An easy way to practice gratitude is by using a gratitude journal. The benefits of using a gratitude journal on you, your kids and your homeschooling experience will be amazing.
Before I get too far ahead of myself, let's establish some facts:
- Homeschooling is hard and can be stressful on everyone
- Expressing gratitude has been shown to help our overall mental, emotional and physical well-being.
Based on those two statements, I firmly believe that practicing gratitude specifically about your homeschooling experience will help you to be less stressed, happier, more grateful about many other things and will help you to sleep better and feel better physically.
Ready to give it a try? Good, let's go.
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Meet Jenna
Jenna has been homeschooling for a few years now. She has five kids, two of which she is currently homeschooling. The baby is colicky and the toddlers are mischievous, so getting a lot of schooling done in a day is usually hit or miss.
Add to that the stress of being tired and cranky herself, Jenna is usually flustered and just not feeling very good about homeschooling. Day after day seems the same and she doesn't feel as if she's doing a good job with her kids' education. Even though they're still young, she's worried about their future and how she's ever going to be able to keep up with everything once they are all school aged.
Life seems hard and Jenna spends a lot of her time focusing on the things that she's NOT doing. It never seems like anything goes the way she planned. Her kids pick up on her negativity and crankiness and end up being that way, too.
Maybe she should just give up homeschooling. Then everyone would be happier.
Attitude of Gratitude
First of all, we know that life would not be easier if Jenna gave up homeschooling. She would be trading one set of struggles for another. We are also not sure that everyone would be happier. She thinks they would be, but there's no guarantee.
Instead of getting drastic, why not try to make some simple changes, first?
There are a lot of things that might need to be changed, but the first thing might be for Jenna to have a shift in her attitude. Instead of focusing on all of the negative things like:
- how hard life is
- the many things she's not doing
- her children's bleak future (as she sees it)
- fill in the blank with the negative things you think of!
Maybe she needs to spend some time each day focusing on the positives in her life, specifically in the area of homeschooling. Let's face it, homeschooling is a big part of Jenna's day. A new outlook on that could change a lot of things for the better.
Did you know that just a few minutes a day of focusing on gratitude and journaling can improve your life in many ways?
The Benefits of a Gratitude Journal
Desperate for things to get better, Jenna starts doing some research about how to practice intentional gratitude. It seems easy enough, but she wants to get it right.
One day she comes across this gratitude journal made specifically for homeschooling mothers.
This just might be the thing she is looking for. After all, she's learned that focusing on gratitude and keeping a gratitude journal can:
- Improve her sleep (who doesn't need that!)
- Help her relax more
- Give her more energy
- Make her friendlier
- Increase feelings of contentment
- Actually produce more and more gratitude which will then spill on to other areas and people in her life.
Think about it! This is one powerful and under-utilized activity and the benefits of a gratitude journal are amazing! While it is not a cure-all, it is definitely something that Jenna can implement right away and will be easy to do.
She hurriedly clicks here and orders her journal so she can get started right away.
Are You Ready to Try?
I know I'm prone to getting burdened by negativity. Writing in a journal, for some reason, is not easy for me, but I've been doing it for awhile now and I can see how it has been causing a shift in my attitude.
If you're still not convinced that this is a great addition to your homeschooling day, here is more information on the many benefits of gratitude.
Then come back here and order your own homeschooling gratitude journal!
It's so easy to use. Just keep it near your homeschooling books and take it out at the end of your day. Say a quick prayer to the Holy Spirit to enlighten your mind and heart and then think of up to three things that you are grateful for from your homeschooling day and jot them down in the journal.
Some days it might take a few minutes to come up with those three things. There are times, too, when what you do come up with seems silly and trivial like, "Johnny sat still for five minutes today!".
Don't worry. It's still being grateful and it will still help.
What's most exciting about this journal is that at the end of the school year, you can look back and see all of the good things that have happened.
I guarantee you that having this journal full of things you were grateful for all year long will give you a much better perspective on the year. It will also be a great keepsake that you and your kids can look back over in the future.