Afew years ago, I started keeping a gratitude journal to keep myself in a positive state of mind. My daily notes were things like my sweet dog, my adorable cats, my warm bed, a funny experience…you know, happy stuff. I found writing this stuff down helped me to remember all the blessings in my life and helped me end each day with a little sweetness.

After keeping my gratitude journal for about a year an a half, life coach challenged me to do something different. She challenged me to start finding gratitude in the things that seemed negative. She wanted me to find the beauty and the gift in the situations that are not obviously positive and truly accept and embrace the reality of life so much that everything is welcome. “Hmmmm…I can do that”, I thought. “I’m a pretty positive person! Let’s do it!”

So each night I would sit there and ponder what gold I could find in the rubble. Let me tell you, it’s way harder than it sounds. Each night I would sit there thinking about something that had happened that I really didn’t want to happen. It might be a disappointment, a conflict with someone or just a crappy outcome of something I had hoped would be better.

So there I would sit…..and ponder….I would peel back the layers on seemingly crappy things and dig deep enough that I could find something good.

The first few weeks it was so hard, I almost gave up, but I was committed to it. So there I would sit…..and ponder….I would peel back the layers on seemingly crappy things and dig deep enough that I could find something good. I would look at any and every way I could view the situation as positive.

I would look at every angle and every possible good thing that could come from it. And then, I would give thanks. I would breathe and be truly grateful that I had the opportunity of whatever it was that I could learn or sometimes, just to be grateful that I had the ability to choose the way I looked at it.

Over time, unbeknowst to my conscious self, my subconscious was working on those negative thoughts about the problem or conflict. It would take the negative situation and turn it into something in my brain that I would look back on and genuinely smile about! What, the what?!!! That’s some cool magic my friends.

This practice has helped teach my brain to start turning the things that I don’t like into moments of gratitude on a much faster basis. I have worked on many thoughts and experiences that I have had throughout my life and work to find the blessing, to find the gold. It takes practice but the brain is totally up for the task of finding gold in the rubble and there is so much “gold in them thar hills!”