The Gratitude Dilemma: How to Be Grateful and Still Want More in Life (Without Feeling Guilty)

What are you grateful for?

A Forbes article I read a while back stated that people practicing gratitude as little as five minutes a day can be as much as 25% happier than people who don’t. Further studies have shown that people practicing gratitude also sleep better and have less physical pain, lower blood pressure, and stronger immune systems. Well, I want to be in the happy, healthy, well-slept, pain-free camp so I’m cultivating a gratitude practice of my own.

If you’re reading this, odds are you are in, or at least from, an industrialized and wealthy nation. AKA: a first world country. You’ve probably checked a number of boxes off Maslow’s “to do” list. And being a first-worlder, most of your problems are going to seem like “spilled milk” compared against situations in undeveloped countries. A la, the famous Helen Keller quote “I cried because I had no shoes until I met a man who had no feet.”

But “apples to no apples”, or in this case, “feet to no feet,” isn’t a fair comparison. Of course, first world struggles seem trivial weighed against more existential requirements like food or shelter (or feet). No one’s questioning that. But first world problems are still problems. Yeah, the guy with no feet is dealing with things that you can’t relate to, and you can (some might say “should”) be grateful for that. But having feet comes with its own set of problems, doesn’t it? Athlete’s foot, toenail fungus, bunions, footwear, fallen arches. It’s quite a list. Should you be grateful for any of these conditions because “at least you have feet?!”

Look, part of cultivating a gratitude practice requires acknowledging that, conveniences and luxuries notwithstanding, modern life can be so full of relentless, irritating, crap, that some days it’s just harder to find something to be grateful for.

Harder. But not impossible.

I say “cultivating” a gratitude practice because, as the word implies, it takes work that never seems to end. It’s like a psychological garden that needs constant weeding, watering, chasing pests out, etc. It’s not always easy.

I’m well aware of the many blessings in my life and I am deeply grateful for each of them, including my feet. An old adage goes, “Comparison is the thief of joy.” Yet comparing our situation to someone else’s is why social media has the impact that it does. Comparison is what we are brought up on, what we are trained for.

As kids, if we didn’t like something our parents tried to feed us, they’d force it on us, pontificating about the “starving children” in (insert 3rd world country of choice) who would love to have it.

If we complained about our clothes, there were even more kids in that 3rd world country that didn’t have anything to wear at all.

Today, when I hear kids complain about network speeds, all I can think is “we only had dial-up.” (My generation’s equivalent of walking barefoot to school, in snow, uphill, both ways. Now, get off my lawn.)

But comparisons like these aren’t designed to make you feel grateful. They’re purposely out of balance to humble you and make you feel guilty. As if they’re saying, “you have what you have and you have no right to desire anything more.”

To me, this flies in the face of our natural desire for more, to improve, to better our situations and ourselves. Imagine saying to Simone Biles, “Forget gymnastics. Just be grateful you can walk.” Or telling Elon “You’ve done great with PayPal. Maybe you should stop there.” Okay, well, maybe someone should have told him that. But you see where I’m going with this. It’s our innate desire for “more” that fuels our progress. I’m not sure how fat or thin the line is but there is definitely a line between ambition and greed.

So, how do you overcome the gratitude dilemma? How can you practice gratitude while still wanting more? Easy. Just say “thank you.” That’s it! It all starts from there. Say “thank you” to whomever or whatever, whenever, wherever. “Thank you.” Thank you for what I have. Thank you for what I’ve been given. Thank you for where I am. Thank you for x, y, and z. Start with a simple “thank you,” acknowledge your good fortune, and go from there. And, at the risk of sounding pedantic, no, you don’t have to “say” thank you. You can think it. But think it often.

Hell, you can even be grateful for your desire to have more! Have a job? Great! Want a better one? Awesome! Be grateful for your current job AND the desire for a better one. This might even help you shift to a mindset of abundance in lieu of scarcity.

There are a number of other things you can also do to nurture your own gratitude practice: Daily reflection, journaling, meditation or prayer, to name a few.

A Study by Emmons & McCullough in 2003 found that those who journaled frequently about their gratitude or their daily reflections were happier, more satisfied, and more optimistic than those who journaled about negative or neutral events. The happy journalists also reported fewer illnesses, like colds, and were more resilient to life’s stressors than their less-than-happy counterparts.

The same findings were reported by people who prayed or meditated daily.

Gratitude, like any practice, is a journey. But with every ‘thank you,’ we nurture both our contentment and our drive for more. My gratitude practice is still burgeoning but is already bearing fruit. Over the months that I’ve been developing it my mood has improved, I’ve lost a few pounds, and even though my wife has had a few bouts with colds, COVID, and the flu, I haven’t been sick once. (I love that for me.)

So, right now, what are you grateful for? It could be something as innocuous as not needing glasses to read this article. (I love that for you.) It could be that you finally had five minutes to yourself. (I love that for you, too.)

You don’t even have to mention anything specific. Just think to yourself, “thank you.”

Oh, and one last thing I’m grateful for: You took the time to read this and that means the world to me.

Thank you!