Giving thanks in thankless times
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BY ERIN ANDERSEN / Lincoln Journal Star
With the stock market hitting new lows, the auto industry on the brink of bankruptcy, foreclosures and job layoffs mounting and the world’s financial foundation collapsing like a house of cards, it doesn’t seem like there’s much to be thankful for this Thanksgiving.
Or does there?
Being thankful — especially in these tumultuous times — can improve your outlook, your health and even your life, says Robert Emmons, professor of psychology at the University of California-Davis, and author of several books on gratitude including “Thanks! How Practicing Gratitude Can Make You Happier.”
Robert Tonack had it all: university degrees in medicine and architecture. Great job. Great family.
The Nebraska "good life."
Then he lost it all: his good paying job. His health. His home.
“It led me down the road to depression,” said Tonack, 55.
Tonack put his six cats and his bird into the car, drove to a campground and pitched a tent by a lake. For four months, this was his home.
It was all he could handle to take care of himself and his pets.
“I pulled myself out of society,” he said. “Society rejected me as I rejected myself. I didn’t answer the phone or my mail ” it was a total loss of self.”
He turned his bitterness inward.
As summer turned into fall and the pounds fell away from his frame, a vocational rehabilitation worker urged him to get to someplace warm and eat some nourishing food. He was told to go to the People’s City Mission and get something to eat.
He drove to the mission parking lot and sat in his car.
“It took me a few days to get out of the car and check myself in,” Tonack said.
Once inside he found food, shelter, appreciation and hope.
This past February, he was offered a part-time job in the mission’s kitchen ” 20 hours a week and minimum wage.
“That gave me the finances I needed to move into the mission’s transitional housing, the Curtis Center,” Tonack said.
Eventually, he will transition back into society and away from homelessness. He is reconnecting with people. He’s socializing, talking on the telephone and answering his mail.
Although he is paid for 20 hours of work in the mission kitchen, he puts in many more out of gratitude.
And he’s content.
Happy, actually.
He turned down an offer for a high-paying job and a new life out of state.
“I feel it is best to make a few dollars and be content in my gratitude,” Tonack said. “I am content to be making minimum wage and cooking for the homeless. This is where I was helped, and now I am helping others.”
And he sees the importance of not only giving thanks, but receiving it from others.
“If I am willing to accept it (thanks), that will touch me and grow inside of me. And it makes it easier for me to pass that gratitude on to someone else.”
” Erin Andersen
10 steps to a more thankful life
1. Spend five minutes each day focusing on all the things that are going right.
2. Take daily 10-minute gratitude walks.
3. Each day, write down three things you are grateful for.
4. Write a letter of appreciation to people who are important to you.
5. Enjoy everyone around you.
6. Use all of your senses ” sight, taste, sound, scent and touch ” to appreciate what it means to be human.
7. Consider what you have instead of what you don’t.
8. Accept your current situation, and move forward.
9. Cut yourself some slack.
10. Believe tomorrow will be better.
- Sources: Pastor Tom Barber, People’s City Mission; Debbie Way, Roper & Sons; Robert Emmons, author of "Thanks! How the New Science of Gratitude Can Make You Happier."
According to his research in positive psychology, people who regularly practice grateful thinking can increase their “set point” for happiness by as much as 25 percent. Thinking gratefully improves your energy, sleep, job/school performance and health, Emmons says.
“Thankfulness has to be thought about and practiced on a regular basis,” said Scott Young, director of the Food Bank of Lincoln. “You couldn’t develop a discipline that would improve your life any more than that of being grateful.”
The Rev. Jim Keck of First-Plymouth Congregational Church says “thankfulness is foundational for a spiritual view of life.”
He recalled the teachings of a church forefather: “If you ever try to pray and the words fail, just say ‘thanks.’ That is the full and substantive prayer.”
Thankful thinking is like “a positive snowball rolling down a hill and developing more momentum,” said Julia Christoffersen, psychologist with Samaritan Counseling in Lincoln.
“It is getting into the practice of being aware each day of the little things in life that we appreciate — a nice sunset, kissing a loved one, hugging your child, being there for a friend,” she said.
Yes, times are tough.
And they probably will get tougher.
But if you really looked at your life, you would see there are far more things “right in our lives than are wrong,” said Debbie Way, outreach director for Roper & Sons Funeral Care.
“When we are really honest with ourselves, that column (of things going right) is a lot longer than the other,” she said. “But we allow other things that are not going so well in our lives to overshadow it, and then it gets so muddled it is hard to step of out of that.”
So while it is important to acknowledge the dire news making headlines, it’s critical to look within to find and appreciate all that is great, Lincolnites say.
And there is a lot for which to be grateful.
Reach Erin Andersen at 473-7217 or eandersen@journalstar.com.
More thoughts on thankfulness
Jennifer Bauman, agency relations director, Food Bank of Lincoln: “It is so easy to turn on the television or read a magazine and be persuaded that we should have so many things in order to make our lives be happy. If we can just step back from that and be thankful that we have the essentials. I run into people with such hard choices to make: Are we going to buy food this week or are we going to pay the utility bills? It is like a bucket of cold water on your face — and a reminder that ‘Oh, I don’t really need a lot to get by.’”
Debbie Way, outreach director, Roper & Sons Funeral Care: “Gratitude and appreciation are the key to living happy. There is no way you live and say you are happy without practicing those.”
Scott Young, director of Food Bank of Lincoln: “Most of us have a family picture on our desk, but we don’t look at it and think how grateful we are. Don’t take it for granted. They are life symbols of things meant to remind you about how lucky you are. ... If you are not awakened to what we have to be grateful for, then you are not thinking clearly.”
Julia Christoffersen, psychologist, Samaritan Counseling: “If we imagine it is the last day of our lives, we will not say: ‘I wish I had a better job or more money in my IRA,’ but ‘I am glad I had my friends, my family and their love and support and faith.’”
Deb Daily, director of operations, Center for People in Need: “It’s easy to lose sight. You have to make your day, every day.”
Pastor Tom Barber, director, People’s City Mission: “Being thankful is not what we do, it is something we are. There is a difference between people who are thankful because they are supposed to be, and somebody who has a thankful life view. It is more who you are and not what you do.”
Jim Keck, pastor, First-Plymouth Congregational Church: “Don’t wait until you have enough to be thankful for. ... You have to start with thankfulness. You cannot wait for something outside of yourself to make you thankful.”
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