3 Tools to Bring Gratitude into Your Life

It’s easy to talk about the things going wrong in our lives. Looking at the things you are thankful for can help you focus on the positive. Below are three tools to help you show gratitude.

What’s up, healthy dads? In today’s podcast, I’m going to give you three tools to bring gratitude into your life. Yes, it’s easy to talk about the things that are going wrong, but how do we shift the focus to talk about things that are going right? Join me in this podcast as we explore the three tools to bring gratitude.

What is up, healthy dads? This is Mike Ruman, founder of HealthyDads.com, and yes, I called you a healthy dad. If you’re listening to this podcast, you are making the steps to being healthy, and I commend you for that.

Today, we’re going to talk about three different tools to bring gratitude into your life. Last week, I was hanging out with some dads, and we were talking about everything going wrong with kids, marriage, just life, and somehow, the conversation shifted to the things that were going right. The things we loved about our kids, about our spouses. And then it got a little bit deeper, and we started talking about these miracles that happened in our lives that we kinda forgot about. I’m going to go into more depth on these miracles in a different podcast, but it changed the tone of our conversation.

And so, it got me thinking. I’m going to fast forward to this morning, where I was getting the kids ready for school. I had one kid who refused to eat her breakfast, another kid who was throwing a tantrum because we didn’t have any gluten-free snacks that she liked, and then the boys were fighting, and both crying.

And I did not handle this right but driving home after this, I was thinking about how much I love those kids. And even the daughter who was throwing the fit, she is so cute when she’s pouting, and it just made me smile. And I thought about how I could have handled this morning, and also, the tools that I use that can help bring gratitude into my life, and also yours, and so that’s what this podcast is about, our three tools to bring gratitude into your life on a daily basis.

Tool #1: 1 Second Every Day App

Tool number one is, it’s an app. It’s an app I’ve just started using pretty recently, but it’s called One Second Every Day, and the idea is just as it sounds. Every day you take a second video, or a second and a half video, of that day. And I just started doing this two months ago, and I love looking back on these videos and seeing … I’m usually capturing the good things we did that day. So, I have a kid doing a cannonball into the pool. Easter egg hunt. A kiddo on the monkey bars.

And it’s just a way for me to kind of look back and remember all those little good things we did in our lives. And there’s a quote about how, when you look back, it’s the small things that will actually turn out to be the big things in your life. And so, I recommend. It’s $4.99 right now. It’s worth it. One Second Every Day.

And if you don’t want to buy the app, just try and capture videos and pictures of you and your pictures. I actually posted my One Second every day video at HealthyDads.com/gratitude, so you can kind of get an idea of my life, my family. And so, yeah. One Second Every Day.

Tool #2: Facebook On-This-Day Feature

Kind of along the lines of that same app, I’m going to talk about the second tool, which is the … It’s on Facebook. It’s the feature called On This Day. I love to go and click on that, and it gives you … And Facebook’s been around long enough where we have some pretty good years’ worth of video and pictures from On This Day.

And it was a few weeks ago, I was looking at my On This Day, and my wife and I have been through a lot of surgeries with our kids, and it was crazy, because it was on this day that three of our kids went through three different surgeries in different years. We had all sorts. One was tonsils. We’ve also had some health issues with our kids, and so it was just like, “Oh my gosh, remember that? Remember how scared we were in that time?” And fast forward to today, when our four kids are pretty healthy.

It’s just a quick little tool that helps me. I love to post on Facebook, and so it makes me laugh. I think about just how I felt back then, and how I feel today. Just that look back on that day throughout the years of what happened with our kids. So, yeah. Facebook On This Day.

Tool #3: The Panda Planner

The third tool is called the Panda Planner. Now, I’m looking at mine right in front of me, and I would say, journal … This is kind of like a journal, and some of you may be thinking, “I hate journaling.” You know what? So do I. Actually, last night, I was flipping through my journal, and I’ve made three entries in the past year into my “journal,” but my Panda Planner does a great job of making me capture the good stuff in my life every day.

Panda Planner, why I love this is because it’s not dated. So, you buy this, and it’s supposed to be a six-month use, but I don’t do it on the weekends. And I’m a task-oriented guy, so it does a good job of combining tasks, big picture goals, but also … In the morning, you write down what you’re grateful for, what you’re excited about. You give yourself a Stuart Smalley daily affirmation. There’s a focus block, an exercise block, and then priorities, schedule, task, notes, and then at the end of the day, you write down today’s wins, and then how you’ll improve.

And so, what’s good about this is, I’m already in this planner, because I’m writing down my tasks and my schedule, and you can’t help but not see this “I’m grateful for” block, and you just take 30 seconds and write down what you’re grateful for. Our hot water tank went out last week, so today, I’m grateful for the fact that it’s fixed, and I had a hot shower. It’s those little things in life that you don’t think about. I’m in pretty healthy shape. I’m not sick today. I’m grateful for that.

And so, check it out, Panda Planner. I bought mine on Amazon. I think it’s like $40 bucks, or whatever. But what’s nice is, this will probably last me, probably nine months. Yeah, I can plan it around my day, and I love this tool.

And I also want to give you just a bonus tip, and that tip is to hang around happy people. People that show gratitude, find those people and hang around them. And I love the quote by Jim Rohn, who said, “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” So, if you want to level up your life, level up the people you hang around.

That’s it for this episode. There are the three tools to bring gratitude to your life. You can find these and links at HealthyDads.com/gratitude. And let me know. There’s a private Facebook group. I’d love for you to be a part of this. What are some tools out there that you have in your life, or some systems that bring gratitude into your life? Post those on there. Share this, and I appreciate you guys.