How Important Showing Appreciation Truly Is
Have you ever done something nice for someone and they didn’t say, “Thanks”? We’ve all experienced that. It makes you not want to do anything nice for that person again. A simple “thank you” is so easy to say and holds such power. Yet we all forget to say it sometimes. When someone holds the door open for you, takes you out for lunch, gives you a gift, whatever nice gesture it is, it deserves a thank-you. It feels good when someone says, “Thank you,” because you know they appreciate you. People crave appreciation almost as much as they crave food. We all need our self-esteem to be nourished. You know how good it feels to feel appreciated, significant, liked or loved, sexy, etc. So if we all crave these feelings, why don’t we ever give those feelings to others? It doesn’t cost anything. All you have to do is move your mouth.
Once we stop being selfish and realize that, when we give what we want, we will receive what we gave. Have you ever noticed when you compliment someone, they tend to compliment you back? We’ve all experienced that. Even though we know that compliments and appreciation will eventually be returned, we rarely act on it. Instead of complimenting someone, most people act lazy, prideful, selfish, and sometimes even scared of the reaction they will get from complimenting someone — especially if it’s a stranger. This is a stupid reason to not compliment someone. It feels better to get a compliment from a stranger than from a friend or family member because you know that it was sincere and that it must be true for a random person to have noticed and to say something to you about it.
Compliments — both those that you give and those that you receive — dramatically increase your self-esteem and confidence. You become so confident in yourself because you know you make other people’s lives around you better. You know that you are a significant person because of the joy and light you shine on other people’s lives. You make society a better place with your presence through your positive and inspirational actions. Start being more aware of situations where you can give a simple compliment or show appreciation in some way. This will have a positive effect on the way people feel about you, look at you, and even buy from you, if you’re in business.
Feeling appreciative is such a wonderful and great thing to feel. The more things you feel appreciative for, the more purpose and meaning your life has and the more you’ll enjoy life and everything it has to offer. If you or someone you know is having trouble feeling appreciative, here are a couple strategies I think are great tools for reinjecting some appreciation into your life:
If you want to remind yourself how lucky you are, try sleeping on the ground for a night. When you feel lucky and appreciative of your life, get back into your bed. Put up motivational and inspirational quotes on your desk or bathroom mirror, a place you look at every day. If you’re reading this book, your life probably isn’t too bad. If you need to feel thankful and appreciative of what you have, put up a picture of real poverty and hardship — something or someone who’s in a way worse a situation than you. By seeing this daily, you will begin to realize how good you have it. Once you’re to the point where you can feel appreciative and thankful for everything you have every day, then you can take down the picture.
Too many people are not appreciative of what they have. This usually happens with kids, because they have not had to work for what they have. It’s been given to them by their parents or whoever is their primary caregiver. But you don’t have to work for what you have to appreciate what you have. It’s a mindset. We must all appreciate the life and health we’ve been blessed with, regardless of what stage of life we’re in. Once our life and health are endangered, suddenly we have a news flash and begin to appreciate them much more.
It’s better to appreciate what you have while you have it than to remember how good you had it when it’s all gone. It’s very easy to get caught up in what we want or already have. The fact that you have the choice of what clothes to put on in the morning makes you lucky and blessed compared to most of the world’s population. Your biggest worry with regard to food is what you’re going to eat, not if you’re going to eat. We have so much to be appreciative of. We just have to recognize it. The hardest part is constantly reminding ourselves of all the things we have to be thankful for.
Exercise: Write down a list of things that you are thankful for. Writing it down by hand is more powerful than typing it. So please use a pencil or pen, and write down this list of all the things you’re appreciative for. I’ve already given you a few suggestions.
Let’s say someone brought you lunch or flowers every day and then stopped doing it. At the beginning, you appreciated it. But now that it’s become expected, when it stops, you no longer appreciate it. You may get angry that it stopped rather than thankful that you had it at all and had it for so long. When someone gets something, they might appreciate it for a while. A child might receive something from his or her parents but then sees their brother or sister — or even just other kids — with something better. Suddenly they need to have something better, too.
If you have children, pour them all a glass of juice. Fill some glasses to the top and some only half full. The children with the half-full glasses of juice will ask why they didn’t get a full glass and the others did. This happens with adults too. “The neighbor bought a new car; why don’t we have a new car? Maybe it’s time we bought a new car.” “Everyone at work has the new phone; I need it, too.” “All my lady friends buy this brand; I want to buy it, too.”
At some point or another, we all allow our external environment to influence our level of appreciation to some extent. Just make sure your external environment isn’t negatively affecting your internal appreciation for what you already have. It’s okay to appreciate what you have but still want more things and a better life. But it’s not okay to not appreciate what you already have until you obtain whatever it is you think you need. Make sure you don’t allow your external distractions to dilute your high level of appreciation of the current wonderful life and blessings you’ve been given. It’s not about what you actually have — it’s about what you make with what you have.
Find more things to be appreciative of, and your quality of life will better overnight.
Random Fact
A shrimp’s heart is in its head.
