The Vibration of Gratitude

How You Can Find It, Even When You're Feeling Down

By Barbara Cook

Chairs are being knocked over, there’s screaming and wrestling, and tears are being wiped from eyes.

Yes, it’s my grown-up daughter’s family birthday party, and five so-called adults and four grandchildren are playing an unruly and side-splitting game of musical chairs!

My face hurts from laughing and my heart feels like it will burst with joy at us all being together again. I feel like crying with gratitude for my beautiful family.

Contrast this to years ago when anyone coming into the house would have felt a very different vibe. Stricken with grief when my marriage ended, I was wandering around in a daze and could barely smile or hold a conversation.

Most people instinctively have a sense of feeling ‘down’ or ‘elevated’, depending on the emotional state they’re in. These words are no accident; they are literally describing the energetic or vibrational quality of those states.

The Energy Body

Science is beginning to find evidence for the intuitive sense we have that we and other people are giving off different “vibes”. Energy workers and ancient medical systems talk about “the energy body”, also referred to as the auric field or the “biofield”.

In a peer-reviewed article in Healthline, health and technology writer Rebecca Stanborough talks about Vibrational Energy. She explains electromagnetic energy waves in the body, how thoughts and behaviors impact bodily rhythms and how certain practices such as gratitude are known to provide important health benefits and raise your vibration.

LET’S ALL STAY IN THE GRATITUDE VIBRATION, THEN!

That’s easy when we have a windfall or get that new well-paying job. It’s natural to be thankful when someone has given us a gift or a caring gesture.

But what if life events have you feeling despair or totally stressed out or enraged?

Gratitude can be hard to find when there’s an intense health crisis for a child or partner, a loss of your beloved business that you built from scratch or a home situation that is far from safe.

What Can You Do?

Telling someone who’s in despair or grief to “look on the bright side” or “count their blessings” can be the best attempt by a confidante to make them feel better; to literally lift them up out of the heaviness of the lower vibration.

It can also unwittingly be a negation of very real, valid, and understandable feelings.

PERHAPS THERE’S ANOTHER WAY.

You could notice and gently ‘sit with’ those ‘lower emotions’ and allow them to be, without trying to avoid or suppress them.

You could acknowledge that of course you are shattered at your relationship break-up or having to ask for food assistance after losing your livelihood. You could gently hold space for yourself (or your friend) and...

SIMPLY SAY, “YES. THAT’S HARD. NO WONDER YOU’RE FEELING LIKE THIS.”

You could seek help from a therapist if you’re feeling overwhelmed.

But won’t I stay in that lower vibration forever?

It can definitely feel like that, but while allowing our less-than-lovely feelings, we can at the same time make a choice to start finding something small to be thankful for. Our circumstances may or may not change, but in that moment, we can raise our vibration, one tiny thought at a time.

For example, do you remember that feeling of absolute gratitude when you came out of your first lockdown?

“YOU MEAN I ACTUALLY GET TO SIT IN A MOVIE THEATRE WITH MY FRIEND AND EAT ICE CREAM? EEEEEEK!”

“I CAN FINALLY VISIT MY GRANDMA IN THE AGED CARE FACILITY? OH, MY HEART!”

Sometimes when I stand under a hot shower, I deliberately remember that first shower back at our Kathmandu Hotel after a ten-day Nepalese trek without a proper wash. Who knew that a simple shower could be so euphoric?

My Mum, Lorna’s story

My elderly Mum was usually an optimist; however, in the last couple of years of her life she was beset by many and varied health issues and a growing list of lost freedoms and things she could no longer manage.

Sometimes I would visit and she’d be despondent.“What’s the point of going on like this any longer? I’mno good to anyone. This is not life.”

That was really hard to hear. Resisting the urge to remind her that her family loved her and she was precious to every one of us, I would sit quietly, hold her hand, look into her eyes and say, “I’m hearing that part of you that feels like you can’t see the point of a life like this. Yeah, I get that.”

I’d visit again the next day, expecting more of the same. But oh no! Lorna was a changed woman! Having expressed her feelings, she had then made a choice to shift her awareness into a higher vibration.

She would say, “I gave myself a good talking-to! I said to myself, ‘Come on Mother, remember you have a precious family who all love and support you, a comfortable brick house like you’ve always wanted and caring neighbors.’”

You see. We all have the power to choose gratitude.

Love you, Mum. x

Barbara Cook is an Australian author and Awareness facilitator who helps people who have had enough of being stuck in old patterns and are curious about the opportunity for growth. She loves assisting people to ‘reawaken their essence’ by sharing stories on her blog and social media feeds, along with offering various modalities such as Mindfulness Meditation, Reiki, Soul Focused Psychotherapy and online Soul Journey workshops. She invites you to find her book Good Choice – A Soul’s Story, discover your own Soul Story, follow her blog or sign up for her free newsletter to receive news of her latest workshops and courses.