Giving Thanks: Let Everyday Awe Awaken Your Gratitude

By Jill Palmquist

Shifting our mindset to awaken to and be grateful for everyday awe is the drumbeat of my stunning new coffee table book. In This Lifetime is filled with breathtaking photographs, thought-provoking essays, proverbs, parables, conversation starters, and distilled snippets of life wisdom. The words alone are mesmerizing. But the combination of inspired language and photographs brings the joy and wonder of the human experience into focus.

Becoming a world-class noticer this Thanksgiving can refill our gratitude cup. Here’s a couple ways to start.

Use your nose. It remembers more than your eyes. That schnoz of yours is ready to evoke emotion. Coffee brewing. Pumpkin pie baking. The perfume your Aunt Betsy has worn for the past 40 years. (Okay. They’re not all that good.) Close your eyes and breathe it all in. Transport yourself back to childhood or other significant life moments.

Tap your tastebuds. Those little guys work overtime on these holidays. From the comforting flavors of turkey and dressing to the tantalizing tastes of homemade desserts (and maybe a sip of something bubbly!), savor the tastes and textures of your holiday feast … and the memories they awaken.

Feel the beat (of your own heart) … Take the family on a brisk after-dinner walk. Look at your legs! Your strong and powerful legs. Whisper a little thank-you for letting them move you. Blood pumping in your veins is tangible vitality!

… And don’t stop there with your heart. It’s not just physically keeping you alive; it represents our infinite capacity to experience vivid emotions and feelings. Not just positive ones like elation and love but also the more bittersweet sensations that show up during the holidays: nostalgia, grief, and awareness of the passage of time and life’s brevity.

Readjust your perspective on family time. Take, for example, your little nephew’s temper tantrum. Even the meltdown of an overtired toddler can remind us how quickly it all goes, how fragile we all are, how profound love can be, and how normal it is to fully embrace our feelings (even the difficult ones) and let them be here.

And finally – when it’s over and exhaustion sets in – sit down and let the stillness take you. It was a glorious, shimmering day of living in the present. Whether or not everything went as planned (spoiler alert: it didn’t!), you now get to collapse on the couch, wrapped in a cozy blanket. There, you can feel thankful for the many moments – the mundane and the extraordinary – you were lucky enough to experience.

About the Author:

Jill Palmquist is Life Time vice president and chief storyteller and the author of In This Lifetime, a coffee table book that celebrates the beauty and reminds us of the brevity of the human experience.