aaj ki khushi’. She can’t write on her own and till the time she learns proper writing, I am jotting down her daily happiness in the diary.
She can choose to write whatever good thing has happened to her during the day; be it something at school or with friends at the park or at home.
This is what she wrote today –
Loved going to Laser valley and bestest thing there was a swing. My feet almost touched the sky.
I loved helping mommy in making idli. I think I can make better idli than her. After all I am going to become a Junior master chef soon.
I got my new skates today. Now I will also run on these skates and little prince will not be able to catch me… yippee!
I formed maximum words from letter ‘P’ in class and got three stars on my hand.
Things do get repetitive sometimes. I know she is going to write – Loved going to parks, playing with Lil prince and reading noddy these days. That’s ok.. I am happy that she remembers all the good things at the end of the day.
I thought of buying one of those fancy kids diary when we decided to start writing in the gratitude journal. After wasting a couple of months in just waiting for the appropriate diary, I finally went ahead with a normal one only. Instead, we decked up the one we have with angel’s favorite photos and stickers.
I hope someday when she will be feeling low, she will turn to this journal and feel happy to read all the good things that have happened to her. The focus is to be happy for what you have rather than being sad for what you don’t have.
We also add some happy days pictures to this journal so that she can use it as a keepsake of happy memories in the future. I don’t get time to do it daily so we do it twice or maximum thrice a week. I believe it’s good to start with.
Sometimes, she also draws things in her journal, depicting good things from her day. And I never force her to write multiple things. It’s ok if she is thankful for only one thing in a day. We have to be very careful that kids don’t take this as writing in the journal only once their demands are met. It’s a way of noticing and feeling thankful for all the small joys of life. Seeing a beautiful butterfly in a park is the ultimate joy for the kid if he/she is willing to appreciate this. This week, people in the west are celebrating thanksgiving week. Why should we have to wait for one week in a year for feeling thankful? Let’s celebrate and be thankful the whole year and be happy always.
And to sum up, I completely believe in this quote –
“Gratitude can transform common days into thanksgivings, turn routine jobs into joy, and change ordinary opportunities into blessings.” — William Arthur Ward
So, what are your thoughts on making kids think positive?
Rashmi Sehgal is the mother of two adorable kids, 4 and 1-year-old fondly known as Angel and Lil prince on her blog. She wears the dual hat of mother and IT Professional who juggles between work and kids trying to maintain balance between both worlds . She is a voracious reader , avid blogger , Shopaholic, love to experiment different way of learning and unlearning things with her daughter and take pleasure in reading books to her daughter. She writes at rashworld.wordpress.com