You’ve likely heard about gratitude and the gorgeous benefits of having some kind of gratitude practice.

Perhaps you’ve already tried a couple, or maybe this is the first you’re hearing of it.

Either way, the purpose of this post is to look into what gratitude actually is, and then dive into 10 tools & practices that will help you cultivate a consistent attitude of gratitude into your daily life.

You might really resonate with some, and others maybe less so.

There are 10 tools for you to have a play with and decide which help you live with deeper, more consistent gratitude.

Use this post to experiment with what makes you truly feel – and allow this process to come from your heart.

Enjoy my loves…

What is gratitude?

You very likely already know that gratitude is an experience or emotion that generates feelings or thoughts of love, thankfulness, warmth & kindness.

It’s felt through an experience of something good happening to you, which is then associated with someone (or something) that made this experience possible for you.

It expresses itself in many forms.

Warm physical sensations throughout your body… loving thankful thoughts.

However it expresses itself for you, when experiencing deep heartfelt gratitude, you’ll very likely drop into a state of bliss that’s full of joy & contentment.

Tools for cultivating an attitude of gratitude

The below tools & practices are here for you to have a play with and feel into what resonates and works for you. 

I’ve personally tried all of these – some created bigger transformations than others, but all have their own beautiful power in cultivating an attitude of gratitude within. 

Some can be done daily, whereas others require higher levels of attention, time & work. However, I do strongly recommend trying them all – or as many as you can – and making note of which help your heart flutter with gratitude the most.

I’d love to know how you get on so please do comment or get in touch to share what comes up for you.  

1. MORNING HEART PRACTICE

This practice can bring such good vibes into your day.

When I do this practice in the morning, I feel it flow through my day so flipping much. 

Simply lay or sit up in bed, and connect with your heart.

Maybe placing your hands over the centre of your chest, or breathing into your heart or connecting to it through some kind of visualisation.

Whatever gives you the strongest connection to your heart space. 

You can download this 6 minute recording to guide you towards your heart & gratitude each morning, or you can let your own intuition lead you.  

If you’re choosing to guide yourself, you might like to use touch or sensations, or you could use prompts like bringing people or situations into your minds eye and directing these into your heart. 

Either way, this practice is so effortlessly simple, yet so profound.

It’s had such an impact on my daily life and I really believe you’ll feel it’s magic in some way if you give it a chance.

2. GRATITUDE JOURNAL

If you’ve come across gratitude practices before, chances are you’ve heard of the gratitude journal.

It’s basically taking a moment out of your day to sink into your heart, and write down whatever grateful thoughts or feelings come up from this space.

It can be really obvious things, or on the more subtle personal side.

Whatever it is, the key is to deeply feel what it is you’re writing in there.

Any practice or expression of gratitude is amazing, but try to avoid emptily writing in a journal just because you’ve heard it’s good & will help – instead, truly feel and write from the heart with intention. 

The great thing about this exercise is how effortlessly it can become part of your day,. Just remember to include effort from your heart to experience the true magic of having a gratitude journal.

You can do this spontaneously, or carve out a certain amount of time each day to do this – 5 minutes or 30 minutes.

Choose what feels right for you and is enough time to open up your heart.

You could get yourself a beautiful little notepad that brings you joy to write in, or a plain piece of printer paper.

Just play and notice what connects you most deeply with your heart & sense of gratitude – and get’s you feeling excited to write!

I recommend writing rather than typing. It’s actually really nice to imagine your arms being an extension of your heart when you write to really put this loving energy onto the paper.

Also having the intention of being as specific and detailed as possible can help open you up to subtler things that will help you feel truly alive and cultivate a greater attitude of gratitude.

To avoid this becoming mechanical, I recommend combining this with the Morning Heart Practice so there’s more heart-felt intention going into the journal.

3. YOGA NIDRA

Yoga Nidra is a practice you’ll find much mention of across this website. 

The magic I’ve received from opening up my time & heart to this practice is literally beyond words. 

It’s similar to a guided meditation, except you’re being guided to put the different layers of your being to sleep until you’re left to experience the deepest, truest parts of you. 

I do believe any Yoga Nidra practice will help you to live with an effortless attitude of gratitude, however practising a session focusing specifically on gratitude will elevate this significantly. 

Here is a 40 minute guided Yoga Nidra session for gratitude you can download and practice as often as you wish.

As I said, the effects of this practice are hard to put into words, so give it a try to create your own experience if you feel called to do so. 

I recommend practising a minimum of 2x a weeks for a couple of weeks as this will allow you to gradually start feeling its impact. 

However, if you’re really keen to feel it’s magic, I suggest practising 4+. 

4. CONNECT TO YOUR SENSES

It’s our senses that allow us to actually experience existing on this huge rock as a human being. Take that in, and feel appreciation & gratitude flow through your heart as you do so.

Cultivating the stillness that allows you to deeply feel into the experiences of your senses can help you take in the magnitude of what it truly means to be alive.

So take the time to consciously soak in the miracles within and around you through all your senses.

Whether that’s through deeply tasting your food, going out in nature and fully taking in the sights & smells or even doing this in social situations if that’s possible for you.

It could be good for you to focus on one sense at a time and allow it to consume your attention so you can really sink into it.

It may be that you’re only able to connect more deeply with certain senses; so drop fully into these.

Just become more aware of what these senses are perceiving, and let it take you on a journey of gratitude for being a conscious, breathing human being.

5. SHARE YOUR GRATITUDE

There are so many ways you can share & express your gratitude, but here I’m talking about making a conscious effort to let others know how grateful and thankful you are.

Your gratitude may not always involve others, but when it does, let them know.

Write letters.

Give someone a quick spontaneous phone call or message.

Whatever it is, share your love and any details of the reason why you’re feeling grateful.

This will not only strengthen your relationships, but will also deepen the feeling of gratitude in your own heart and create a beautiful warmth in someone else’s.

6. GRATITUDE PLAYLIST

You can choose to listen to this Gratitude Playlist I created, or you can listen to any music that touches your heart with feelings of love & thankfulness.

Play it the background of your life, but do try to listen whilst doing nothing else at least a couple of times so you can fully soak up all the beautiful vibrations of the songs & allow them to fully vibrate gratitude through your heart and being.

7. GUIDED MEDITATIONS

Although doing a gratitude focussed meditation will again elevate this in your life, it doesn’t necessarily have to be gratitude specific.

It can simply be one that guides you to connect to your heart or those same uplifting sensations & emotions to that of gratitude.

If you’re quite an advanced meditator, you don’t have to choose guided.

Feel free to guide yourself to this space at the centre of your chest where true gratitude arises.

But if you haven’t got too much of a gratitude or meditation practice, I’d recommend choosing to be guided – this 20 minute meditation could be a good place to start.

Do this as regularly as feels good for you, but if you’re starting from zero, I suggest starting with once or twice a week and work on building it up.

At the beginning, it may seem like this meditation practice is just for those 10 or 20 minutes you spend sat with your eyes closed, but you’ll soon begin to feel the benefits and attitude of gratitude seeping into your life.

8. USE PROMPTS / REMINDERS

A daily gratitude practice can often fall off for reasons such as forgetting, a lack of mindfulness towards it or giving it up due to not feeling fast results.

Having visual prompts that remind you to step into gratitude can be great for helping you acquire an attitude of gratitude in your everyday life.

These reminders can be things like sticky notes around your home or phone screensavers.

You could even use mealtimes as a reminder; this can either be an opportunity to say a little gratitude prayer for the food and to everyone & everything involved in the process of getting it onto your plate, or simply use this as a prompt to send gratitude into your heart for whatever is present in that moment.

Sitting down to eat a meal is something many of us are lucky enough to do every single day, and so putting some extra awareness into this blessed moment that so many of us take for granted is a great opportunity to truly remember just how lucky and fortunate we are – for the food itself and anything else our heart calls to in that moment.

9. TOUCH YOUR CHEST

This is one of my personal favourites because it’s so simple yet so powerful in sending gratitude into your heart space and being.

I like this to be one of the first things I do when I open my eyes in the morning as part of my morning heart practice as it’s such a beautiful way of starting your day and setting the tone for how you’d like it to continue.

Although many of these other practices are wonderful, if you’re more of a tactile person like myself, having a physical experience through touch can create a much deeper connection.

All this method involves is placing your hands on the centre of your chest (the area of the spiritual heart) breathing into this space or feeling any sensations or emotions that arise.

Then you can either sit with the expansive sense of love inside your chest, or you can choose to also bring something you’re grateful for into this practice.

The beauty of this one is that it can easily be done whenever, wherever.

Just anywhere or any time that allows you to fully feel and drop into your heart – even if for less than a minute.

9. SELF-ENQUIRY

Self-enquiry is the practice of inquiring into your true self.

The Self before the name, the age, the house or the job.

This can be done in a number of different ways including certain books, writing, meditating or simply internally asking and enquiring.

If you’re quite new to this practice, here is a meditation that focuses specifically on self-enquiry.

Start here if you feel curious about this practice and see where it takes you.

This level of enquiry can lead to a gratitude and awareness of your existence that is far beyond words or beyond the mind.

10. FIND GRATITUDE IN DIFFICULT EXPERIENCES

This is probably the one that most profoundly shifted my life and entire perspective on gratitude.

It can be really tough to journey through, but the peace that’s available when meeting the pain of a situation deep inside the heart with gratitude is one of the biggest most powerful transformations I’ve ever been through.

I’ve experimented with psychedelics.. attended silent meditation courses.. but the growth and liberation I’ve experienced through consciously connecting to the vibration of gratitude inside my heart during times of pain has created a loving freedom I’ve never experienced before.

This isn’t for a second me saying avoid any other emotions you’re feeling and turn only to gratitude…

…if you’re angry, feel and process that anger too.

If you’re feeling sadness, anxiety, frustration.. feel it all so you can process and work with it.

This is just simply an invitation to sit with whatever potentially tough feelings are there and see if you can welcome any teeny ounce of gratitude into that difficult experience.

Gratitude for any insights or lessons this situation or person may have brought into your life beneath and beyond the pain.

Even if this is only possible 2% of the time, observe how that 2% of gratitude affects your experience, mind, body & heart.

And with practice, this can become easier as you start meeting those tough experiences with more peace through your cultivated attitude of gratitude.

Conclusion

So go ahead and try some of these and write in the comments anything you’d like to share about your experience or overall gratitude journey. 

The depth these tools have helped me travel to inside my heart has honestly changed my life. I’m not always super consistent, and you don’t need to pressure yourself to be either. 

If you’re wanting to feel more gratitude, bliss, love & peace in your life, then have a play with the above with an open mind & heart. 

As I said, some will work for you more than others, but here’s the absolute key… whenever and whichever you’re trying, do so from your heart. Don’t think too much, feel into the centre of your chest and sink into this lightness when trying any of these tools.

Enjoy my loves, and feel free to reach out if you want to know more about the combination that has been the most powerful for me.