Six Cool Gratitude Habits to Model for Kids!
By Janice M Simon, MA, CPO
July 26, 2019
Research has shown how much gratitude helps us in a variety of ways, including reducing the effects of stress, insomnia, and depression. It can even help to improve relationships with the people around you, particularly the one with yourself.
It’s not always easy to express gratitude especially when bad things keep happening or everything is a struggle. Like any muscle, gratitude requires regular exercise and attention. When you start recording the things you’re grateful for, you start noticing more of the small things that give you joy.
It’s a great way to establish a good habit for your nieces and nephews and can help them learn to express gratitude for what they have. By using these six gratitude habits below, you can not only model gratitude for your niblings, who can build up their own gratitude muscles. A little practice now will make all of you gratitude pros by the time Thanksgiving rolls around.
Simple Gratitude Journal
At the end of each day, write down the top one to three things you’re grateful for. Writing this down creates a mindfulness exercise and allows you to reflect on the good things in your life. Each night at dinner, one of my brothers, sister-in-law, and two nephews do their own version of this by going around the table to say one thing good thing that happened and one bad thing. By talking about the “bad thing,” they learn how to express frustrations in a healthy way.
Rose, Bud and Thorn Exercise
In this mindfulness exercise, think about your day and write a Rose – something you’re grateful for such as a win or a highlight to your day; Bud – an act of kindness you witnessed or initiated; and Thorn – something you learned today. There are a few slightly different versions of this exercise out there, and you can adapt this to different settings as needed.
Write a Thank You Note
Do you have a favorite Auntie, teacher, or friend who has greatly improved your life by being in it? Let them know. Make it a habit to send a thank you note once a month to a person who has impacted your life. Don’t focus on trying to come up with the “right” words. Perfection shouldn’t come into play when it comes to expressing gratitude.
Meditation
With meditation apps, you can choose guided meditations on gratitude. Apps like Insight Timer, Calm, and Aura have many meditations for you to try. Some apps on the market do require a subscription to access all of their services.
Gratitude Jar
Write down any action or item that you’re grateful for on a piece of paper and add it to the jar. At the end of the year, open the jar and read all of them to relive the year.
Happify App
The Happify app is more than just a meditation tool. The app offers articles, gratitude and resiliency exercises, games, videos, and infographics to build happiness, resiliency, and mental wellness. Some features are free on the app, or you can pay a monthly subscription fee to access all of them.
Photo: (c)
Fizkes