By Sharon Campbell Rayment – Special to the Sydenham Current
With Thanksgiving upon us, I want to share with you a wonderful way to find inner harmony and peace, which is to keep a thankfulness journal.
At times of low tides and set backs like this pandemic, we may experience in our lives it may be difficult to feel grateful.
We wonder why we have experienced these set backs?
Perhaps it is a loss of job, money challenges, relationship difficulties, health issues or anything that leaves us overwhelmed and feeling tense, angry, sad and experiencing the stress response in our bodies.
As you know my set back moment was my horseback riding accident.
I had withdrawn to my dark quiet bedroom to avoid the chaos of life, as I was hypersensitive to noise, light and people being around me.
Yet the longer I stayed there the more depressed and anxious I became.
Upon waking one morning and feeling disenchanted once again, I knew I had to find hope and purpose to enliven me and so I decided that I would write one thing I was grateful for each day.
In my depressed state it was not easy to express gratitude.
Yet I innately knew that as I focused on the positive, I would feel so much better mentally, spiritually and physically.
By focusing on the positive and the good in your life you are actually changing neural connections within the reticular activating system (RAC) of the brain and altering learned negative responses and behavior patterns.
These changes help us to alter habits that have been embedded in our subconscious and have become our automatic response to situations in our lives.
So, begin today to write even just one thing that you are thankful for.
There is always something to be grateful for even in the midst of struggle and even in a pandemic!
Until next time my friends remember every breath you take is a breath of God and a shared one with All my Relations United as One.
