Compilation of a gratitude and ingratitude log of my office colleagues and close friends

Pick up any self help book, it will ask you to compile a gratitude log, and rightly so. A gratitude log allows us to reflect on what the life has offered to us. I personally try to evaluate all the things in my life, I am grateful for — and it always brings a smile on my face.

But let us to do this thing slightly differently here today.

I also developed an ingratitude log — all the things Life has forced upon me for which I am not grateful.

My Gratitude log included things such as my family, my favorite cup of tea, a long walk on a drizzling day, my peace of mind, and all the small things that make me smile.

My ingratitude log included things such as living in a rental home, long wait for promotion at office, etc.

I tried to take this one step forward and talked to my office colleagues and friends, and asked them the same things:

What constitutes their gratitude log as well as their ingratitude log?

All this was part of our normal day-to-day conversation rather than a type form or survey. They all responded to me during my casual discussion over lunch table or evening snack.

At the end of it, when I evaluated all my conversations with my friends (they do not know this of course!) — I had a very big reflection.

For both gratitude log and ingratitude log, I categorized all the responses into two categories as follows:
 — Common responses
 — Uncommon responses

The outcome from both the gratitude and ingratitude log is as follows:

I. Ingratitude log — everyone is ungrateful for the same reasons

The ingratitude log had very similar responses. Almost everyone is ungrateful for the same reasons:

— Not happy with job, promotion is due for a long time
 — Do not have enough money to retire, and still have to work for a long time before retirement
 — Do not have our own house to live, and am living in a rental place
 — Stuck in the mid life crisis. My friends are doing much better in life

Invariably, money is the common cause of ingratitude here.

II. Gratitude log — so many different types of responses

I was so elated to receive such a wide variety of responses. Everyone is grateful for their family members, and that is the only common theme of gratitude across all the responses.

— Grateful for my family and kids (common response)
— Vacation time that I get almost every
— Expensive watches and luxury items 
— Championship win for my favorite football team
— An evening gossip with friends 
— Favorite jazz music 
— My YouTube channel stats

When we reflect on the outcomes, there are two key learnings:

A. Our gratitude is what makes us unique.

When it comes to being ungrateful, everyone is ungrateful for all the same reasons — not having enough money being the common theme of ingratitude. Things we are grateful for is what makes us unique and defines our personality.

Imagine, everyone likes only one sport, or the same music, or red being the favorite color of everyone on the planet. That would make life very dull and lose its diversity.

What we are grateful for is what adds color to our lives — orange, red, blue, rose, green. This is what makes us unique. The things we are ungrateful for, are nothing but different shades of grey.

B. If everyone is ungrateful for same reasons, is it something wrong with the way we are living our life these days?

As we have progressed as a society, we have given lesser importance to things that cannot be quantified in terms of money — Love, Mental health, Purpose in life, Joy of Selfless service, etc.

Our aspirations have risen so high, that we don’t have time for anything else in our life.

We are surely not doing certain things correctly which is reflected in the common theme of ingratitude. As a society, we are definitely moving forward, its just that may be we are not on the right path afterall.

Maybe we should just take a pause and appreciate life for once. That will surely make us happier.

P.S. I am always grateful to all the readers who read and share their reflections😇.

I hope you all enjoyed reading this article. If you have come so far, please share your feedback/reflections in the comments. I read them all.
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