How to Practice Gratitude without Being Fake

Thanksgiving is coming up next week. This holiday is one that is pretty easy for me to love because cooking and eating are two of my favorite things. You get to do both on Thanksgiving and you only have to spend one day with your extended family. Seems perfect, right?

Oh yeah, I forgot about gratitude. In some form or fashion, you may be asked to reflect on or proclaim your gratitude. I don’t doubt the myriad studies that say gratitude is good for us. I appreciate the need to express and receive gratitude. But, as a lifelong pigheaded person, I refuse to feel something on demand.

Honestly, it’s not even truly refusal. I could decide to go along with the little game of gratitude to amuse my family or shut them up. But I would know in my secret heart of hearts that I don’t really feel grateful. What I really feel is resentful.

This same phenomenon is why I also can’t do positive affirmations. They don’t make me feel strong, calm, empowered or loved. They make my mind argue and my mind already does this well enough on it’s own. In short, despite the best intentions of these positive practices, I just can’t force my mind or heart to go in a direction it’s not already inclined to go.

So, what’s the key here? How can someone like me practice gratitude in a way that’s not fake? One way, of course, is to notice when genuine gratitude comes up, savor it, and where appropriate share it. I do this and it feels really good.

But can I cultivate gratitude otherwise? Despite my mental and emotional blocks against fakery, I have discovered a hack. I have written many times about my fondness for loving-kindness practice. One of the reasons I love this practice so much is that it serves as a gratitude practice for me.

I don’t go into the practice hoping for gratitude but it almost always shows up as a wonderful side effect. When I bring to mind the people I love and care about and wish them well, invariably I also feel gratitude that they are in my life. Strangely, I even sometimes feel gratitude to myself and to the difficult people in my life as the practice progresses.

This is why I am sharing a gratitude meditation that is really a modified loving-kindness practice. It follows the same traditional pattern, but instead of wishing the phrases of peace and well-being it includes an offering of gratitude. I did this one for the Mindfulness in Law Society Virtual Sit this week and remembered how much I liked it.

To try out the practice, find it here or on our YouTube channel or on Insight Timer. Please have a wonderful holiday weekend. I am honestly and sincerely grateful to have you as a reader and meditation friend.

Want to learn more about mindfulness and compassion? Check out my new book, How to Be a Badass Lawyer, for a simple guide to creating a meditation practice of your own in 30 days. And to share mindfulness with your little one, check out my new children’s book, Mommy Needs a Minute.

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Published by Claire E. Parsons

Claire E. Parsons is a partner at Wood + Lamping LLP in Cincinnati, Ohio. She has practiced for the last fifteen years in the areas of litigation, employment, local government law. Claire lives in Kentucky with her husband, Brian, their two daughters, and dog. Claire is an active leader in her community and in the legal profession. She has led innovative charitable programs in her community, statewide legal organizations, committees relating to the promotion of women professionals. Claire is also a frequent writer and speaker for these and other organizations. She has published and spoken about numerous topics, ranging from complex legal issues, to law practice, networking and marketing, as well as mindfulness and wellness for lawyers and other professionals. She writes regularly on LinkedIn and even co-authored a book this year with 19 other women lawyers about how they used the platform to network and pursue career goals during the pandemic. In 2013, Claire began a mindfulness practice early in her law career and as she was learning to be a new mom to her eldest daughter, Sophie. When Claire began the practice, she saw it gradually transform her life for the better by helping her to reduce overthinking, manage stress, and infuse compassion practices into her daily life. Over the next few years, she continued to study mindfulness practices and attend retreats. In 2018, Claire began speaking and writing on these topics and she quickly became regarded as a resource for professionals as someone who can explain meditation practices in an approachable and practical way. In 2020, she completed the online meditation teacher certification program with The Mindfulness Center founded by Deborah Norris, Ph.D., to refine her understanding of the science of mindfulness and its practical applications. In 2021, Claire also completed the 500-hour yoga teacher training from My Vinyasa Practice as well as numerous courses relating to compassion practices, including Mindful Self-Compassion and Compassion Cultivation Training. Claire enjoys sharing her experience with mindfulness in her practical, and often humorous voice, to help humanize the legal profession and to make life a little easier for her community.

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