What are the benefits of gratitude meditation? And how is it connected to happiness? Let's take a closer look.
Gratitude Meditation
Sometimes we feel like we should reap more from life, this could be in the form of our well-being, enriched relationships or increased efficiency. If you feel like your life is chaotic and you merely exist but you would like to have a more satisfying and enriching life, then gratitude meditation can help you attain all these things. This is also one of the easiest types of meditation you can practice.
What Is It?
As indicated by the name, it is a type of meditation that is centered on feeling grateful. Unlike other types of meditation, it is one of the easiest to practice. It can be done alongside other activities, for instance, work. In addition to that, it is one of the most rewarding types of meditation. This type of meditation focuses on bearing in mind the different things you are grateful for in your life. It could be the simple things that people do for you like having supportive family and friends who are always there for you or your colleagues who always come through for you to reduce your workload. This type of meditation also allows you to take pleasure in things like the ability to feel, see and taste.
Benefits
- Better mental health
- Better physical health
- Stronger personal relationships
- Greater sense of joy
- Increased social circle
Happiness
This is an emotional state characterized by joy, peace, contentment, satisfaction and fulfillment. Sometimes happiness has many definitions, it is often described as involving positive feelings and life satisfaction. When people say that they are happy, they might be talking about the current emotions that they are feeling or they might be talking about how they feel about life in general. Due to its broadness, scientists sometimes refer to it as subjective well-being. This is because it focuses on the person's overall feelings about their life in the present. There are two key components of 'subjective well-being" in a person's life, which include:
- Life satisfaction - This is all about how satisfied you are with different aspects of your life like work, achievements, relationships, and other things that you might consider important in your life.
- Balance of emotions - As it is normal in life to experience some negative emotions and moods, it is all about experiencing more positive emotions than negative ones.
How To Tell if You Are Happy
While the definition of subjective well-being varies from one person to the other, there are some specific signs that psychologists look out for which include;
- Having more positive emotions than negative
- Feeling like you are satisfied with your life
- The perception of feeling that you have achieved most things you want in life
- Feeling like you are living the life you always wanted
- Perception of the kind of your living condition is good
