Question from Tina C: Would you explain a little bit more about the Power of Appreciation?
Veronica Hope: I strongly believe that the Power of Appreciation is the most powerful source of positive changes and happiness in our lives. If you feel unhappy or stuck with some situation that repeats itself again and again, use the Power of Appreciation, and be ready: your life is going to be changed. It is easy to say: Appreciate everything in your life! But how to do it? What are actual steps or thoughts? After all, to make Gratitude a real positive force in your life, you have to bring into your reality a few very important components of this technique. The first one is Awareness. You have to pay attention to the thoughts that you have in your mind; to the words that you are using when you describe you current situation to your relatives or friends. To your big surprise you may realise that there is so much negativity in your words and thoughts: notice it! Or in other words – be aware! After increasing you awareness, you can go further, to the second step.
Stop using negative terms while describing or thinking about your life situation. The key here, not just say: “everything is perfect!”. When you do so, you bury your worries, concerns or other negative emotions deeper inside. That may lead to worsening of the situation. My advice is: Move your attention from negativity to something positive that you can find in this situation. It can be anything: seeing humor in this situation; or the lesson, that your life kindly provides you with; or, just small things, that you can say “Thanks!” for. Find something good in the situation that you are not happy with!
I’ll give you an example. Let’s say, I have to go to teach yoga class. It is heavily raining outside and my car is broken. I have a million negative thoughts in my mind: I don’t like rain! I don’t want to go out and get wet, teach a class and go all the way back and get wet even more. I’m so unhappy to have problems with my car, especially in a grey rainy day as today…. and so on…
I can stay with all these thoughts, or… First, I may become aware and realise how many negative thoughts are passing through my mind right now. If I just say: “It’s OK, I like rain”, it won’t be true and, as it has been mentioned above, it buries my negativity deeper inside, and obviously not helping. However, can I move my attention from the idea how much I am not happy with situation to the different thoughts?
To be honest, not long ago I have bought very cute raining shoes. They are lovely and completely waterproof. In addition, my umbrella that I have already had for a few years is very strong and does not get broken by the gusts of the wind. After all, I have a job, which I really love. Some people will not mind to go to work at any type of weather, but they cannot do that because they don’t have a job. And I do love teaching yoga, sharing with people my knowledge and experience, helping them to find joy and happiness… It makes me exited and thankful for the opportunity to do what I love to do.
Did you notice what just happened?
From negative thoughts, through acknowledgment and shift of my awareness to something positive, I ended up with my heart filled with happiness, gratitude and appreciation for the ability and opportunity to do something that I believe is beautiful, helpful and useful. I’m happy! Dear Tina, I hope, this explanation and example will help you and you’ll start to use the Power of Appreciation and Gratitude in your everyday life.