Today, I wanted to share a story about how practicing gratitude helped my son overcome stress and perform at his best. Maybe it will inspire you to incorporate a daily practice of gratitude into your life!

A Way to Cope with Pressure

A couple of years ago, my son was playing on a high caliber Little League baseball team that had a good chance of making it to the Provincials, or even beyond. He was one of the youngest players on the team and I was worried about the pressure he would feel as the importance of the games increased.

I was talking about it with my sister, Rachel, who coaches a lot of kids, about ways that he could cope. And she suggested practicing gratitude based on Christie Marie Sheldon’s How to Change Your Frequency to Change Your Reality visualization. (By the way, my sister, Kirsten, has also applied this visualization as part of a daily practice to increase her ability to dream.)

So I watched the video where Christie Marie Sheldon takes you through a visualization, and I thought why not apply this in real life? There’s nothing worse than asking for advice and not taking it! This idea is similar to Kirsten’s blog post that reading fewer books, but applying the concepts might be a better way to go.

Practicing Gratitude

When I went to my son’s room that night, we talked about how the upcoming baseball games might be stressful. I told him that Auntie Rachel recommended this gratitude practice that would help him with stressful situations and could help him to re-ground himself if he needed it. I asked him if he wanted to try it. And he said: “Sure.”

We would lie there in the dark and imagine our gratitude as a ball of light in our stomachs, and we’d give our gratitude a colour. And then we would breathe in and out deeply and imagine the ball of gratitude growing. Then we’d think of some things we were grateful for. And we would take turns saying a few things out loud, for instance: 

• I’m thankful for that great dinner we had
• Practicing baseball in the sunshine is my favourite
• I’m grateful that the bed is so cozy, and
• I loved the time I spent with my family that day.

After a few examples of things I was thankful for, I’d say to imagine the gratitude growing eventually expanding to fill his body, and then extending beyond his body, filling the room, filling the house, then the neighbourhood, then all the way to the baseball field, and then out into the world. And in between I’d keep saying things to feel grateful for.

We did this a few nights in a row – maybe for about a week, but I really wasn’t sure if he was getting it. Still we did practice gratitude every night leading up to the playoffs.

The Moment of Truth

The games started and some of them were easy and fun for his team. The bats had lots of pop to them and there were half a dozen kids on the team who were able to hit home runs, my son included. (Little League has since changed the bat specs).

But as the team progressed, the games were close and more intense. The games were also more important and the teams were better matched.

One day after a particularly intense game, I was driving home with our son, and he said to me:

“Mum, during that game, when I was in the dugout and the game was really close, I could feel my heart pounding and I was really stressed out. And then I remembered ‘gratitude’ so I closed my eyes, and I pictured gratitude as a light inside me, and I thought of things I was thankful for, and my stress went down and I had a great at bat.”

It made my eyes all squirty because my 11 year old was able to put this abstract concept into practice!

And he thought of it and did it by himself at a moment when he needed it.

My heart was full of love and gratitude.

Two lessons I took away from this:

1. It’s never too early to teach your kids tools that might be useful to them
2. Practice gratitude daily. You can’t be grateful enough. And it can decrease your stress when you need it most.

Have you had a similar experience with practicing gratitude? Please comment below. We’d love to hear from you.

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