“Expressing gratitude serves to call your attention to the good things in your life. Almost everyone has both positive and negative aspects of their lives at any given time. It’s just the nature of human existence. In many cases, our current happiness or unhappiness isn’t based on the particular amount of good stuff and bad stuff in our lives. In many cases, our current happiness is strongly influenced by which stuff is commanding our attention and our thoughts. By thinking of the good things—parts for which you are presumably most grateful—those good things come to be more central to your thought process.”(Peter Vishton)
“Gratitude goes beyond the "mine" and "thine" and claims the truth that all of life is a pure gift. In the past I always thought of gratitude as a spontaneous response to the awareness of gifts received, but now I realize that gratitude can also be lived as a discipline. The discipline of gratitude is the explicit effort to acknowledge that all I am and have is given to me as a gift of love, a gift to be celebrated with joy.” (Henri Nouwen)
“…gratitude is not a type of feel-good escapism whereby we tell ourselves that things are fine when they really are not. Rather it is learning to see life in a new way, perceiving the good that may be obscured by the familiar context of the ordinary…There is a popular misconception that gratitude practices flow out of a prior attitude of gratitude. But usually it works the other way around: we have a grateful attitude because we have first chosen to engage in gratitude practices…Gratitude is not an attitude, just as exercise and dieting are not attitudes. Rather, gratitude is a practice—it’s something you do…“Gratitude is worth the effort since, once mastered, it is the one virtue that makes all the other virtues (and indeed everything else in life) much easier.” (Robin Phillips)
“Let us be having gratitude; that is, let us keep on giving thanks to God. For not only ought we not be discouraged at present things, but even show the greatest gratitude to Him for those future things,…It is possible to worship God acceptably by giving Him thanks in all things,…both in temptations and in their abatement.” (St. John Chrysostom)
“The spiritual person is the one who is grateful for everything. He is the one who receives everything with thanksgiving, and who knows that he has nothing except what he has received from God (cf. Jn 3.27). And from His fullness have we all received, grace upon grace (Jn 1.16)… The spiritual person has thanksgiving and gratitude in all circumstances, in everything and for everything. This thanksgiving is rooted in the firm conviction of God’s merciful providence and care in all things, in the steadfast faith that “God works in everything for good with those who love Him” or, as the passage may also be rendered, “everything works together for good with those who love God” (Rom 8.28)…The spiritual man does not thank God only for what he considers to be good. Rather, he thanks God for everything, even for what appears to be bad, knowing that God’s tender care is over all, and that the evil in this world—which is always present and inevitable (cf. Jn 17)—can itself be the vehicle for spiritual growth and salvation if rightly understood and overcome by the grace of God.” (Fr. Thomas Hopko)
“...do we know that practicing simple gratitude brings about happiness? Researchers testing gratefulness have discovered that it actually changes the brain and makes us happier. But gratitude changes more than brain chemistry, for it makes us better and kinder to others.” (Abbot Tryphon)
“The secret of a happy, joy-filled life is a grateful heart. Without a heart filled with gratitude there is never a possibility of a life of happiness.” (Father Thomas J. Paris)
“Being grateful does not mean that everything in life is perfect, but that we look at life as a whole and receive with gratitude all the goodness in it…When it comes to our spiritual gifts, the need for a grateful heart is foremost.” (Abbot Tryphon, Marianne C. Sailus)
“Let us remember at all times that God makes Himself known to us in order to bless, heal, protect, and illumine us. To worship Him in gratitude is our natural response.” (Dynamis
5/1/2014)
“May God’s grace elevate our gratitude and keep us from every form of envy and dissatisfaction. Let us never question what God gives us, especially in relation to what He bestows upon others.” (Dynamis 8/6/2014)