Happy Thanksgiving, everybody!
As many Americans celebrate Thanksgiving this week, we will be practicing gratitude by sharing with friends and family what we’re most grateful for.
This is a wonderful practice that helps our brains create more neural networks for a positive bias. This is especially useful as our brains naturally are wired to have a more negative bias.
From an evolutionary perspective, our ancestors needed to have a negative bias in order to pass on their genetic material. If our ancestors’ brains didn’t assume the worst each time their status quo was disrupted and if they didn’t run away each time they heard a rustle in the bushes, they would not have survived and their lineage would have ended.
And each time they fled from the unknown, the neural networks in their brains associated with negative bias got reinforced.
Fast forward thousands of years later, we are no longer hunting and gathering food in the wilderness on the lookout for beasts wanting to eat us. Even though it’s no longer necessary to assume the worst all day every day like our lives depended on it, we have inherited the negative bias to assume the worst when the status quo is disrupted, even in everyday situations in life and work.
In the space of personal and professional development, “status quo disruption” can be interpreted as uncertainty, the unknown, or a new challenge.
Making time to practice gratitude every day, not only during the holidays, helps you reinforce more of a positive bias in your brain.
Practicing gratitude and positivity is a skill set, and you get better at what you practice.
Keep in mind though, that practicing negative bias is a skill set too…and you and your ancestors have been practicing this for thousands of years.
While practicing gratitude and positivity intentionally and regularly takes effort, the fruits of this labor are bountiful.
Being able to catch yourself in your natural negative bias state and reframing it into a more positive space can help you:
- Take bigger risks to create more joy and deeper fulfillment in your life
- Build more confidence and self-belief by taking more actions toward dreams and goals that you once thought were impossible
- Discover new and amazing gifts and strengths that you didn’t even know you have
- Be able to look at situations more objectively to assess whether something is useful or not useful toward creating the life and outcomes you desire
- Surround yourself with positive people who support you in creating what you do want, instead of focusing on what you don’t want
I encourage you to not take gratitude for granted.
Practicing gratitude and positivity is one of the most powerful skill sets that you can master.
I invite you to continue your gratitude practice not just during Thanksgiving and the holiday season, but every day.
Daily gratitude and positive practice will strengthen the neural networks in your brain for positive bias. And since we get better at what we practice, you’ll get better and better at taking more risks and actions from a positive place which will not only enhance your life, it can transform it.Now, that’s something to be grateful for!
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