start monday with gratitude

Think of a household gadget that you don’t already have but which you would love to buy. A piece of equipment that would make life so much easier, so much more enjoyable, so much more luxurious for you.

It could be something for the kitchen, the living room, the bathroom.

Perhaps you’d love a dry-cooker so you could make all those treats you enjoy, healthier.

Perhaps you fancy a robot vacuum cleaner to save you extra work.

Perhaps you’d love an LED TV screen set above the bath so you can watch your favourite series while soaking in the bath.

Choose one item and spend some time thinking how much better it would make your life, how much fuller your life would feel, how much more luxurious your life would be.

Really go to town with this.

Today and for the rest of this week, we’re going to change our perspective. Rather than focus on what you would love to have but don’t have, we’re going to fall back in love with what you already have and gain an appreciation for just how much you already have.

So, let’s take a dander round your home.

Our first stop will be in the kitchen.

I invite you to open every drawer and every cupboard door in your kitchen.

Look around.

Are the cupboards and drawers completely empty or do they have ‘stuff’ in them? Perhaps they’re full of ‘stuff’?

Go to the drawer that holds your cutlery.

Take out all the clean teaspoons in your drawer and count them. Do you have any teaspoons anywhere else, such as sitting in a dishwasher? Count those too.

How many teaspoons do you have in total?

How many people live in your house?

Do you have more than 1 teaspoon per person in your household?

Now. What about food in your kitchen.

Do you have enough food in your cupboards, fridge, freezer to feed you and your family for today only?

Or could you rustle up meals for tomorrow, the next day, even the next day?

Can you see just how abundant your kitchen is and how much you have to be grateful for?

Let’s head back into the kitchen today, again.

Do you have a gadget or a piece of equipment stored away in a cupboard that you haven’t used this week?

Perhaps a toastie machine or a blender of some type? What about a beater or whisk?

When was the last time you used this piece of equipment?

Do you use it at least once a week or is it sitting there gathering dust?

I invite you to find a reason to use that piece of equipment on more than one occasion over the remaining days of this week.

If it’s a piece of equipment that has been gathering dust, find some enjoyment in re-using it again. If it’s a piece of equipment you still use once a week, give thanks for how much easier it makes life for you.

Have you ever said, “I don’t have anything to wear!”?

Perhaps you were invited to an unexpected job interview or to a friend’s last-minute party.

Go to your wardrobe and look inside.

Do you really have nothing to wear? Are there no clothes hanging in your wardrobe?

Your challenge today is to find an outfit that you could wear for an interview and another outfit you could wear to a party.

Put each outfit on in turn and admire yourself in a mirror. Don’t just look at yourself, admire yourself. And compliment yourself too.

Then express gratitude for all the beautiful clothes you have.

Go in search of an item in your home that is special to. An item that you enjoy using, an item that makes you feel special, an item that, perhaps, feels luxurious.

It should be an item that you use regularly, preferably daily.

Perhaps it’s a coffee-maker, perhaps it’s a juicing machine, perhaps it’s a state of the art set of cinematic speakers or a large flatscreen TV.

Choose one item and then think of life without that one item, that one item that makes you feel special that you use regularly.

How much easier and more enjoyable is life with that one item?

Can you discover a new-found appreciation for that item?

How fortunate do you feel having that item?

Today I invite you to spend some time sitting with an item that means a lot to you.

It could be a book you read months or years ago that you couldn’t put down, it could be an item belonging to a grandparent or other close family member or friend who has since crossed over, it could be a photograph of you having fun as a child, a day you will always remember.

Choose an item that, to anyone else, would simply be ‘just another item’ because it doesn’t hold a lot of financial value. However, it should be an item which, to you, holds so much sentimental value to you.

Sit with that item and remember and relive why it is so special for you.

Remember how you felt reading that book, not wanting to put it down. Or how you always knew when your grandfather put on that cap, he was planning on taking you out on an adventure. Or how that day at the park with your best friend was when you just knew you’d always be, and still are, BFFs.

Recall the significance of your chosen item in as much detail as you can.

And then give thanks and gratitude to the memories and experiences associated with that item.

You have spent the majority of this week getting reacquainted with objects that you maybe haven’t used for a while, simple items that you perhaps have taken for granted in the past, but which make you life easier such as the basic teaspoon, appreciating that you have much more than you realise, and spending time with an item that has sentimental value to you.

Now go back to Monday’s exercise where you focused on an item that you would love to have but don’t yet have.

Do you still feel the same way about that item? Do you still feel have a desire for it? Or do you now have a better appreciation for everything you already have, all the objects that already make your life comfortable and enjoyable?