One of the happiest moments I experienced lately was in Aleppo, on the evening of December 29th. My friend TK and I were traveling through Syria and had befriended some locals who were taking us out that night. We first went to a see-and-be-seen-type of a coffee shop, had Tea and Shisha, and got to meet more of their friends. We then went for a bar (yes, a proper bar) serving alcoholic drinks. After that we cruised through Aleppo, stopped for Shawarma and then later for Kunafeh. All along, we were chatting, joking, engaging in deep conversation or just being silly. And along each moment, each laughter, and each connection, I told myself “I am so happy and grateful for this right now.”
This post today isn’t about what I experienced, it’s about how I experienced it.
A few years ago I started a new exercise in my journal which was to jot down my gratitudes for each day. Even if it was just a single bullet point, I would write down what I was grateful for that day. It could be as simple as “I learned a new expression in Chinese” or “Mom called me out of the blue and said she missed me.” Whatever it was that I was grateful for, I would write it down. I did that for about 3 months, but after a few weeks I noticed something shifting in me. While the exercise of capturing my gratitudes was retrospective (I would sit down every morning and write down my gratitudes of the previous day), suddenly my ability to appreciate a moment for what it was, was becoming instantaneous. I would go through the day, and whenever something was happening to me that was positive, I would be able to single it out as a positive experience, and more importantly, experience it more deeply with more presence and appreciation. I wasn’t just going through the moment, but I was truly experiencing it with a whole lot of awareness.
I don’t know what happened back then, but I stopped that practice after 3 months, and with that, the muscle I had trained, weakened. Only recently I decided to restart this exercise and jot down the 2-5 things each day (sometimes more, sometimes less) that I am grateful for. And before I knew it, that muscle was coming back and I was starting to experience good moments with more awareness and appreciation.
And that’s exactly what was happening in Aleppo. The experience wasn’t just happening to me, but I was extremely aware of what was happening and what it all meant. I was able to tell myself “what I am experiencing right now is something I will always remember” or that “this is exactly why I came to this country, to make friends and build memories.” Being able to be more in the moment is an incredible gift and skill, and I can only encourage everyone reading this to consider giving the idea of a “gratitude journal” a shot. Do it for 30 days, and if you don’t see anything shifting in you, let it be. I am extremely confident though that you will experience that shift and become more aware of the good stuff happening in your life. The effort is minuscule, the benefit is tremendous.
