Love is easy to forget when the media is drawing our attention to a pandemic, political debacle, and economic uncertainty as our job security grows more precarious than ever before. If we lose sight of ourselves now, it’ll be an even longer recovery when things normalize.

Gratitude is a kind of love. It may feel strange at first, but practice being thankful right before you get in to bed. Think about what little things matter to you and that you have in your life. For me, it starts really small like having a comfy bed, then moves to being grateful that I can go to bed at the hour of my choosing, continues with having a safe comfortable home for my family, and grows into gratitude for being able to get another day to learn from my mistakes and become a better person than I am tonight.

Try waking up and doing it again. Find things to be thankful for immediately around you. If it’s hard, make it easier by finding something that you’re instinctively grateful for and put it near your bed. Fill yourself up to the brim with gratitude before you even begin to think about getting out of bed.

For me, mornings start with grateful thoughts in this approximate order: the majestic way the light of dawn enters my bedroom when I first open my eyes, how my day has not officially started yet and I can stay in bed for a little while via a snooze hit, how my pup is already awake but pretending to sleep until he’s sure my wife and I are both awake, the crazy cat who wants food right now and scratches at the door, how I’m able to work on my side projects before work, the integrity of the health and spirit of my growing family.

You don’t have to wait to be a Grateful Dead 💀, you can be a grateful living. You’re allowed to be grateful, and there’s not shame or guilt in having things to be thankful for.

As I was writing this, a great opportunity presented itself to test my fortitude with gratitude. I was interrupted by a scolding from my boss for not delivering work fast enough according to a timeline for which I’d originally voiced was impossible. He further stressed my slowness would set the company back if I did not accelerate my pace. In his defense, we are going through a stressful time in the company given the economic effects of the pandemic finally reaching our company. However, it was trying for me to keep my composure, let alone keep my gratitude, I am human.

After the episode, I went for a walk in search of what I had just a moment ago been so clearly grateful for. I found the gratitude and regained my balance.