Gratitude Journal

I've heard a lot about how beneficial writing in a gratitude journal can be. Gratitude is a great long term strategy to cope with depression and mental lethargy because it trains your brain to focus on positive things. Our minds are constantly adapting to the information that we feed it.

It is natural to focus on the negative instead of the positive. In fact, it helps us to survive. Obsessing over possible dangers helped us to avoid situations that could potentially kill us. Focusing on the things that were wrong with our lives helped us to fix them so that they did not become permanent. Focusing on the negative helped to keep us safe and build a life that had as little resistance as possible.

In today’s world, where survival isn’t that hard to accomplish, the things that bother us mentally aren’t matters of life and death. They have morphed into less consequential things like what other people think of us and what our future will look like. Although the things that bother us don’t threaten our survival, our minds will still fixate on them with the same measure of intensity.

By focusing on the positive, we give our minds a break from negative emotions that haunt us. We slowly learn how to enjoy the comforts that we do have: good food, beneficial relationships and enjoyable activities.

Positivity has a whole range of health benefits. It increases physical energy and learning ability. It also helps us to avoid bad habits and stick to good ones. You need less motivation to do something when you are in a good mood.

Serotonin, the happiness hormone that is associated with comfort and feeling good, helps to regulate mental function. It increases the rate at which your body can recover from injury and facilitates the resting process. This can lead to better sleep quality and feeling more refreshed.

Dopamine, another happiness hormone, increases the brain’s learning capability and increases the length of time that we can spend doing certain tasks. Dopamine release, for example, explains why we can focus intently on a series that we enjoy, but struggle to pay attention 5 minutes into a work meeting. Dopamine is also a major contributor to the kind of habits we have. Addictions like smoking, drug and alcohol abuse keep us coming back for more because they stimulate dopamine release.

People with naturally lower-than-usual levels of dopamine are more likely to partake in addictive behavior. People who naturally produce higher amounts of dopamine are more likely to make better life choices and gravitate towards healthier activities like exercise, self-improvement and learning.

My story is less extreme than many who would typically benefit from keeping a gratitude journal. I don’t struggle with depression. You might be wondering why I would try this experiment if I don’t feel any urgency to reshape my emotions. I wanted to see if keeping a gratitude journal would show me any noticeable differences in the health benefits that I described above.

To make sure that I stayed on the right track, I stuck to the following rules:

1. Write a gratitude journal once a day

I decided to do this at night because I could focus on it without being distracted by all the tasks that I had to get done. Doing it at the end of the day also meant that I had an entire day’s worth of thoughts and experiences that I could be thankful for.

2. Write in two separate sections every day: Things I feel thankful for and things I should be thankful for

I decided to separate the list into two parts. The first part consisted of things that I am actually glad about. If I needed to think of something that I should be thankful for just because some people don’t have the privileges that I do, or simply to fill up the page, I’d add it to the other side.

3. Write a quick anecdote about any changes that I experienced because of the gratitude journal

I thought that it would be very interesting to see how my experience changed over the course of the month. Would there be any differences between day 1 and day 10? The anecdotal notes would make up the report that I could share with you.

Here are some of the highlights of the notes that I took about this experiment:

Day 1

I was planning to spend 5 minutes on this, but it ended up taking just under an hour. It was easy for me to think about things that I am thankful for. I feel a little guilty about not feeling thankful for things that I take for granted. I’m worried about whether I can think of new things to write down tomorrow. Overall, I feel really energized and happy. I’m in a much better mood than I thought I’d be!

Day 2

I was in such a great mood last night that I struggled to fall asleep. I’m not grateful for that! I slept lighter than usual. It was easy for me to get out of bed this morning. A few people asked me why I was so happy (weird, since I had only done this once so far). I thought that I acted normal - just like any other day. Whenever something good happened to me, I felt good about having something to write about later. Today made me realize that a lot more good things happen to me than I realize. I was tempted to write some of these things down so that I don’t forget, but decided to limit this experiment to my nighttime routine.

Day 3

I struggled to fall asleep for the second night in a row because of the excitement. I’m wondering if I should do this in the morning instead. I felt sleepier during work – most likely because I haven’t been sleeping as well as usual.

Day 9

My sleep has finally returned back to normal. I might be sleeping better than usual now, but not sure. I get sleepy when I start writing in my journal - probably because I associate it with sleep. I have noticed that I am a lot calmer and I don’t stress about certain things like I used to. Everything else feels the same.

Day 10

It is just me or is my life actually improving since I started this!? Not intrinsic like my energy levels and stuff, but more good things are happening to me. I’ve had really great opportunities come my way the last few days. People are being super nice and generous towards me for no reason. Maybe being positive has somehow set something off?

The other days were typical ‘I feel good’, ‘nothing out of the ordinary’ ‘I like the way I feel’, etc.

I must say that my life has improved in ways that I didn’t expect. I was more successful at things I was trying to accomplish with work and people seemed to gravitate towards me. Maybe they sensed the positivity and wanted it for themselves? It has also been a lot easier to stick to my workout and diet plans. I’ve made less bad health decisions during the last 30 days than usual. The last two benefits are definitely worth the time that it took to complete this task.

I invited Saguren Redyrs, a personal trainer from SA Spotters, to verify the health claims that I made about serotonin and dopamine’s effects on the brain. He had this to say:

You are absolutely right about how serotonin and dopamine affects the brain. Positive thoughts can trigger the release of these feel-good hormones. We know that these hormones affect our decisions when it comes to things like eating, exercising and avoiding negative behaviors.

Serotonin and dopamine greatly influence the actions we take. This is why it’s so easy for people who exercise regularly to stick to their exercise regime while others can’t. It takes a few weeks before dopamine and serotonin (released by endorphins) encourage us to exercise more. Ironically, you need to exercise to get these benefits. Positive thinking, such as gratitude, is a great way to up-regulate the release of these neuro-transmitters.

This experiment was a big eye opener for me. I get why gratitude journals are all the rage right now! I have since decided to keep doing this - but in a slightly different way. Instead of writing in a journal, I am going to make an effort to think about the things that I am grateful for throughout the day. Every time that I do this, I must mentally list all the good things that have happened to me since the last time I did it. I highly recommend that you try this for at least a few weeks to discover the benefits for yourself.