Why Does Gratitude Feel So Hard Now?

Speaker A00:00:28

I want to start with today's listener question. Ralph, by the end of the holiday season, I usually feel tired and distracted.How can I refocus on gratitude and finish the month with the right mindset? What a great question today. And listen, we found this recent article in the Gazette reminds us that practicing gratitude doesn't just feel good.Wait to hear this. It literally rewires our brain. They found that it lowers stress hormones, it improves sleep, and it strengthens relationships.Well, I don't know about you, but that sounds pretty good, doesn't it? So if you're feeling drained or distracted as we close out the month, today's your invitation to hit the reset button with gratitude.Because here's the thing I want you to know. Gratitude doesn't come naturally when we're exhausted. When we're tired, it's hard to find it. But it's the key that really unlocks peace.Because here's the truth. A grateful heart resets everything. So let's talk about how to refocus on gratitude. Let's cover that on today's show.This is Financially Confident Christian, your daily dose of gospel, grounded insight and faith driven tips to help you break the cycle of financial shame with confidence. Welcome to the show, everyone. I'm Ralph.My goal every day as I record this show is to help you break that cycle of financial shame and do it with confidence. And we're continuing on our series of finding joy without going broke over the holidays. And I hope you've been listening.If you missed any of the episodes, you can check them all out at our website.That's financiallyconfidentchristian.com and listen, I've been doing this for a long time and I've seen people in my own life when they live in gratitude, it completely breaks that anxiety. I'm telling you right now, personally, gratitude has carried me when money was tight and life felt so heavy. It was so much, so much going on.But man, when I re challenged myself, this is what I did. I challenged myself. I said, you know what, Ralph? I remember going through a particular tough season of my life. Felt like everything was going wrong.And I started to think, you know what, I got to change my mind. I'm going to talk a lot about mindset change today. But I said, I'm going to do something different.I decided to do is I'm going to write down three blessings every day for a month. That was my goal.Every day when I get up, out, before my feet even hit the floor in the morning, I had a little pad of paper next to my bed, and I wrote down three blessings that I was grateful for every day. And I got to be honest, when I first started, I was like, well, this is a silly exercise, but, man, I noticed my heart started to change.Listen, my bank account hadn't changed. It wasn't about finances, but everything in my heart had changed. Which is why I love this quote from Pastor Charles Stanley.He said, thanksgiving is not a day. It's a way of life. And that's something I think we all can embrace today.We all think about Thanksgiving or the beautiful turkey and the family, but that's just a day. But living truly in Thanksgiving is a way of life. And that's what we really want to focus on today.So let's answer this question today right from the listener. How can I refocus on gratitude and finish the month with the right mindset? First thing, I'm going to encourage you to do like I did.It's all about changing your perspective. See, gratitude redirects your attention, what you lack to what God's already provided. Think of all we already have.We are one of the most abundant times in culture and times in history. Right now we have so much, and there's so much for us to be grateful for in his provision.Now, listen, God never said he's going to make us comfortable, but what he did say is he would give us provision. So here's the thing I'm going to tell you. Stop comparing yourself on social media. Like, here goes Ralph again, ranting about social media.But it puts you in the wrong perspective. I found myself in that same perspective just this week, and I was scrolling through, I think it was TikTok. And then I started comparing myself again.I'm like, wait a second, Ralph, that's not living in gratitude. Look at all the Lord has already given me. I don't need those other things. That. That's not my race. That's not my lane. So start there.Shift your perspective. Second thing I'm going to encourage you to do is live in praise over pressure. Start every day with thanks.Because, listen, when that pressure loses its power, that's when you'll really see a change in this. You got to remember who's in control, rewiring your brain.Like the news article said, when we lived in that thankfulness, when we lived in that gratitude, what do we do? We slept better. We got more rest. We built stronger relationships, we had less anxiety, less depression.When we really focused on praise and let that pressure just go. Remember as a kid, my Grandmother used to cook with a pressure cooker. I don't know if anybody ever used one of those.And I remember she used to make these string beans. And string beans were great. But she would take this pressure cooker and she would seal it super tight.And, man, I'll tell you what, when she finally reduced that pressure, man, it was. Was a relief. I'm encourage you to do the same thing. Let that pressure go.Third thing I'm going to encourage you to do is have a blessings list like I did. Just small daily practices. They help you slow down and reframe your mindset before the date runs away.Because it's so easy for the day to get away from this. But when you live in that daily practice of that blessings list, because, listen, here's what. Here's the truth. I say this on my show all the time.What gets measured gets done. So if you write those things down, if you put it in black and white and just visit that.Listen, sometimes you got to visit several times a day because you get into one of those days. And I have those days, I'm sure you do too, where it's like, man, everything is going wrong. Everything is a disaster, everything is a mess.Well, that's when you get out that blessing list. You start reading about, oh, I can get out of bed. I don't have cancer. I don't have chronic illness. I have a loving wife. I have a loving family.Family. I have all these things. I have a job, I have a place to live.When you start to do that, you start to say, wait a minute, I don't have to live in that mindset. Because here's the truth. Thankfulness will fight the worry. Because here's the truth. You can't stay anxious and at the same time give thanks.One emotion cancels the other. And we live in a culture where it's so easy to live in fear. It's so easy to be worried about what's going to happen next.If you listen to the news, you're going to constantly be living in fear. But that's hard to feel when we're thankful. When we start off with that gratitude, we start off with that thanks.And here's something else I wanted you to take away for today. You can honor God through thanks, because here's a bold statement, but I want you to hear this. Gratitude is worship.I want to say that again because a lot of people don't get it. But being grateful is a sense of worship because it shows God this.It shows him that you trust him both through the good times and let's call them the not so good times or those difficult times. He's like that true friend. If you ever have that true friend the Bible talks about, if you find one true friend, man, you've gotten it.But think about that true friend you have. No matters what's going on. They're there for you during the good and the bad and the ugly. Well, that's what God is to us. That's what Christ is to us.He's our true friend through good and bad. And when you are grateful, that's worship. Let's get to our Bible verse. Actually have two Bible verses today. It's a two for Tuesday, as they say.The first one comes to us from 1st Thessalonians, chapter 5, verse 18. It says this. Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus. What is it? What is he telling us?Give thanks in all circumstances. Starts there. And Psalm, chapter 100, verse 4. Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise. Give thanks to him and praise his name.Listen, I can't say any better than the Scriptures do. Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise. I just picture that in my mind.Just that grateful heart, that grateful, that praise of him. Hey, listen, right now, that's what heaven's going to be like, my friend. It's going to be constant days of praise and thanksgiving.Well, how about we pray right now, Lord, we come to you right now. And we may not be feeling so grateful. We may not be feeling that thankfulness that we need to feel, Lord.So help us to have that grateful heart and really end this month strong. Teach me to see the blessings, Lord, and help me to see the challenges that you're there to help me provide for, Lord, and.And let that thankfulness overflow into a state of peace and to a state of generosity. Help us to squash all that noise and that feeling of not having enough, Lord, and help us to just focus on what you've already given us.Help us to grateful in that. And I ask this in the name of Jesus. Amen. All right, so here's your action item for today.Just like I did, I want you to write down three things that you're thankful for each day this week. I'm not asking you for a month, just this week. Just write down three things that you're grateful for every day.I don't care if they're big, I don't care if they're small, but make it a habit. Make it A habit of praise versus that pressure. Because let me tell you right now, at the end of that week, your mindset will be changed.Now, before we wrap up today, I want to invite you to be part of something special. We just launched what we're calling the Financially Confident Christian Community.Now, this is a place where believers just like you can grow together.We can share encouragement, we can share those challenges that we're facing, and we can help spread God's truth about money and all the spiritual things we want to. And listen, when you join us, and you could do it real simply, I made it super simple here. Just go to financially confidentchristian.com join.And when you go there, you're not just supporting the show. You're helping build a community of faith and a community of freedom that reaches people all over the world. So I'm going to encourage you right now.Come be part of what God is doing through this mission. You. You get to that by going to financiallyconfidentchristian.com/join. Listen, it's absolutely free.There are some membership options if you're interested in supporting the show. But please go there today and join us. That's at financiallyconfidentchristian.com/join. Remember this, gratitude changes how you see everything.And the more you thank God, the more peace you're going to find. And so let's end November with praise because it's going to set the tone for December's joy.So go out there today and be a financially confident Christian. Have confidence in you and the Lord is cheering you right on as well. Stay financially savvy today. God bless you. And you have a great day today.