I'll start with a small story. I met an old friend from London recently. He had just completed his first full time corporate job and he was telling me all about the great experiences in his job. He spoke in length about the good relationship he shared with his colleagues and his managers. The conversations and the work stories he shared sounded too pleasant to be true and the cynic in me dismissed it as that’s how you feel in your first job!
I probed him further and he told me about a ritual he followed every day. On his way to work, Rohit would always think about his firm. He would thank the firm for giving him this wonderful opportunity; thank his managers for sharing their knowledge and for patiently dealing with the novice in Rohit. I was impressed!
Coincidentally, my character strengths profile (From viame.org) highlighted that gratitude was one of my lower strengths. I found that it is often easy to be critical and look for things that are wrong and form opinions about what needs to be fixed (Rather who needs to be fixed!). Further analysis led me to understand that I find it harder to acknowledge people for giving me their time and patience and pass it off as something obvious that doesn't have to be stated.
Cons:
I was concerned that too much focus on a lower strength can negatively impact some of my signature strengths. I firmly believe that each behavior has a pro and con, so I explored the cons of too much gratitude. Studies have shown that too much gratitude goes towards indebtedness, which is an unpleasant feeling of obligation. Looking back at some experiences in my life, I've realized that indebtedness has had significant impact on some of my relationships. These bad experiences meant that gratitude slowly deserted me and I treated every interaction as a transaction – I give you something and you give me something back in return.
What next?
State it: I’d like to start with addressing my hesitation to show gratefulness. I would like to challenge myself and thank people for being nice and helpful. Of course, I would want to be mindful so that I should be authentic and only say things that I mean, and not say it when I don’t mean it. At the same time, I would also want to make sure that gratitude does not grow into indebtedness.
Further, I've decided to write at least two things each day about things I am grateful for and people/experiences that have made me feel good. I intend to do this for the next two weeks and see if it makes me feel any better and help me improve one of my lower strengths.
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P.S – Meanwhile, thank you all for reading the blog :P
