The Thankfulness Challenge

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Every year around this time I take a moment to do an exercise that impacts my life tremendously. I started this habit years ago, but after coming to learn about the Solution Focused Approach it’s become an even bigger deal in my life. In this video I share this habit and challenge you.

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Here in America, we’re about to experience one of our major holidays, Thanksgiving. So one of the days that we all get together with the people that we love and the people we care about and we share a big old meal and often times express the things that we are most thankful for. And uh, and to be very honest with you, this time of year always makes me a little bit sad and I’m going to share with you how I counter it and then I’m going to give you a challenge, something that I’m going to challenge you to do as you watch this video. Um, but the thing that makes me sad about it is I would love to just sit at a big old table with all the people that I love and care about all the people in my family. But unfortunately it’s really difficult because my family’s all spread out

throughout the United States. My mother lives in Chicago and you know, it’s just, it just people spread out everywhere. And then as I’ve lived my life and had many, many people touch me. Um, my, my, my chosen family has expanded, you know, the Froerer family in Atlanta, Georgia that Iveson family in England, the Crandall family in Massachusetts. Like I would love to just have everybody near and nearby and just sit and just have everybody together. That would just be a dream come true. And maybe one day I’ll be able to make it happen. But whenever we come to a holiday like this, I get a little bit sad that I don’t have that. And a few years ago, several years ago, in fact, I was really bothered by it. I was super duper homesick and I was missing my hometown of Massachusetts and I was stuck in Texas and, and I hadn’t even learned anything about

Solution Focus Brief Therapy really. But I was just so, like feeling bad and gutted that I wasn’t around all of the people that I cared about. I got a note pad out and if you know me, I’m always walking around with something I can write on and write with. Um, this was before that is now an iPad, but you know, this is a piece of paper. And I started making a list of all of the things that I was grateful for and thankful for and all of the people that I was grateful for and thankful for. And now as I do, I’ve really learned the importance of doing those sorts of things and I’ve worked with clients and ask them to make lists of things that they are pleased about and things they are noticing and things that they appreciate. And, and uh, I do that in my own life.

When I come to Thanksgiving every single year I challenged myself to see how many things I can come up with that I’m grateful for. Uh, I don’t remember how many I got to last year and I don’t do it as a, as a competition necessarily, but I do it to really kind of focus my intention of the things that I’m grateful for. Like I’m so grateful to all of the people who watch these videos. So grateful to you. I’m grateful for the Solution Focused University community. I’m grateful to the team of people that work with me and help me develop my business and develop my passion and spread this message. Lesley Worsham, Anna Francis and, and I mean, the list could go on and on. I’m grateful for Chris Iverson. I’m grateful for Evan George. I’m grateful for Adam Froerer I’m grateful for Denise Yusuf. All of these people! I’m grateful for Harvey Ratner and I’m grateful to his wife

Sila, like I’m grateful for all of these people who have come into my life and really, really touched me. Alesya Courtnage, Paula Lange, Bekka Ouer, like all of these people come to my life and enriched it. And every year, like in my life goes a mile a minute. I’m in a different city, in a different state, in a different country every week it seems like. So one of the things I enjoy about holidays like this is I get to slow down a bit and I get to just sit and think, “yeah Elliott, life is stressful, things are going a mile a minute, but here are the things that you’re really, really grateful for”, and it’s one of the best things that I do every year and it really helps me stay centered and stay balanced and it helps me, um, stay the type of person that I want to be. People often ask me, I get emails all the time from people saying like, Hey, make sure you take care of yourself.

And you know, you seem to work really, really hard and you seem to be all over the place. Like what do you do for self care and what I do for self care, one of the things I do for self care, if you follow this channel, you follow my social media. You see, I go to the gym and I work out and I do lots of things for self care. But one of them that is so important is I pause every so often in particularly around the Thanksgiving season, just because you always hear these messages. It’s just on my mind. And I sit and I think, what are the things in my life that I’m grateful for? So what I would like you to do is when you’re done watching this video, take a moment to just look around your life regardless of the circumstances going on and regardless of thing going on that really hard, just take a look around your life and I just want you to have a little think about what are the things around me that I’m really thankful for and who are the people around me that I’m really grateful for and what are the, what are the processes I’m really thankful for because it helps me to, to pay it into the small things.

You know, one of the things that’s a Thanksgiving tradition here in the United States is American Football. And my favorite team is the Detroit Lions. And they stink. They’re almost never on television, but every year they’re on, on Thanksgiving. So tomorrow I get to watch the Detroit lions game and I’m really excited about it. And if I don’t take a moment, just pause. Then those little things get missed and I fail to get excited. So I want you to watch, when you’re done, watch this video. Sit down with a piece of paper in a nice quiet place and challenge yourself to see if you can make a list on the many, many things that you can write down that you’ll be grateful for. I promise it will touch your life. I promise you’re going to write down things on that list that surprise you and I promise it will make a difference in the way that you experience things.

So anyway, I hope you guys are enjoying these videos. I hope you’re enjoying my channel and if you are, please hit subscribe and make sure you hit the bell so you get notifications when I post new content on this channel. Head on over to www.elliottconnie.com where I’ve got loads of free material, I make announcements there. That’s my, my general website. And, uh, please share this video on social media because one of the things I want to share in this, in this holiday season here in the US is an attitude of greatness, a gratefulness. And I need your help to do that. So if you could share this on your social media platforms, and let’s get as many people as possible, making as many lists as possible about the things in your life they’re grateful for, because I think it would not only make their life better, but if we can have a whole ton of people better and make it for better, more thankful world. So I will see you in the next video.