Embracing My Journey ~ Living with passion & purpose!

By Victoria Loveland-Coen, Embracing My Journey Guest Blogger

One chilly morning last November, I went for a run in the woods close to where we live in North Carolina with my dog.  It was unusually cold and most of the trees had already shed their leaves.  I was deep in thought about my life and all the things that weren’t going well…all the opportunities that appeared to have passed me by and how unfair it all seemed.  I was running tired and kept stumbling over stones and tree roots, and just considered turning back, when my dog (on leash) stopped and sniffed at something for what seemed like an eternity.  Irritated at the idea of being forced to stop, I grumbled something, and then suddenly…I looked up and noticed it.  The sun had broken through the clouds and appeared to be shining directly on one tree in a grassy patch.  This tree still had its leaves which had turned golden, and in the direct sunlight it positively glowed.  I stood there in amazement.  “What beauty!  What a gift this is!”

I started to spontaneously give thanks to the universe for the beauty of this site, and then gave thanks to my dog for stopping me so that I wouldn’t miss it.  I was grateful for the whole forest and for the opportunity to run in it that morning with my dog. Well, as it happens with gratitude, one gratitude led to another and then to another, and another.  This attitude of sudden gratitude started slipping into my thoughts about my life and, before long, I began to realize my life was pretty darned blessed.  My thoughts turned to all the prosperity, love and well-being in my life.  A blast of energy rushed through my body and was suddenly leaping over stones and roots.

When I got back home I was changed…perhaps forever.  The experience woke me up to the power of gratitude to transform our lives and inspired me to begin The Gratitude Experiment.  The blog site, www.gratitudexp.com went up Thanksgiving Day and has been a source of support for my own practice of intentional…or “proactive” gratitude…and for many others as well.

How can you transform your life by practicing proactive gratitude?

All it takes are 3 simple steps. They are…

Step 1.  Practice actively searching for the good in your life on a daily basis. These can be the obvious things like good health, your children, your job, etc.  But, more importantly, notice the “little” things like the view from your office window, or the color of the flower by the front door, or your spouse’s eyes, or the fact that someone let you in on the freeway this morning. You are training your mind to notice all the good stuff that most people miss because they’re so busy focusing on what’s wrong.

Step 2. Then, once your find them, embrace them…celebrate them.  Consciously allow yourself to feel good about all the blessings in your life.  Give a little, “woo-hoo!” if you want to.  Get up and dance or sing. Allow the good feeling of gratitude to fill up your body and energize you.

Step 3. Document your gratitudes on a daily basis.  This is your proof…your evidence.

Take 5 things a day for which you are grateful and write them down either in a journal you keep by your bedside, or come and post them on the Gratitude Experiment website.  When you share them on the site, other people can rejoice with you…which actually increases the energy that attracts more good into your life.

It’s that simple. It’s a simple, easy process that has a profound impact on your life.

One of greatest benefits of practicing proactive gratitude is that you begin to “take it personally.”  You begin to realize that you live in a friendly universe that has created a magnificent world for you to enjoy.  You begin to feel…deep down in your bones…that there is a force (call it Creative Intelligence, the Infinite, God, or whatever) that loves you so much that It has given you…and continues to give you…more good than you can possibly imagine.  When you realize that, you’ve shifted your energy in the balance of receiving more good. And, you will attract more good into your life because you know feel…deep down…that you are worthy of it.

Many Blessings.

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Victoria Loveland-Coen is a speaker, life coach and author of two books, Manifesting Your Desires, and The Baby Bonding Book. Her new blog site, The Gratitude Experiment, www.gratitudexp.com supports those who want to transform their lives through the simple practice of proactive gratitude. She’s active on Facebook and twitter (@manifestingmama).  Victoria lives in Chapel Hill with her husband and twin daughters.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 9th, 2010 at 2:11 pm and is filed under 30 Days of Amazing People. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.