Rewire Your Brain with Gratitude
Growing up, my mom made us sit down and write thank you notes to family members for our birthday and Christmas gifts. As a young kid, I found it a chore that I’d rather not do. It just seemed silly, writing a note and thanking someone when I had already told them thank you in person when I had received the gift! But, I’d do it anyway. And, though I found the exercise tedious, I must admit I felt a bit of uplift in my spirit as I sealed the envelope and dropped the letter in the mailbox. It seemed the act of thinking back on something and showing gratitude for it made my heart feel a little lighter.
Though my mom hadn’t read the research, she was on to something. A few years back, a study was conducted at U of C, Berkeley. They followed the mental health path of 300 adults as they sought counseling for depression. The group was split up into three parts. The first part, along with counseling, was assigned to write a note of gratitude to a different individual each week for 3 weeks. The second group was asked to list their deepest complaints and grievances. The third attended counseling without either assignment (Brown & Wong, 2017).
It was discovered that the first group who expressed gratitude reported better mental health 4 and 12 weeks after their writing practice had ended than the other two groups. So, not only did expressing gratitude help them feel better in the moment, it also had effects long afterwards as well (Brown & Wong, 2017).
They continued the research further and found some more surprising things about gratitude:
When an individual puts into practice the act of gratitude, it helps shift the mental focus from toxic emotions like jealousy and resentment, which contributes to better mental health.
The effects of gratitude writing take time. Generally, the thought has been that gratitude would decrease over time, like most feelings do when you are further removed from a situation. But gratitude has shown to have the opposite effect. Though you may feel a bit better after initially expressing gratitude, the practice actually has a snowball effect and you can continue to feel better over time.
Gratitude can actually rewire your brain. Brain scans were conducted on individuals who participated in this study. For those who took up the practice of gratitude, they were found to have ‘greater neural sensitivity’ in the medial prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain associated with learning and decision making. This suggests that people who practice gratefulness are also more attentive to how they express gratitude. What surprised the researchers was that the brain scans were done 3 months after the study was concluded. It seemed that gratitude had helped train the brain to be more sensitive to the experience of gratitude not only in the immediate, but in the future as well (Brown & Wong, 2017).
The simple act of practicing gratitude is a simple step towards improving your mental health now - and over time.
Reference: Brown, J. & Wong, J. (2017). How gratitude changes you and your brain. Greater Good Magazine. Retrieved from https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/how_gratitude_changes_you_and_your_brain.
Challenges/Points:
Take 5 minutes today to sit down and make a list of things that you are thankful for in your life. Post it in a place where you can see it daily.
Expressing gratitude can not only improve your mental health in the moment, but over time as well.
When we begin to look for ways to be thankful, we start to retrain our brain to continue to look for more ways to express gratitude.
Questions:
What part of this study surprised you the most?
When was the last time you expressed gratitude towards a friend or family member?
How can you make gratitude a part of your daily habits?
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