Writing a Gratitude Journal for Thanksgiving Day
By Kathy Warnes
Writing a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal and presenting it to the one you are thanking on Thanksgiving Day benefits the recipient and the writer as well.
“It isn’t what you have in your pocket that makes you thankful, but what you have in your
heart.”
Today, is the day to start writing your Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal! It doesn’t matter if the temperature is in the wrong numbers outside, gratitude works in all seasons.
Keeping a daily Thanksgiving gratitude journal with an eye to a reading some of its entries at Thanksgiving dinner is a good way to remind yourself and others of forgotten blessings. A Thanksgiving gratitude journal is also a good way to let the important people in your life know what they mean to you.
Keep a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal Because...
The hustle and bustle of the holiday season and the hurry and stress of our busy lives in general make it easy to take the blessings in our lives for granted. Blessings include people as well as things and people like to be appreciated. Small gestures of appreciation such as a personalized gratitude journal can often mean much more than an expensive gift.
For children, making a gratitude journal is an educational experience without being in school. Writing or drawing a daily entry in a gratitude journal teaches them discipline and develops their creativity and writing and drawing skills. Psychological and spiritual benefits include developing a sense of thankfulness and thinking of others as well as deepening of relationships with their creator and their friends and family. Keeping a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal can be a fun and worthwhile family project as well as a worthy project for individual family members.
A Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal Could Look Like…
The outward appearance of your gratitude journal doesn’t have to be fancy. You can buy a bound booklet
with blank pages at an office supply store. You can also use loose leaf notebook paper and a binder or you can even use a legal pad if appearances don’t mean as much to you as content does. For a journal for your children you can use a three hole punch to punch holes in computer paper and give them a report cover to protect their journal.
A gratitude journal can be...
A gratitude journal can be handwritten in pencil – as long as the writing is legible- ink, or calligraphy. It can be typed on the computer and printed off and trimmed to size. Children can use crayons and colored pencils to illustrate their entries in their gratitude journals or even oil pastels and water colors if they are extra artistic. You can make double entries or make copies of pages so you can give a copy to that special someone instead of just telling them what they mean to you. If your gratitude journal is to your mother or your grandmother or other special people, you can even dedicate an entire journal to them and present it to them at Thanksgiving dinner.
As long as it can survive being handled and written in every day, a gratitude journal can be as fancy or as plain as you want it to be. The possibilities are limited only by your imagination.
What and How to Write in a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal
The contents of your Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal depend on the contents of your heartand your imagination. If you’re thinking that your heart and your imagination have been crowded out by daily life, think one more time. Thank the friend who picked you up when your car broke down. Thank your son for making his bed without being tortured. Thank your daughter for making macaroni and cheese for dinner.
Thank your friend who really listened to you. According to Neil Clark Warren, Ph.D. and founder of eHarmony.com, “communication is 85 percent listening and 15 percent talking. The more you listen, the more you enhance communication.” In this case he was talking about married couples, but his comment applies to all relationships.
Thank a friend who gave you comfort by just being there. Thank your spouse for being there emotionally as well as physically. Thank your son for wiping his feet when he came in from the muddy yard. Thank your daughter for not making a smart aleck remark when you gained those extra pounds.
.
Help younger children make a written or bulleted list of the things they appreciate. They can illustrate the list as well.
Older children can write thank you notes to friends or family for things that others have done for them.
Teens and adults can write an "I remember when you did this for me" list or paragraph.
Unexpected Benefits of a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal
According to Dorene Clement, author of Keeping the Five Year Journal, keeping any kind of a journal, including a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal, helps the journal keeper grow personally and makes them freer because they are focusing on their inner and outer worlds and bringing them closer together.
Albert Schweitzer said, “Sometimes our light goes out but is blown into flame by another human being. Each of us owes deepest thanks to those who have rekindled this light.”
If someone has renewed your hope, let them know by thanking them with a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal.
The amazing thing about focusing on a“gratitude attitude” and keeping and giving a Thanksgiving gratitude journal is that you develop a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal in your heart that you write in every day.
Presenting a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal
Send a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal to a soldier here or overseas thanking him or her for sacrifices for America. Send a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal to a wounded veteran or an aged veteran.
Send a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal to someone in a nursing home, thanking them for contributing their lives to build and maintain our country.
Present your Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal with a smile, a hug, and a thankful heart and receive one with the same attitude. A Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal is a lasting thank you that can be read and re-read over the years. It is an eternal loving message from the person who created it.
References
Diehn, Gwen. The Decorative Page: Journals, Scrapbooks & albums Made Simply Beautiful. Lark books, 2003
Roberts, Kelly Rae. Taking flight: Inspiration and Techniques to Give Your Creative Spirit Wings. North Light Books, 2008
Trout, Diana. Journal Spilling: Mixed-Media Techniques for Free Expression. North Light Books, 2009
Writing a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal and presenting it to the one you are thanking on Thanksgiving Day benefits the recipient and the writer as well.
“It isn’t what you have in your pocket that makes you thankful, but what you have in your
heart.”
Today, is the day to start writing your Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal! It doesn’t matter if the temperature is in the wrong numbers outside, gratitude works in all seasons.
Keeping a daily Thanksgiving gratitude journal with an eye to a reading some of its entries at Thanksgiving dinner is a good way to remind yourself and others of forgotten blessings. A Thanksgiving gratitude journal is also a good way to let the important people in your life know what they mean to you.
Keep a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal Because...
The hustle and bustle of the holiday season and the hurry and stress of our busy lives in general make it easy to take the blessings in our lives for granted. Blessings include people as well as things and people like to be appreciated. Small gestures of appreciation such as a personalized gratitude journal can often mean much more than an expensive gift.
For children, making a gratitude journal is an educational experience without being in school. Writing or drawing a daily entry in a gratitude journal teaches them discipline and develops their creativity and writing and drawing skills. Psychological and spiritual benefits include developing a sense of thankfulness and thinking of others as well as deepening of relationships with their creator and their friends and family. Keeping a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal can be a fun and worthwhile family project as well as a worthy project for individual family members.
A Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal Could Look Like…
The outward appearance of your gratitude journal doesn’t have to be fancy. You can buy a bound booklet
with blank pages at an office supply store. You can also use loose leaf notebook paper and a binder or you can even use a legal pad if appearances don’t mean as much to you as content does. For a journal for your children you can use a three hole punch to punch holes in computer paper and give them a report cover to protect their journal.
A gratitude journal can be...
A gratitude journal can be handwritten in pencil – as long as the writing is legible- ink, or calligraphy. It can be typed on the computer and printed off and trimmed to size. Children can use crayons and colored pencils to illustrate their entries in their gratitude journals or even oil pastels and water colors if they are extra artistic. You can make double entries or make copies of pages so you can give a copy to that special someone instead of just telling them what they mean to you. If your gratitude journal is to your mother or your grandmother or other special people, you can even dedicate an entire journal to them and present it to them at Thanksgiving dinner.
As long as it can survive being handled and written in every day, a gratitude journal can be as fancy or as plain as you want it to be. The possibilities are limited only by your imagination.
What and How to Write in a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal
The contents of your Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal depend on the contents of your heartand your imagination. If you’re thinking that your heart and your imagination have been crowded out by daily life, think one more time. Thank the friend who picked you up when your car broke down. Thank your son for making his bed without being tortured. Thank your daughter for making macaroni and cheese for dinner.
Thank your friend who really listened to you. According to Neil Clark Warren, Ph.D. and founder of eHarmony.com, “communication is 85 percent listening and 15 percent talking. The more you listen, the more you enhance communication.” In this case he was talking about married couples, but his comment applies to all relationships.
Thank a friend who gave you comfort by just being there. Thank your spouse for being there emotionally as well as physically. Thank your son for wiping his feet when he came in from the muddy yard. Thank your daughter for not making a smart aleck remark when you gained those extra pounds.
.
Help younger children make a written or bulleted list of the things they appreciate. They can illustrate the list as well.
Older children can write thank you notes to friends or family for things that others have done for them.
Teens and adults can write an "I remember when you did this for me" list or paragraph.
Unexpected Benefits of a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal
According to Dorene Clement, author of Keeping the Five Year Journal, keeping any kind of a journal, including a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal, helps the journal keeper grow personally and makes them freer because they are focusing on their inner and outer worlds and bringing them closer together.
Albert Schweitzer said, “Sometimes our light goes out but is blown into flame by another human being. Each of us owes deepest thanks to those who have rekindled this light.”
If someone has renewed your hope, let them know by thanking them with a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal.
The amazing thing about focusing on a“gratitude attitude” and keeping and giving a Thanksgiving gratitude journal is that you develop a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal in your heart that you write in every day.
Presenting a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal
Send a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal to a soldier here or overseas thanking him or her for sacrifices for America. Send a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal to a wounded veteran or an aged veteran.
Send a Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal to someone in a nursing home, thanking them for contributing their lives to build and maintain our country.
Present your Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal with a smile, a hug, and a thankful heart and receive one with the same attitude. A Thanksgiving Gratitude Journal is a lasting thank you that can be read and re-read over the years. It is an eternal loving message from the person who created it.
References
Diehn, Gwen. The Decorative Page: Journals, Scrapbooks & albums Made Simply Beautiful. Lark books, 2003
Roberts, Kelly Rae. Taking flight: Inspiration and Techniques to Give Your Creative Spirit Wings. North Light Books, 2008
Trout, Diana. Journal Spilling: Mixed-Media Techniques for Free Expression. North Light Books, 2009
