Why I Started a Gratitude Journal
Towards the end of October 2024, as the US presidential election was becoming uncomfortably close and I began feeling more and more on edge, I decided to make two changes. One was to ramp up my meditation practice, which had slipped over the summer. The other was the start a gratitude journal.
I already have a regular gratitude and forgiveness practice, which I do in my head each night, but I wanted to add something more formal, something to orient me towards the good in my life. I needed to balance out that pervasive sense of being on the cataclysmic edge of catastrophe. I needed to water the seeds of groundedness and enoughness in my store consciousness (to borrow a phrase from Thich Naht Hanh), not just the seeds of worry and fear.
I looked for a gratitude journal to buy and couldn’t find any I liked. They were too big, too small, too corny. They crammed in too many things — habit-tracking and intention-setting and appointments. They asked me to rate my days, as if the course of emotions in any one day could ever be assigned a single word or number. They were too goal oriented, too judgy.
Instructions for Making Your Own Gratitude Journal
So I made up my own. I bought an A5 notebook — not too big, not too small (this one, if you’d like to know).
At the top of each page, I write the date and the words “Top Three Things” on the top line. I then write a numbered list of my top three things from the day. Could be moments, actions, feelings, sights, meals, anything.
Next I write the words “Things I’m Grateful For Today,” and then I make a list until I reach the bottom of the page.
That’s it. Simple, quick, straightforward.
And effective. Try the practice as the last thing you do before you turn off your light and go to sleep at night. See what happens.