Fathers, how we feel doesn’t buy the groceries. Our feelings don’t keep the lights on. They don’t make our families feel safe, or loved.
It’s what we do that reveals whether we’re taking care of the business of fatherhood. And the sum of all our accumulated actions, not our precious feelings, will determine the legacy of our parenting.
What I’m saying is that gratitude shouldn’t be filed in your Intentions folder, it should be in your toolbox. Your lunchbox. Your briefcase. Whatever daily work imagery works for you. The point is that practicing gratitude means putting in deliberate effort. Not just when we feel like it. Not just when the spirit moves us. The practice of gratitude requires intentionality and frequency.
Why not just when we feel it? Wouldn’t that be more authentic? More genuine?
Well, no. Imagine your child is hurting inside, and being a complete jerk to everyone around him because of that hurt. Instead of giving him a much-deserved whack upside his head like you secretly want to do, you hug him and say, “I love you.” Are you being inauthentic? Of course not. You know that mature adults don’t act out love just when we feel like it. That’s not really love anyway, is it? That’s sentimentality. No, love means doing what’s good for someone, no matter how you feel in the moment about them.
Picking up the theme here? Actions, not feelings. That’s what we’re up to here, dads. And this applies to gratitude. No matter how crappy your life feels right now, the truth is that you’ve won the lottery, my friend. Food, housing, clothes, medicine, tools, entertainmentâmaybe you feel dissatisfied with your lot in life, but compared to a 16th-century farmer who could expect to lose half his teeth and his children before dying by age 35, you’ve got it pretty damned good.
And the funny thing about gratitude is, the more you practice it, the more your eyes open to all the things you should be thankful for. The practice of gratitude, in other words, engenders the feelings of gratitude. People who want to wait around until they feel it before they do it, in other words, have got the whole thing bass-ackwards.
A last thought about this first and perhaps most important habit: you might be thinking that I’m eliding the question of exactly who or what we’re supposed to give thanks to. And if you are thinking that, you’re exactly right.
I mean, I have my opinions about whom (or Whom) we should be thanking, and if we were talking about religion here, I’d be happy to share those opinions with you. But while I have definite opinions about the source of every blessing, right now I just care that you embrace an attitude of gratitude. Thank God, thank the Universe, thank that really gnarly and noble-looking tree stump in your back yard. Just practice the habit of gratitude, and see how that transforms your attitude, and with it, your fathering.
Additional Resources
31 Benefits of Gratitude. A science writer who came to the topic of gratitude with agnostic skepticism enumerates its many benefits born out by scientific studies.
40 Simple Ways to Practice Gratitude. Ciara Conlon offers practical steps anyone can take to cultivate a habit of gratitude.
Cultivating Gratitude. Practical steps any parent can take to model the habit of gratitude for his children.
“Gratitude List.” This short poem by Laura Foley sets the mind right.
Gratitude is a Superpower. Countercultural musician and DJ Akira the Don offers some thoughts about the power of gratitude, starting around the 15-minute mark.
I Had Trouble in Getting to Solla Sollew. Dr. Seuss offers not only a caution against utopian fantasy, but a reminder that we’re better off facing our troubles with a happy heart than lamenting them.
One Thousand Gifts. Ann Voskamp offers a compelling and authentic guide into the heart of gratitude as a daily spiritual practice.
The Gratitude Experiment. See what happens when people being interviewed about gratitude are prompted to call someone out of the blue who’s influenced their lives.