Gratitdude

Denise Hebelrein

MA, LPC, CCTP

11/9/2025

Have you been hearing that this is the most wonderful time of the year? Christmas songs and commercials have started playing. Songs of joy, and how this is the happiest season of all, are on repeat. It is a time of celebration for the birth of Jesus, our Savior. We are making plans to spend time with family, slowing down, and counting our blessings. The reality is that for some, it is not a season of joy.

If you look around the world, you will find a great deal of negativity. There are wars, famines, storms wreaking havoc, unrest between people, the government shutdown, people out of work, homelessness, people have lost loved ones to illness or an unexpected death, and the list goes on. It certainly is not the most wonderful time of the year.

It is extremely easy for us to focus on the negative. Yet we are to renew our minds and to keep our minds focused on lovely things. Have you ever cultivated an attitude that is built on gratitude?

Research indicates that cultivating gratitude can reduce stress and anxiety, enhance mental, emotional, and physical well-being, and foster greater life satisfaction and stronger relationships. Who would have thought that something so simple as gratitude could have such an impact on us?

I encourage you to find three things daily to be grateful for. Create a gratitude journal to track how it influences your mindset and life. Try to focus on the lovely things that are around us. Go outside and use your senses to appreciate the natural world. Look for opportunities to value others. Think about the ability we have to move in our bodies. Cherish the little things that are taken for granted daily. Recognize the gifts we have to make an impact on our environment.

“God gave you a gift of 86,400 seconds today. Have you used one to say, “thank you?”

William A. Ward