An Attitude of Gratitude

It’s Thanksgiving week and I want to thank all of my clients and readers for supporting me and my new company which we launched six months ago this week.  I am incredibly grateful for the opportunities I have received and look forward with eager anticipation to the year ahead.  I visited Thanks-Giving Square this week in downtown Dallas and was inspired by their story and mission.  Dallas has the drive and ambition to do great things, but also the humility to do so with a greater purpose and perspective.  And that’s why I’m proud to call our city home.

I spend most of my time dealing with the minutiae of financial planning, but I know that knowledge alone is not the source of success.  To make it work, you have to be an optimist, you have to believe in the process.  Over the past 15 years, we’ve had tremendous opportunities to create wealth, and many have grown their net worth dramatically.  And still there are people who will tell you that the market has been terrible over this time period and that they’ve not made money.

People who are thankful, who have gratitude, tend to have more success in their finances.  Gratitude and optimism are two sides of the same coin and maintaining that positive attitude goes a long way towards accomplishing goals.  But I don’t think we always feel grateful.  Most of us have to be reminded from time to time to step back and consider all the things we should not take for granted.

Is it worthwhile to try to be thankful?  Can you become more grateful?  In a 2003 psychological study, participants were asked to keep a journal.  One group was instructed to write things they were thankful for, while a second and third group recorded negative thoughts, or neutral events (no positive or negative instructions).  Researchers found that those with a “gratitude journal” felt better and were more optimistic.  They were also more likely to have made more progress on their personal goals.

We will all think of reasons to be grateful this Thursday, but why let it be a one-day event?  What if, instead, you wrote down just one thing you are thankful for, each day for the rest of the year.  That’s what I will be doing and I invite you to do the same.  I hope you will accept, and if you do, please send me a message after January 1 to tell me about your experience.  Thank you!