start monday with gratitude

week 14

Welcome to Week 14, lovely soul, as we enter the 2nd quarter of this gratitude journey and experience.

Below you'll find the video and video transcript introducing you to this week's quote and musings.

Scroll further and you'll discover this week's daily exercises, high vibe tune, and downloadable wallpapers.

When it comes to life the critical thing is whether you take things for granted or take them with gratitude

GK Chesterton

video transcript

Where do you stand on the scale of taking life for granted? How many of the everyday miracles we experience in life do you not even think about? How many things do you do and receive on auto-pilot?

We all do it. We all take life, to one degree or other, for granted.

When we're born we take very little for granted because we know very little and can do very little for ourselves. But we're fast learners and before long we know that if we cry loud enough and for long enough one of our parents will come to answer our need.

Then we grow and progress and before long we're crawling, then walking, then running, then jumping, then skipping... and after we'd learned these new-found skills we quickly take for granted that we can do them and do them easily.

And so our life continues. We learn something new, we master the skill, and we take the ability to perform it for granted.

Which means, that even if you consciously practice gratitude every day, there are many parts of your life that you are taking for granted and are forgetting to take with gratitude.

Many of the 'simple' things in life are miracles.

Like breathing.

While you're reading this, I guarantee you're reading and, hopefully, thinking about what I have written. And yet you’re probably doing so without any thought or even conscious awareness that your body is breathing regularly and keeping you alive. We all take our breath for granted until we are met with an illness that makes something so seemingly simple, so difficult. Or until we reach our final day on earth.

And yet breathing is not something we should take for granted. Because without the ability to breathe, without sufficient oxygen around us to fill our lungs, without our body's ability to exchange oxygen and carbon dioxide... we would die.

So when we take the apparently 'simple' act of breathing for granted we're taking the very act of living for granted too.

I'm not saying that for every inhale and exhale we should say "thank you" to our bodies, to life-force. But maybe when you waken up in the morning you could be grateful for all the breaths your body took while you slept that kept you alive and will continue to take throughout the day ahead.

When we practise gratitude we tend to focus on the big things, the manifestations in our life. But what about the 'little' things, like breathing? They are the very foundations to living gratefully.

daily gratitude practice

Think hard… what is the biggest thing you took for granted and then lost?

It could be a home, a person, a pet… anything. But try to home in on the biggest thing.

It’s never too late to express gratitude, even when you’ve lost something or someone so special.

Take some moments now to express the gratitude you didn’t when you took ‘it’ for granted.

Look at your life today. Think of something that you’re taking for granted.

Something that, if it was removed tomorrow, would leave a gaping hole in your life.

Now’s a good time to start expressing your gratitude for it and stop taking it for granted.

What daily everyday things, do you take for granted? The things you do or receive each day without even thinking about them.

It could be walking, reading, listening to music, being able to go outdoors, having a variety of food to eat.

What would happen if they were removed from your life?

What impact would that have on your life?

What annoyances or difficulties would that cause?

Spend about 15minutes today expressing gratitude for the daily everyday things that you’ve been taking for granted.

Think of 5 people who are part of your life, people who are there for you whenever you need them, who are a joy to be with, who support you and let you lean on them.

They could be family members, friends, close colleagues.

Get in touch with them, either meet up with them in person, phone them or facetime them and tell them how grateful you are that they are in your life.

Think of 5 people who played a significant role in your life in the past but who have since moved on.

Perhaps, for whatever reason, you’re no longer friends.

Perhaps they were a colleague who moved on to work for another company.

At the time they were in your life, no doubt you took their presence for granted. And whether or not, when they left, they left a gaping hole, at one time in your life their presence was significant and positive.

Find a way of getting in touch with them, send them a card, write them a letter, drop them an email.

Find a way to get in touch and tell them how grateful you are that they were part of your life.

What gifts do you have, what skills have you acquired through your lifetime up until now?

Gifts and skills that you’ve had to work on and hone until they became second nature to you, now that you can turn to them without even thinking about it, that you can now use them without any effort.

Make a list, as long as you can, of those gifts and skills ranging from your earliest years until now and express gratitude for those gifts and skills that you have been blessed with or have acquired.

Do you appreciate how amazing your body is?

Do you appreciate how remarkable your mind is?

Do you appreciate how incredible your soul is?

Do you appreciate what a miraculous human being you are?

Give thanks and gratitude for all aspects of your life, your body and mind, and your soul.

and let's not forget...

Today we're reminded to say "thank you" to everything and everyone in our life, past and present, who has made our life better

dance to this week's high vibe tune here

have gratitude wherever you go...

... with this week's gratitude quote wallpaper.

Note: details of how to download this week's wallpaper is provided below.

“When it comes to life the critical thing is whether you take things for granted or take them with gratitude” ~ GK Chesterton

16:9

16:10

4:3

mobile

how to download your wallpaper

Before copying one of the pictures below, you'll want to quickly check your screen settings because the worst thing you can do is use a wallpaper with an aspect ratio that differs from the aspect ratio of your screen.

The aspect ratio of a rectangle is simply the proportion between width and height. The most common are 16:9, 16:10 and 4:3. And it will be for these 3 sizes that I shall provide you with your free wallpaper.

To find your screen resolution follow this basic guide. Steps for your computer may vary slightly but I hope this will give you some guidance:

Right-click the desktop and select Display settings.
Scroll down until you see "Resolution" (you may have to choose an "Advanced" option)
To find your aspect ratio, divide the width over the height. For example, if my resolution is 1920 x 1080 then I would divide 1920 over 1080 to get 1.778, which indicates a 16:9 resolution. Similarly, 1.6 indicated 16:10 and 1.333 indicates 4:3
When you've calculated your screen's aspect ratio, go to the picture below that matches that size
Right click on the picture and select "Set as Desktop Background"
Choose whether to "Fill", "Fit", or "Stretch" your picture - if you've chosen the right size "Fit" will be your best option
Select "Set Desktop Background" and you're done

First, save the wallpaper image to your phone by pressing your finger on the wallpaper image and hold down on it until you see a menu.
From here, click the “Save image” tab, and it will begin downloading.
The next step is to set this saved image as your wallpaper by pressing and holding a blank area on your screen (meaning where no apps are placed), and home screen options will appear.
Select 'add wallpaper' and choose whether the wallpaper is intended for 'Home screen', 'Lock screen', or 'Home and lock screen'.
Another set of options will appear where you can choose where the photo you would like to use will be coming from, namely the Gallery.
If necessary, crop the image to a suitable size. Once satisfied, simply click 'Done'.

First, save the wallpaper image to your phone by pressing your finger on the wallpaper image and hold down for about 2 seconds until a menu appears.
From here, click “Save Image“, and it will begin downloading.
The next step is to set this saved image as your wallpaper by, first, going to the 'Photos' app and selecting the wallpaper photo you've saved there.
Click on the share icon on the lower left corner of the screen, then select 'Use as Wallpaper'.
Then choose to set the photo as either the lock screen, home screen or both.