GRATITUDE

I came into recovery and sobriety very ungrateful. I was mad at the world, God, and everyone around me. I didn't understand why I had to suffer and at that point in my life I had nothing I thought I could be grateful for. I had been evicted from my apartment, was homeless, and because of the ways I acted when drinking and using drugs, people did not like me anymore. I was alone and lost. When I got a sponsor and started giving sobriety a chance, one of my first assignments was to write a gratitude list every night. I was in a group chat with other young sober girls and we would all send our gratitude lists in the chat every night. My sponsor told me to make it a thorough gratitude list and not just one worded things I'm grateful for such as "family" or "friends."

This was my assignment:

Write three things you're grateful for and WHY.
Write two things you are looking forward to.
Write one thing you love about yourself.

Seeing the other girls' gratitude lists with more time and experience in recovery/sobriety than me inspired me to try and find things to be grateful for. It started off small, with things I was grateful for such as having food, a roof over my head, and resources for recovery support. Now I am 15 months sober and my gratitude lists look completely different. I have an abundance of love in my life and have gained things I never thought I would gain 15 months ago. My life is completely different and my personality is completely different.

Writing a gratitude list is a simple assignment that I have always used and still use to this day. When I am having a bad day, I always turn to gratitude and ground myself in the things that I have in my life and am grateful for. It helps remind me that when I change my perspective and get outside of those negative feelings, I can easily go back to the positive feelings. It just requires action on my part. Sometimes it is harder to be grateful and other times it is easy. I think ending your day with writing a gratitude list is a beautiful thing because then you can look back over your day and see all the good things that happened and all the good things you have in your life. It helps you wake up in the morning feeling positive and ready to tackle the hustle and bustle of the world.

Here is my gratitude list for today:

I am grateful to have a full time job. In active addiction, I couldn't hold down a job and would get out of work all the time in order to go party and do the things I wanted to do. This resulted in getting fired from multiple places and never having any money. Today, I have a full-time job that I show up to on time and I am able to save money since I am not prioritizing getting drugs/alcohol anymore.
I am grateful for my dog. He is so cute and whenever I am sad he is always there to comfort me and cuddle with me. I used to always look for false senses of comfort and void fills when I didn't feel good and today I know I can just simply go cuddle with my dog and feel better.
I am grateful for my sponsor. She has known me since 2022 and has never given up on me even when I kept relapsing for a period of time. She constantly showed me love throughout all of it and I never thought I would have people in my life that stuck by me and didn't give up on me but she proved to me that I am lovable and can do hard things.
Looking forward to going to a meeting tonight.
Looking forward to chairing the Thursday meeting I always chair tomorrow night.
I love my style of clothing.

I recommend that all of you try this simple assignment out and if you stay consistent with it, you will start to notice your perspective on life change. You will find more beauty in things and see more of the good in the world rather than more of the bad. I am grateful for my life today and wouldn't want to change any of it for the world.