The fastest mood reset: the miracle of gratitude
When I was at the lowest of the lows with my drinking at my eating disorder, a daily practice of gratitude helped to save my life. I know we hear about it a lot- but it’s a powerful tool to shift your day, your perspective, or your outlook. Listen or read now and be sure to share with a friend if this helps you- it means the world.
FULL TRANSCRIPT
Hey guys, Emily here. I wanted to share with you something that has really been transforming the way I experience hard moments in my life. a lot of you guys know that I've been in recovery for a long time. I've been sober for almost 20 years, but I am like such a sensitive and open human being. I definitely am deeply flawed and imperfect and
I have noticed that my brain's default state is negativity and pessimism. Like I have to constantly be absorbing positive information and uplifting material to stay positive. My brain is inclined toward seeking safety and all of our brains are actually inclined towards seeking safety, which is often why we don't want to take risks.
But I really believe that some people just have that personality where the glass is more half full. my brain tends toward fear, anxiety, and stress overthinking.
And this has really been helping me tremendously and I call it abiding in gratitude.
And the purpose of this exercise is to catch ourselves when we're feeling really negative and really victimized or really resentful and to be able to shift ourselves out of that state. And the reason that's important is because we are responsible for our own happiness. I know I can really get stuck in a state of negativity and resentfulness, I think.
Emily Garcia (01:51.328)
A lot of moms carry, wear a trillion hats, literally a trillion hats. mean, my list of things to do this morning was like 27 things long. It's crazy. You're constantly thinking about who needs to go to the dentist, who needs to go to this appointment, who needs to go to this tutoring session, who needs to go to this sports practice, making sure everyone's where they need to be, not to mention planning and shopping for breakfast, lunch and dinner and making time.
for your partner or making time for one-on-one time for your children, making time for your work. I mean, we haven't even talked about work yet. Laundry, dishes, housework, I mean, the list literally goes on and on and it is so easy to be resentful of all of that.
Emily Garcia (02:42.688)
instead of grateful. And I'll just give you guys an example of when I used this recently because it helped me so much. We just came back from our family vacation. We went camping around Maine and it was such a blast.
Honestly, the simplicity and nature element of camping, well, it's not simple. It's a lot of work for mom and dad. I have to give Rich credit. He was like all in.
Anyway, I'm sorry I'm taking so long to get to this exercise. We had just been camping for four days. Every single piece of clothing that we had was filthy and we needed to get our laundry done before moving to our next campsite. And so we went to a laundromat in town. The house was completely trashed. The car was completely trashed, which is how it gets on road trips. I have the car, which is trash. I have a trunk full of dirty clothes and I send.
Rich and the boys to a local park to play for a while. And I'm in the laundromat and my resentment starts to pile onto me. Like, why am I the one doing the laundry? Nobody helped me load the car today. The car is completely trashed. I can't believe we were like rushing at the last minute. This is so annoying. Just some negative thinking. It is so hot in here. Of course I don't have money for the vending machine.
Let me go find $5 to make quarters, whatever. Just some negativity creeping in. Oh great, there's no machines available.
Emily Garcia (04:24.194)
you know, I start getting the laundry done, eventually get all the laundry done. go back to the car and I'm reminded that the car is trash and I'm like, feeling so taken advantage of by this point. Now the reality is my boys are very helpful. They just still need a lot of instruction at this point and I can get resentful that they're not particularly proactive. and I.
could not get the bag of laundry in the back of the car because it was so disorganized. We were on like day 11 of the road trip at this point. It was so filthy. And also we had to buy a lot of clothes along the way because it was really cold in Maine, which is exactly why we went. It's so hot in Florida. We've been really struggling. We hadn't taken a family trip yet and we're like, you know what, let's go somewhere where it's chilly and we can camp and enjoy being outside and reset.
So we bought a bunch of sweatpants and sweatshirts. So all of this clothes that we had, as well as like mudding boots and clamming boots, were no longer fitting in our backs. So I couldn't get everything to fit into the back of the trunk. And I'm like...
This is so annoying. Why am I the one sweating my arse off in the laundromat, doing all of this all by myself, cleaning out the car, which is completely trashed. No one in my house or family appreciates me. And I just find myself going down this rabbit hole of resentfulness.
And I remembered that we attract what we are. We attract what we are. And if I was going to stay in this state of negativity that I was going to attract and feel more and more and more negativity as the days and the rest of our trip, trip went on. And also that that discomfort inside of my body, that anger is such a frequency emotion.
Emily Garcia (06:30.646)
that I needed to just let it pass right through me and shift to a state where I felt better because I wanted to feel better and go back to having a blast. And so I shifted to a practice that I'm calling abiding in gratitude. And I say abiding because I was doing it consistently throughout the day, every day, and trying to find a hundred things to say thank you for. But I use it in this specific moment to try to shift my mood and instead say,
Thank you so much that we have the financial security to go into a Target and buy all of these sweatshirts and all of these sweatpants. Thank you so much for the convenience of that Target. Thank you so much for the convenience of this laundromat. Thank you so much that I was able to find the money and the coins that I needed. Thank you so much that the machines opened up for me. Thank you so much that Rich is right now playing.
Baseball and football with the boys in a field right nearby here, which they absolutely love when he plays with them. It's probably their favorite thing in the world. Thank you so much for the s'mores and the crusty dried up marshmallow on these sweatpants and the chocolate and these filthy socks and the holes in these socks because my boys are so healthy and so active.
that they're constantly covered in dirt and getting holes in their brand new socks. Thank you so much for the memories that we've made around these fires that my new sweatpants smelled like bacon because we cooked bacon over the fire this morning. Thank you so much for this incredible family time that we have had, right? Finding...
every single thing I could possibly be thankful for and you will feel the energy in your body begin to shift. We attract what we are. We become what we are. So using this tool and a lot of the times the word gratitude is tossed around but really what it means
Emily Garcia (08:52.158)
is finding a place of deep thankfulness inside of our bodies where we can truly feel thankful and shift the way our body feels in that exact moment.
Emily Garcia (09:13.086)
It's such a powerful tool. I would really encourage you guys to try to abide in thankfulness, which is much harder. I kind of go in and out of that practice on the days that I remember to do it, on the days that I remember to say thank you the moment my eyes wake up, because every day that we wake up is an absolute miracle. Every day that we get to be alive is an absolute miracle. Thank you so much for this day. Thank you that I am alive.
that my heart is beating all on its own, that I can get up and walk out of this bed and go make myself a delicious cup of coffee, right? When you can abide in that gratitude, abide in that deep thankfulness, the moment you wake up, you will see your life begin to shift. But you can also use it as a very powerful tool when you're feeling super negative, super victimized and resentful because we are responsible for our own happiness.
and we also attract what we are. And so from that moment, I was able to return to the park with so much thankfulness and so much joy. And I wasn't snapping at everyone or getting annoyed when the boys fell and got another grass stain on their sweatpants and saw that they were running around in their brand new socks, getting mud on them.
Emily Garcia (10:37.482)
because I knew that none of it mattered. What mattered is how we all felt, how I felt on the inside and how we all felt being around each other. So I hope that this is helpful to you guys in the way that it has been helpful to me. And please send me a message if you want help seeing a certain situation from a different perspective.
or if this was helpful to you. You can write me at heywiseandwild@gmail.com or find me on Instagram at @heywiseandwild. Love you guys. Thank you so much for listening.