“BE GRATEFUL. NOT HATEFUL.

Gratitude is said to be the most powerful human emotion. It encompasses all other positive emotions such as joy, happiness, appreciation, and love. Gratitude has an incredible ability to alter moods, change perspectives, shift attitudes, and impact lives directly. Gratitude is dynamic, as it can be expressed or given, it can be received, it can be reciprocated, and it can spark many other emotions at the same time. It is the conduit to positivity. It is the simplest and yet most powerful thing that we can do for each other.

"Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.”

With all that is going on in this world today, gratitude can be a powerful reminder that we are all humans, we are all people, we all matter. Every one of us is grateful for life, to be alive, to be on this earth each day. That is a core sense of gratitude. Now if there was another shift in how we use gratitude, and directed it towards each other; we could see more of the good that still exists today. There is an abundance of positivity that is out there, and being done to combat the negativity on display lately. We need to not only be reminded, but act on this positivity, share this positivity, express this positivity, and embrace this positivity on as many levels as we can. Doing this will show the type of gratitude we do have in this world, and for each other.

“The way to develop the best that is in a person, is by encouraging the expression of gratitude.”

Now with such a powerful emotion such as gratitude , there will be the inevitable nemesis to its purpose. Gratitude has its Darth Vador, Magneto, Lex Luther, Dr. Octavius, and that is Hate. Hate is another powerful emotion, but it is a crippling emotion. It is what fuels anger, frustration, fear, and discontent. Hate also does something that is apparent these days, and is a dangerous element to society, to us as humans; and this is separation. Hate drives the wedge deeper and deeper into us, as a race. It creates a divide amongst us that can be so dangerous that it can corrupt all that we know, all that we strive for, and all we stand for. It creates no benefit to life, it holds no value, and it does not solve anything; it only spreads. Hate begets hate, it is pain to suffering, and agony to despair. Hate cannot resolve anything in life, its sole purpose is only to destroy. We know this about hate, yet we still let it fester, we let it control, and we let it cloud our minds and our morals. Hate knows no bounds, nor does it know anything of responsibility, or control. Hate is chaos, it is the acid of society that burns down into the layers of what we are, and it wounds us so deeply. It gets under the surface of what we are, and like acid, the burn is there before you know it, and the damage is done before we can even see it; and you better believe we are going to feel it. With all this negativity surrounding this emotion, why then, why do so many of us embrace it daily, uphold it, teach it, live with it? We know so much about hate, and here we are in a world that would rather strike down the man next to him than actually be grateful he has another person there alongside us in this life. Grateful they are alive too, and respect them as a human. Why is it that we cannot express more gratitude and must get caught up in all the hate that is surrounding our fragile society. Well, I am telling you we can; and we must! We know how to wage wars, fight wars, declare wars. When’s the last time we declared peace, stopped fighting, waged a learning on gratitude. We haven’t. What better time, than right now!

“Gratitude has the ability to change everything.”

Gratitude is by far the healthiest thing we can express to each other as humans. Unlike hate, which separates, gratitude brings us together. The more you express gratitude, the more it is seen and felt, the more that it is seen and felt, the more it continues to encourage others to express it. With that said, the more gratitude you express, the more you will be receptive to gratitude, therefore the more gratitude you are receptive to, the more you will hold in your heart. Having all this gratitude in your heat then completes the cycle of you having more gratitude to express. It creates such a positive cycle of emotion and feeling, that it can at times overwhelm us and bring such purpose and understanding to the good out there that needs to be done. It humbles us, it keeps us respectful, accountable, honorable, and most of all, it keeps us together. It is the fullness to life, and it is what turns what we have and what we thought was enough, into more. It is the bridge between where we are as a people, and where we could be as a people.

We have a chance to build a foundation of gratitude in our society, that not only acts as a solid foundation, but as nourishment. It will cause flourishment to our race, and an acceptance of us all as a whole. Gratitude lives and comes from the heart, it is the lifeblood to our happiness and our joy in our existence. It is something that we can own ourselves and at the same time, share freely, and also receive from one another. We as a culture, a race, a society, need to make a choice to set positivity to the forefront of our agenda. We need to enact an attitude shift and express more gratitude each day. We should be making it an every day aspect of our lives. By doing this, we will be sure to determine how our lives, and our world will change. We have the ability to grow gratitude, so let's plant the seeds now, and watch this positivity flourish for generations to come.

“Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a gift, and not giving it. We all have gifts to give.”