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In short, a Gratitude Jar was what saved me from myself. Things were not good for me. During early recovery, after a relapse, I struggled to regain my bearings in sobriety. Then, after leaving rehab, even with a supportive staff and program, I struggled even more. I felt like the world was against me. Then, the unthinkable happened, I lost my job.
It shook me to the core because I was already on a thin line with my addiction recovery. Even though I had a supportive family and therapists to lift me up while I looked for another job, I felt anger. I felt disgusted at myself and everyone around me. Finally, after weeks of feeling like this, the therapist I was seeing suggested that I was stuck.
They gently suggested I needed a change. Fighting resistance, I knew deep down that change would be the only way forward. I was stuck on how I could change for weeks. Finally, my therapist suggested I use a ritual for change. They suggested a Gratitude Jar. A quote my dad used to tell me popped up, “If you can’t make yourself happy, make someone else happy.”
The shift was beginning for me to understand how gratitude could positively affect my mental health. I realized that gratitude helped shift my focus, I was able to see beyond my own depression and issues. I began to understand that others had issues too. I was understanding that I had a lot to be grateful for and shifting my focus could ultimately change me for the positive.
The first step in creating a proper Gratitude Jar is to have an open mind and heart. But the second is simply finding a jar that will suit your purposes. I had a Bell Jar lying around so I decorated it and put it somewhere I would be sure to look at every day. You can purchase fancy craft jars on Etsy or eBay if you want something customized and special.
It’s up to you how you’d like to express your gratitude. It’s a special, sacred place so take your time to think about it. What inside of you cultivates a feeling of gratitude? I found decorating mine to be a way to express my gratitude for everything, the jar helped me realize that gratitude could be expressed artistically.
Every morning I have a ritual where I write down something I am thankful for. Some days it’s simply being alive, which if you would have told me that I’d be thankful for when I was in the middle of my depression, I would have laughed at you. But after weeks of being grateful something shifted, and I realized that even being alive is a gift.
My recovery was a rocky road. It felt dismal and impossible. The statistics don’t help, knowing that a relapse could be right around the corner. I had relapsed before and that didn’t help contribute to a positive attitude. I felt hopeless. A big change was getting into the program I chose with the help of Rehabs Of Armerica. It was there I began to get the support I needed. The attitude of gratitude really helped as well though. A study by the NIH talks about how gratitude can help your coping skills.
People who practice gratitude report less levels of depression according to this study. Sometimes when we have a lack of emotional connection, we can experience dysphoria. Gratitude can help shift that, in my case it did. Once I began to slowly start recognizing even the smallest acts of kindness, like a smile from a stranger or a hello, I began to notice other small things. I noticed how my smile could change someone’s day. How reacting with kindness could shift a tough situation and even my own being.
I was over at a friend’s for dinner one night months after I had started with my gratitude jar. I noticed that her children had not said thank you one single time throughout the evening. I had bought a key lime pie for them and served it, thinking for sure that would elicit a thank you. I was wrong. While we were cleaning up (the kids had run into their rooms after stuffing their faces with pie), I brought up what I observed to my friend. I approached the subject by telling her about my experience, she knew about my gratitude jar.
I pitched it as something fun that she could do with her kids, decorate it, and make it a ritual where everyone in the family contributes to the jar once a week. They ended up taking on my idea and since then whenever I come over, we go over what the kids have put into the jar. They have become more thoughtful and conscientious as a result, and I find a similar effect in my own life (and my recovery).
At first, her kids didn’t want to do it. I saw them struggling with the same sort of resistance that I had experienced. I told them to start with really small things. They took it to heart at first, some of their responses were, “The sprinkle on my cupcake” and “The whiskers on our cat”. Kids can be great teachers because by taking that literally, they were understanding my point. Life is often in the small things, the little details that we can miss when we are in a slump.
For me, in recovery, my problems seemed extremely large and were like a dark cloud blocking out any sunshine. It was really hard to start seeing the small things but I forced myself to. Having a hot cup of coffee in the morning, a cold drink of water, and waking up to sunshine, are all the little things that make up life. That gives life meaning. I had lost a lot of this understanding due to my addiction.
If beginning with small things is tough there are a ton of resources to help you. I like to begin with positivity right away in the morning. Oprah’s website has a quote you can look at every day and you can also subscribe to have a “thought of the day” sent to your inbox.
Another great resource that can help you to understand gratitude is the “Four Noble Truths”. These are from the Buddhist religion but can be applied to anything and for anyone. They explore the root cause of suffering in life and see it as a journey we all take. We cannot escape suffering, yet we can explore the cause of it and how we react to it.
We often resist change. Change is not easy and there are days when gratitude can seem difficult. Well good news, that means you are human. There are days when I really struggle to find anything but suffering.
But I found that creating a daily ritual to focus on gratitude was extremely helpful. The gratitude jar was extremely helpful as a reminder to practice my daily ritual. These small acts, which only take a few minutes, can have a large lasting effect, they did on me in my recovery.
Since my friend and her kids ended up taking on my idea, whenever I come over, we go over what the kids have put into the jar. They have become more thoughtful and conscientious as a result. I’ve become more thoughtful and conscientious as a result. I cannot thank my therapist and the treatment center I discovered with Rehabs Of Armerica for how much they supported me on my journey.
My recovery is still a journey, and I cannot avoid suffering. None of us can. But there are so many tools out there to help you discover your own personal path to peace. Practicing gratitude is one step of the way, and one of the most joyful ones I have found.
Edward lives and works in South Florida and has been a part of its recovery community for many years. With a B.A. in English Literature from the University of Massachusetts, he works to help Find Addiction Rehabs as both a writer and marketer. Edward loves to share his passion for the field through writing about addiction topics, effective treatment for addiction, and behavioral health as a whole. Alongside personal experience, Edward has deep connections to the mental health treatment industry, having worked as a medical office manager for a psychiatric consortium for many years.
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