Tag: gratitude

  • Do what’s right, or else…

    Do what’s right, or else…

    When raised with fear and compliance as the tool to ensure good behaviour, or religious subscription, we create validation-seeking individuals whose willingness to compromise on what is right will be driven by social acceptance.

    Instilling values in our children, or living by our own values, must be grounded in a substantial appreciation for why it is valuable, and not why it is right.

    When we focus on right and wrong, we focus on judging others rather than understanding them.

    Arriving at a conclusion about whether something is right or wrong has its place.

    But without understanding and an appreciation for the value of what we want to establish, compassion is lost, and harshness is assumed to be justified to uphold truth or morality.

    It is counter-productive to use harshness to teach understanding.

    And it’s an exercise in futility to ignore what influences you are working against when trying to instil, or live by such values.

    Being mindful of two things is therefore critical towards maintaining your sanity.

    Firstly, connect with purpose and substance to the values that you stand for by connecting it to the good that you want to create in the lives of those around you.

    Secondly, be aware of your ability to influence the adoption of those values in the lives of those you care for.

    Sometimes, the appeal of instant gratification, or social inclusion may render your influence impotent.

    When that happens, take the time to plant the seed, but don’t exhaust yourself in nurturing it.

    We’re all responsible for nurturing our own seeds of goodness in our lives.

    Own Your Life.


  • Cyclical abuse

    Cyclical abuse

    At first, we remain in a bad relationship because we truly believe in the sincerity of the claims of our partner to want to improve, or to overcome what they’re struggling with.

    After some time, if we’re not careful, our inability to get them to follow through will convince us that we’re not a good enough reason for them to be better.

    When that continues for long enough, we begin to doubt our ability to be enough for anyone else, and thus find ourselves trapped in a cycle that we’re unintentionally sustaining.

    Some may claim that they stay because it’s their way of expressing unconditional love.

    Unconditional love, if it ever exists, is the sacrifice of one in favour of another. When you sacrifice yourself to compensate for the bad behaviour of someone else, that’s not love, that’s self loathing.

    If you don’t love yourself, loving another becomes a cry for significance or acceptance, and love has nothing to do with it.

    More importantly though, the choice of how to respond to bad or abusive behaviour is not binary. It’s not just about staying or leaving.

    Between those two choices lies a number of ways to potentially break cycles of abuse, all of which requires a better understanding of why the abusive behaviour is the way in which the other person is trying to feel significant, or to rage at an injustice done to them in the past.

    By understanding what drives their behaviour, we allow ourselves to see the human struggle behind the behaviour, rather than to judge the entirety of the human by their behaviour.

    But this is only possible when we don’t feel inadequate about who we are in that situation.

    A healthy self-esteem is therefore at the heart of truly breaking cycles of abuse, otherwise we may exit that situation, but we’re likely to be attracted to yet another cycle of abuse in our search for significance.

    It always starts with you.

  • Are you grateful for you?

    Are you grateful for you?

    Trying is something that you do when you’re unsure of your ability to do it.

    Trying relates to the process of developing the skills or understanding to accomplish something, and not to the outcome itself.

    When we try to do something, it means that we don’t believe that we’re capable of doing it yet. Otherwise, we’d just do it.

    This is true when it comes to accepting who we are.

    If we’re trying to, it means that we don’t.

    If we don’t, it means that we’re rejecting parts of who we are, or sadly at times, it means that we’re rejecting the whole of who we are.

    That’s what happens when we live our lives by comparing ourselves to what we see in others.

    Rather than admire them as inspirational, we judge ourselves as inferior.

    That’s when illness sets in. Illnesses of the heart, and of the body.

    Chronic illnesses result from a sustained rejection of what we dislike about ourselves, or what we believe is not good enough about who we are based on how others treat us.

    That rejection that we feel towards ourselves or our life is an indication of the ingratitude that we hold within.

    Ingratitude is at the heart of unhappiness because it focuses on what we don’t have, and diminishes the value of what we do have.

    When we find ourselves in such a space, it’s time to introspect about what defines how we feel about ourselves and the life that we have.

    It always starts with you.

  • The destruction of self-deprecation

    The destruction of self-deprecation

    In our efforts to subdue our ego, many resort to self-deprecation.

    Sometimes we put ourselves down to test if anyone will be willing to disagree with us, thereby hoping to receive acknowledgement or appreciation that would otherwise not be forthcoming.

    At other times, we put ourselves down because we try to convince ourselves that we should not expect more from those around us.

    In both instances, we know, deep down inside, that we are being dishonest with ourselves.

    However, when we are convinced of our inadequacy, or truly believe that we’re not worth more or good enough, that’s when we become saturated with ingratitude.

    The reason we become convinced of our lowly state is not because of who we know ourselves to be. It’s because we constantly judge ourselves by how much others accept or approve of who we are.

    If we reject ourselves, we become more reliant on validation from others.

    Worse still, if we reject ourselves, we rarely fulfil the rights of others because we don’t believe that we’ll be good enough, so we avoid the rejection by not contributing in the way that is expected from us.

    On the surface, we may appear obstinate or selfish, but the truth beneath the surface is that we’re simply putting up our defences to avoid our shame from being revealed. That is, the shame of what we think we’re lacking in.

    Gratitude for the self cannot be inserted by anyone else.

    No amount of validation from others will establish such gratitude. If anything, external validation will risk taking ourselves for granted because we’ll lose ourselves to doing things for show or praise, rather than sincerity.

    Be careful of the slippery slope of ingratitude.

    It destroys more lives than any other vice we may have.

  • Gratitude is the sister of faith

    Gratitude is the sister of faith

    When faced with trials, there are too many who surrender to coping with such trials instead of persevering to overcome them.

    Purposeful perseverence is called for when we find ourselves in situations that are weighing us down.

    No matter how little our resources or ability to influence the outcomes, using that little that we have while having faith that we will rise above it is what will slowly build the momentum to finally overcome the trying circumstances.

    The moment we diminish even the little that we have or the little influence that we can bring to bear on the situation, we risk falling into ingratitude.

    Ingratitude is the enemy of faith.

    When we diminish who we are because of the way that others treat us, or because we convince ourselves that we are undeserving of better, we take ourselves for granted and give up any opportunity to improve the condition of our lives.

    Faith is not born out of certainty, nor out of favourable conditions.

    It is tested during moments of hardship, and is often taken for granted during moments of ease.

    Thus, gratitude and faith become companions, because when we live with ingratitude for who we are, we will find ourselves in situations that will test our faith.

    And the more we live with gratitude, not only for what we have but especially for who we are, despite the weight of life, we will always find comfort in knowing that we are capable of navigating the trials of life while having faith that ease will follow the hardship.

    It is only through connecting with gratitude that we recognise the ease that followed the many hardships and trials of life, while ingratitude leaves us focusing on the persistent trials that followed those periods of ease.

    Thus, a grateful heart connects with the reality that ‘this too shall pass’, because they continue to purposefully persevere in persuing good, despite not always having it within themselves to immediately overcome the bad.

    It always starts with you.

    Own Your Life.


  • Enjoying the deferral of death

    Enjoying the deferral of death

    “When we go through life waiting for our struggles to be recognised, to be seen as the walking wounded, or the ones that survived, we become defined by that survival. We become survivors. Survivors don’t enjoy the sweetness of life. They simply enjoy the deferral of death.” From The Egosystem in the chapter titled Recognise My Struggle.

    When we lack appreciation for who we are, we seek that validation from those around us by highlighting our struggles so that they may admire our strength or resolve.

    When we focus on reciprocation, we find reason to emphasise what we do for others, often by mentioning it to anyone that will listen, because again, we lack appreciation for who we are and therefore go out in search of validating the good that we do for others, hoping that it will give us reason to feel worthy.

    We wear the badge of martyrdom when we feel sorry for ourselves, believing that we’re not appreciated or valued, and that our only value to those around us is in how we serve them.

    These are a few examples of how we diminish the value of what we do because we’re trading it for recognition or praise, rather than doing it because we believe in the value of what we do.

    When we mention the good that we do, we become distracted by the praise, and we lose sight of the dignity of those we assisted by mentioning their neediness while highlighting our generosity.

    At the heart of it all is a low self-esteem.

    Once we reach the age of awareness, our self-esteem is no longer inherited from our parents. It’s defined by our gratitude for who we are and what we have.

    The survivor mindset undermines gratitude because it anchors our focus on everything that we need to overcome, while distracting us from everything that is good and wholesome, or blessed in our lives.

    That’s when the sweetness of life is lost, and feeling good about ourselves becomes dependent on how others acknowledge or praise the good that we do, or the struggles that we overcome.

    At which point will we pause to consider how blessed we are to have the ability and the resources to overcome those very same struggles?

    It always starts with you.

  • Ingratitude starts with you

    Ingratitude starts with you

    We most often only realise that we’re ungrateful for a blessing that we have when it’s too late.

    That’s when regret sets in and either spurs us on to improve our awareness of what we should be grateful for, or it makes us bitter for the loss that we experienced.

    Gratitude is something that no one can instil in us.

    Others may be able to give us something to be grateful for, but they can’t insert that gratitude into our hearts.

    Gratitude is therefore something that we must connect with through our own way of valuing what we have.

    But, valuing what and who we have in our lives becomes difficult, if not impossible, if we believe that we’re entitled to what they offer.

    If we reduce the contribution of others to simply bring their duty, or the expectations of the role that they fulfil, we’ll inadvertently diminish our own value to simply being one of duty and responsibility as well.

    We see ourselves through the same lenses that we use to judge the contribution of others in our lives.

    When we regret the loss of something or someone because we took it for granted, we need to pause and reflect how much of who we are do we take for granted.

    What do we recognise as cherishable traits or attributes about ourselves that we must nurture and protect from contamination?

    Or do we take who we are for granted because we’ve grown so accustomed to trading and transacting with those around us?

    This happens when we believe that what we do for others deserves reciprocation because we need something from them.

    That’s how we lose sight of who we are, and the value that we are capable of creating in the lives of those around us because we want them to experience that value, and not because we need something from them in return.

    You can’t give what you don’t have. That’s why ingratitude towards others begins with ingratitude towards yourself.

    It always starts with you.

  • Gratitude starts with you

    Gratitude starts with you

    The very essence of gratitude lies in recognising the value of what we have.

    That sounds obvious, yet so many take for granted the lives that they have while yearning for a life that feels out of reach.

    The moment we long for something that isn’t there, we risk taking for granted that which is there.

    When we focus on what we don’t have, we’ll be focused on the shortcomings and flaws of what we do have.

    This applies to both people and things.

    We grow distracted by what we believe we deserve when we don’t trust those around us to be concerned about what we need.

    That lack of trust is due to many reasons, most of which relate to how we see ourselves.

    But, most importantly, the underlying expectation that accompanies such a focus on what we believe we deserve means that we feel betrayed each time we don’t get what we need.

    Expectation, by default, carries with it a sense of entitlement. That’s why we feel betrayed when our expectations are not met.

    But back to gratitude. If you look at what you get from others, and you assume that it’s simply their duty or obligation to provide it, then you won’t appreciate the blessing contained in what they provide, regardless of their reasons for providing it.

    That’s how we become ungrateful without meaning to.

    That’s how life becomes transactional.

    That’s how happiness and peace becomes elusive.

    It always starts with you.

    Own Your Life.