The Grateful Life

The Grateful Life is a guide to discovering – and realizing – one’s dreams though a positive attitude. Through years of research and practice, authors Nina Lesowitz and Mary Beth Sammons have discovered that grateful living can transform lives. Grateful people are happier people. They are healthier and less stressed. They report much higher levels of satisfaction with their relationships, and are less likely to credit “luck” with the good fortune of others. This book contains inspiring stories about those who practice gratitude as a spiritual practice to rise out of adversity to new life, and it will also show how grateful living is central to the good life and to attracting abundance. Filled with motivational quotes, resources and exercises, The Grateful Life will help people on their journey to create the life they’ve always wanted. Taking the concept of Living Life as a Thank You to the next level, The Grateful Life includes absorbing and transformative stories from the frontlines of real people, who unveil the secret to achieving success – big and small in life.

365 DAYS. TWO WORDS. ONE MIRACULOUS TRUE STORY. One recent December, at age 53, John Kralik found his life at a terrible, frightening low. All aspects of his life seemed to be failing: his relationships with his children and partner, his work, his health. Then, hiking on New Year's Day, John was struck by the thought that his life might become at least tolerable if he could be grateful for what he had. Inspired by a beautiful, simple note he had received thanking him for a Christmas gift, John set himself the goal of writing 365 thank-you notes in the coming year. One by one, day after day, he handwrote thank yous for gifts or kindnesses he'd received, large and small, from loved ones and coworkers, past business associates and current foes, school friends and doctors and handymen and neighbours, and anyone, really, who'd done him a good turn. Immediately after he'd sent his very first notes, surprising benefits began to come John's way­. Over the year John was writing his notes, his whole life turned around. 365 Thank Yous is a rare memoir, its touching message delivered in the plainspoken storytelling of an ordinary man. Kralik sets a believable, doable example of how to live a good life. To read 365 Thank Yous is to be changed.

Trista Rehn was a pediatric physical therapist moonlighting as a Miami Heat dancer when she heard about casting for a new reality show—one guy getting to know twenty-five girls in the hope of finding a fiancée. As improbable and crazy as it sounded, Trista took the chance—and had her heart broken on the very first season of The Bachelor. But the next season, as the first Bachelorette, her fairy tale fell into place during a whirlwind courtship with poetry-writing firefighter Ryan Sutter and, eventually, a dream-come-true wedding on national TV. In the midst of building a life with Ryan and raising two kids, Trista started to make a conscious effort to remember her favorite part of each day. And she's made sure to post these thoughts, her own personal expressions of gratitude, almost every night on Twitter and Facebook—even on days she was dealing with fertility issues, a difficult pregnancy, family deaths, and other challenges that many of us face. Sometimes it's the smallest gestures and the most unassuming things that can have the greatest effects. Trista is often asked her secret to being one of the rare reality-TV relationships to make it to the altar and beyond. In this heartfelt book, she shares the simple yet profound keys to finding everyday happiness: gratitude and grace. From the blink-and-you'll-miss-them moments we have with our kids, our spouses, our pets, or even strangers, to the more obvious lessons we pick up from reading the news or hearing an inspirational story, knowing how to recognize, accept, and be grateful for all of our daily blessings is truly what “happily ever after” means.

What are you grateful for? That is precisely the question that Hailey Bartholomew asked herself every day for a year. Struggling with depression, she reached out for help and received life-changing advice: Find something every day that you are grateful for. Embracing her assignment, Hailey used her talents as a photographer to put a twist on the exercise, taking pictures of her “gratefuls” and becoming more aware that her depression was lifting in the process. 365 Gratefuls is a collection of photographs recounting Hailey’s transformation from depression to an unhindered appreciation of the world around her, combined with stories and images from many others who have encountered the effects of gratitude. This uplifting book will inspire you to look at the world with new eyes, emphasizing gratitude over anxiety in everyday moments.

Discover the Positive Power of Gratitude Living as if each day is a thank you can help transform fear into courage, anger into forgiveness, and isolation into belonging. Authors Nina Lesowitz and Mary Beth Sammons present a simple yet comprehensive approach for incorporating gratitude into one's life and reaping its many benefits. The book is divided into ten chapters, including ''Ways to Stay Thankful in Difficult Times,''.....''Gratitude as a Spiritual Practice,'' and ''Putting Gratitude into Action.'' Each chapter includes stories of individuals whose lives have been transformed by thankfulness, motivational quotes and blessings, and suggested gratitude practices. Whatever is given - even a challenging moment - is a gift. With this book, you will be able to feel more connected to the flow of life and less alone in your struggles and fears.

What does it mean to be vulnerable and defiant at the same time? In Deeply Grateful and Entirely Unsatisfied, author and artist Amanda Happé poses this question with disarming honesty and humor. Her colorful marker drawings and quirky hand-lettered sentiments offer an idiosyncratic take on life's challenges, reminding the reader that "you are the sign you've been waiting for." Brimming with compassion, empathy, and a healthy dose of sarcasm, Deeply Grateful and Entirely Unsatisfied is, in Happé's own words, "so good it's odd."

A Network for Grateful Living curates this collection of quotes and reflections aiming to help you discover that the roots of happiness lie in gratefulness. Inspiration from well-known minds such as Maya Angelou, Confucius, and Anne Frank is combined with original reflections and practices that will help you recognize the abundance of everyday opportunities for gratitude and joy. Hand-lettered art makes this beautifully designed collection a gift to treasure, regardless of whether you keep it for yourself or give it to a loved one.

The Wilbur Award-winning book Grateful is now available in paperback and with an updated subtitle. If gratitude is good, why is it so hard to do? In Grateful, Diana Butler Bass untangles our conflicting understandings of gratitude and sets the table for a renewed practice of giving thanks. We know that gratitude is good, but many of us find it hard to sustain a meaningful life of gratefulness. Four out of five Americans report feeling gratitude on a regular basis, but those private feelings seem disconnected from larger concerns of our public lives. In Grateful, cultural observer and theologian Diana Butler Bass takes on this “gratitude gap” and offers up surprising, relevant, and powerful insights to practice gratitude. Bass, author of the award-winning Grounded and ten other books on spirituality and culture, explores the transformative, subversive power of gratitude for our personal lives and in communities. Using her trademark blend of historical research, spiritual insights, and timely cultural observation, she shows how we can overcome this gap and make change in our own lives and in the world. With honest stories and heartrending examples from history and her own life, Bass reclaims gratitude as a path to greater connection with god, with others, with the world, and even with our own souls. It’s time to embrace a more radical practice of gratitude—the virtue that heals us and helps us thrive.