With Thanksgiving and the Holiday season quickly approaching. We wanted to touch on a few skills and thoughts that may be helpful in this season……

Gratitude, Happiness, and Optimism

Adapted with permission from the presentation-

Happiness: How Positive Psychology Changes Our Lives by Lynn Johnson, Ph.D.

 

Gratitude prayers are the best at producing happiness

• Write down some people who have been kind to you. What did they do for you?
• How do you feel when you review those memories?

Gratitude Experiment

• Jot down 3 things, in the past 24 hours, that you feel good about and would like to see continue
• Jot down one or two things you did that you feel were good, right, ethical, or noble, some things you approve of
• Rate your feelings before/after 0-10

Gratitude for Challenges

• Jot down something that upset you
• Now try to brainstorm: How might this be a blessing in disguise? How could I turn it to my advantage? What could be good about this?
• Rate your feelings now: 0-10

Gratitude Diary

• Each day, write 3-5 things that you liked
  • What happened to me? Why did it happen?
  • What did I do right? Why did I do that
• Then write one thing that you didn’t like
• • Ask yourself: “And how is it also good, a blessing in disguise?”
  • Find two or three ways it helps you

Random Kindness

• One day per week, do five acts of kindness
• Write about it in your diary

Future Diary

• Describe your future state
  • The present tense “I am doing X, achieving Y….”
  • How did I do it? Break down into discrete steps
• Write on this once per week
• • Six months to five years in the future, 10 years in the future

Future Diary- Miracle Question

• How would things be if your problems were miraculously transformed into solutions?
  • So if the current negatives actually ended up as a benefit (solution) in the long-run
• What would you do? What would others see you doing? How would others know the miracle had occurred, without you telling them?
• Write on this once per week

Smile Assignment

• Practice smiling more on random days
  • Magic coin flip technique
    • Flip a coin- heads you purposely smile extra that day and document in your diary, tails you smile normal and document in a diary
  • Recall happy times, and then smile
• How does smiling more affect you?
  • Track experiences in your gratitude diary
  • How do I feel?
  • How do others respond to me?

Mindfulness

• Focus on the sensory impressions in a moment-to-moment fashion
  • Food
  • Activity (walking, running, sports)
  • Conversations
  • Friends
  • Recall & Nostalgia
  •    Notice anxiety
  • Do not attempt to change or stop it
  • Notice the feelings, thoughts, fears, changes in your body

Reducing Trauma

• 15 minutes of “Mindful breathing” reduced reaction to stress and improved mood.
• Even 5 minutes 2x’s per day has significant benefits.

“What went well” diary

• Can I make it happen again?
  Diary of when you said thanks – what happened?