4 POSITIVE EFFECTS OF EXPRESSING GRATITUDE

There is a lot of research available on gratitude and its effect on many aspects of your life.

The reason for this is that the act of “feeling grateful and expressing gratitude” changes the way you as a human being engage with and react to the world around you.

The benefits of embracing a more gratuitous life include improved health, the ability to deal with adversity, and an understanding of how to build strong relationships.

Since people feel and express gratitude in multiple ways, it’s important to understand just how it affects you in all aspects of your life, including your marriage.

Here are just a few reasons expressing gratitude is a skill you’ll want to embrace.

It makes you feel good and makes others feel good, too.

When you make a habit of acknowledging other people’s contributions, you quickly find this can lead to new opportunities. That’s because when you feel more gratitude, you also express more of it.

In your marriage, you may tell your spouse how much you appreciate them doing the dishes after dinner and they may later tell you how splendid dinner was. Gratitude is often reciprocal because it feels good to not only be recognized, but also to recognize others.

In your marriage, it also creates a healthy dialog that keeps you connected and engaged with one another.

Gratitude improves everyone’s psychological health.

The link between gratitude and overall well-being is strong. It not only helps to reduce feelings of envy, hate, frustration, and regret, but it also reminds you that everyone is human and thus flawed.

With the assumption of perfection out of the way, you open yourself up to building connections with those around you rather than distancing yourself from them.

Gratitude increases happiness, thus reducing feelings of depression, too. You’re less likely to isolate yourself or distance yourself from your spouse. Instead, you’ll look to communicate and problem-solve.

Grateful people are more open to understanding others.

Because gratitude enhances your ability to feel empathy, it will also reduce feelings of aggression and frustration. This means when something negative happens, those that embrace gratitude experience more sensitivity and empathy toward others rather than anger. When embracing gratitude, you also are less likely to seek revenge or hold a grudge.

In your marriage, this means you’ll accept your spouse for who they are, seeking to love and appreciate them, and grow together.

Grateful people don’t look to see the bad, they look to support, nurture, and cultivate the good, not only in themselves but in others.

Gratitude improves self-esteem! 

A 2014 study published in the Journal of Applied Sport Psychology found that gratitude increased athletes’ self-esteem.

This also had an unexpected side effect: it increased their optimal performance levels. That’s because gratitude reduces social comparisons. Rather than becoming resentful toward people you perceive or know to have money, better jobs, or a bigger house, grateful people can appreciate other people’s accomplishments.

When you feel good about yourself, and embrace that you are where you need to be, you quickly realize that life is good! Recognizing all you have to be thankful for, even during the worst times, fosters resilience, too.

Gratitude allows us to celebrate the present and magnify the positive emotions we feel.

It also makes you appreciate the value of something. When you appreciate the value of something, you will extract more benefits from it, being less likely to take it for granted. From saying thank you to showing empathy, being grateful doesn’t mean you’ve got rose-colored glasses on. Nor does it mean that everything is necessarily “wonderful” all the time.

Expressing gratitude simply shows you’re aware of your blessings. That you appreciate the small things in life, and acknowledge all that you have.