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Our Five Favourite Ways To Be Grateful: Here’s How To Show Gratitude

26th November 2021

Community Health

26th November 2021

By Beth Shelper

Remember that time a colleague told you that they liked your perfume, a passer-by held the door open for you, or a family member popped round with a freshly baked batch of your favourite brownies?

Remember how that made you feel?

Wouldn’t it be great if we could make someone feel that great about themselves, every single day? We certainly think so.

Here at Innermost, we’re getting prepped for the festive season. And with November coming up, that means only one thing: Thanksgiving. As a result, we’re celebrating actions of gratitude and giving this month, and we want to share the love and positivity in our community (and further, if we can).

To get us all on the same page, and in the mood to share the love and some good old fashioned gratitude, let’s define the term gratitude: what it is, what It means to be grateful, and why.

The gratitude definition: what is it?

In reality, one person’s gratitude definition could be very different to another’s. But, broadly speaking, when we refer to gratitude, we’re talking about feelings of appreciation, and the positive feelings we experience when someone offers us a gift, compliment, offering or even just experience a positive interaction.

Aka, that warm fuzzy feeling you get inside.

How to show gratitude

There are plenty of ways that you can show gratitude, but also a range of techniques to help when it comes to how to feel gratitude, too. From paying it forward to gratitude jars and gratitude journals, the choice is yours.

To kick off our month of gratitude here at Innermost, though, we’ve rounded up some of our favourite ways to be grateful, and our go-to gratitude habits to start implementing in your daily life to help everyone in your life feel loved and appreciated.

  1. A simple thank you

Let’s start this list of easy. A simple thank you really goes a long way.

Whether you’re thanking someone for holding a door open for you, for taking some of your workload during a particularly stressful week, or even thanking your bus driver when you get off the bus from your morning commute: we promise, people really do notice!

You can even get creative with saying thank you, if you like! Send a card, send some flowers, bake a cake or take someone out for dinner if you really want to go the extra mile.

  1. Create a gratitude jar or a gratitude journal

This is one of our favourite ways to sit down and reflect on the good things that have happened in our day or week. It’s also gratitude habit that requires us to head on down to the stationary store and pick up some new pens and a swanky new notebook: something we’re never going to say no to.

A gratitude jar, or a gratitude journal – whichever you prefer, is essentially a place in which you write down and store all of the small (or big) actions of gratitude that you have experienced or created for someone else.

Writing them down and keeping them in a jar or journal gives you a place to return to on days where you may be feeling particularly down, to receive a little reminder and pick me up surrounding the good actions and people in your life, and reflect on how these actions made you feel, too. This is a pretty relaxing experience, and a cathartic one, too.

  1. Check in on your friends, colleagues and family

One key way to show gratitude is to regularly check in on your loved ones. Whilst you may see your friends, your partner, colleagues and families every day (or on a pretty regular basis), it’s important to let them know that you appreciate them in any way that you can.

When it comes to gratitude habits, this one is up there with one of the most important. Send them a text or a card, or even a letter if you’re feeling fancy, and let them know that you love them, appreciate them and are here for them whenever they need. Share the gratitude and love.

We all love a bit of reassurance, so why not offer that to your loved ones and show your gratitude through support and a listening ear?

  1. Bake someone a cake

If you’ve got the time (and the baking skills), why not whip up a cake? This is a particularly great way to show gratitude to someone that often cooks your dinner, does the chores or has done something notable recently that really deserves some recognition and gratitude.

After all, who doesn’t’ love cake, right?

Okay, there are some people that don’t like cake (questionable, we know), and for those people we recommend a hearty home cooked meal.

  1. Write a gratitude list at the end of everyday

This one is for you and you only.

At the end of the day, take five minutes to yourself and reflect on your day. Take the time to write down everything that has made you feel grateful for today: whether that’s something as a simple as having a delicious lunch, or being able to see a friend… or even maybe having experienced the support of a colleague. It all counts.

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Instead of asking, “Am I seeing results yet?”, the more useful question becomes, “Can I repeat this next week?” Remember, the most effective fitness routines aren’t created in January - they’re carried through February, March, and beyond. References Dai, H., Milkman K.L., Riis,J. (2013).The Fresh Start Effect: Temporal Landmarks Motivate Aspirational Behavior. Management Science. 60 (10), 2563-2582. Click here. Cezar, B., Macada, A. (2023). Cognitive Overload, Anxiety, Cognitive Fatigue, Avoidance Behavior and Data Literacy in Big Data environments. Information Processing & Management. 60 (6). Click here. Ntoumanis, N., Healy, L. et.al. (2014). Self-Regulatory Responses to Unattainable Goals: The Role of Goal Motives. 13 (5), 594-612. Click here. Cleveland Clinic. Overtraining Syndrome. Click here. Sebire,S., Standage, M., Vansteenkiste,M. (2011). Predicting objectively assessed physical activity from the content and regulation of exercise goals: evidence for a mediational model. 33 (2), 175-197. Click here.  
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