Gratitude Journaling
What
A Gratitude log/journal is a tool for reflecting on and expressing thanks for God’s presence and activity – guidance, mercy, grace, peace, etc. – throughout the highs, lows, and mundane moments in our daily lives. A gratitude log/journal can be kept regularly, or you might choose to keep a record through a time of transition in your life.
Why
Our brains are wired to scan for safety. As a result, we notice and remember danger, threats, and scary things a great deal more easily. This micro-behavior is so subtle and frequent that we rarely notice it when we do it. Still, our news cycle and the types of stories we hear leverage this very human survival instinct to garner and keep our attention. Both our human instinct for survival and the regular flood of negative information toward us can leave us feeling pretty icky, anxious, and depleted most days. When we’re anxious or scared, our attention narrows. We focus only on our survival. As a result, we miss things within and around us. Sometimes we even miss God. The practice of keeping a gratitude log/journal expands our attention from merely our own survival to the larger picture of God’s presence and activity in, through, and around us.
Through gratitude, the Holy Spirit draws our gaze outward to the fullness that God brings about within and through our lives even amidst the hard things. Fixation on our survival, just ask any character in a suspense thriller or show, depletes us. Expressing praise and thanksgiving fills and fuels us. Just as our brains are wired to focus on the negative things, our brains are also wired in such a way that gratitude reshapes our brains, our imaginations, and our overall sense of well-being. Keeping a gratitude log/journal also allows us to record the different periods in our relationship with God. This becomes increasingly helpful – like breadcrumbs – when we’re trying to discern God’s will and direction in our lives.
How
A gratitude log/journal is an individual experience. You can choose to keep a log/journal in whatever way you want. This can include writing in the form of journal entries, poetry, letters to God, prose, or notes and thoughts. You can include pictures, drawings, church bulletin clippings, or whatever helps you record ways that you’ve experienced God in your daily life.
List | Identify 3-5 moments, interactions, experiences, or gifts, particularly instances of God’s presence and activity in your life, you’ve received throughout the day and offer thanks to God for them
Create | Develop a collage journal of art, pictures, textures, and colors that remind you of God’s presence and activity in your life over time
Build an Altar | Each night, build an altar comprised of a stone for as many things as you’re grateful for, selecting one stone for every instance of gratitude. Offer a prayer of thanksgiving to God once you finish building your altar. If doing this as an individual, couple or family, each of you build and explain your altar and then offer a prayer together.
Pray | Keep a prayer log/journal of requests, prayers, and answered prayers
Collect | Write a one-word description of what you’re grateful for on a rock and then place it in a jar. Review the jar at the end of the week and offer a prayer of thanksgiving for God’s presence and activity in your life.
Curate | Develop a journal of quotes, poetry, and Scripture that speaks to you
Free-write | Journal your unedited thoughts, feelings, and reactions, so you can present them to God in prayer and reflection