Simple gratitude. F O R
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FA M I L I E S
G U I D E D
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P R A C T I C E
T H A N K F U L N E S S
Welcome
to Simple Gratitude.
This booklet is designed to guide you through a month’s worth of simple, heartfelt gratitude. Pick a time each day to focus on gratitude. Perhaps even read the prompt for the day in the morning, and then reflect on it in the evening. Take time and space to breathe deeply, and let your heart open to focus on that day’s topic. Every other day the gratitude practice will focus on a different area to help to broaden what you give thanks for. USING SIMPLE GRATITUDE WITH YOUR FAMILY It’s never too early to start a practice of gratitude. Engage your child(ren) where they are. Older children may enjoy talking about the quote or Bible verse, but it’s not necessary to participate in the practice. Some days have an extra prompt for kids if the main gratitude question does not fit for them. If there is no extra prompt, ask your child(ren) the main question. You are encouraged to write notes or doodles of your thankfulness in the open spaces between each day. You could also write each day’s gratitude on a paper leaf or sticky note to display. May you find blessing in this practice and thankfulness in your days.
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Breathe in God’s grace. Breathe out your thanks. Saying and meaning “Thanks” leads to a crazy thought: What more can I give? We take the action first, by giving—and then the insight follows, that this fills us.
Give thanks.
What are you thankful for today?
– Anne Lamott
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Breathe in. Focus your gratitude on community. Give thanks.
The greatness of a community is most accurately measured by the compassionate actions of its members.
How can your thankfulness move you to action?
– Coretta Scott King
FOR KIDS: Give thanks for school.
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Breathe in God’s grace. Breathe out your thanks. Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised.
– Psalm 145:3a
Give thanks.
Give thanks to God for this day.
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Breathe in. Give thanks for creation. Give thanks.
The care of the earth is our most ancient and most worthy and, after all, our most pleasing responsibility. To cherish what remains of it, and to foster its renewal, is our only legitimate hope.
What in creation are you thankful for? How will you help care for the earth?
— Wendell Berry
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Breathe in God’s grace. Breathe out your thanks. Give thanks.
Gratitude is the inward feeling of kindness received. Thankfulness is the natural impulse to express that feeling. Thanksgiving is the following of that impulse.
How will you show your thankfulness today?
– Henry Van Dyke
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Breathe in. Center your heart on friendship. Give thanks.
Which friends are you thankful for? How can you show you care?
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A friend is someone who helps you up when you’re down, and if they can’t, they lay down beside you.
– A.A. Milne
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Breathe in God’s grace. Breathe out your thanks. Yes, everything is for your sake, so that grace, as it extends to more and more people, may increase thanksgiving, to the glory of God.
Give thanks.
What are you thankful for today?
– 2 Corinthians 4:15
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Breathe in. Focus your gratitude on your well being. Give thanks.
What about your well being can you give thanks for?
FOR KIDS: Give thanks for growing.
Anything that’s human is mentionable, and anything that is mentionable can be more manageable. When we can talk about our feelings, they become less overwhelming, less upsetting, and less scary.
– Fred Rogers
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Breathe in God’s grace. Breathe out your thanks. Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend.
– Melody Beattie
Give thanks.
What has gratitude transformed for you? FOR KIDS: Is it easy to find something to be grateful for each day?
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Breathe in. Give thanks for family. Having somewhere to go is home. Having someone to love is family. Having both is a blessing.
Give thanks.
What aspect of family are you most thankful for?
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Breathe in God’s grace. Breathe out your thanks. Give thanks.
Let us come into God’s presence with thanksgiving; let us make a joyful noise to the Lord with songs of praise!
How will you make a joyful noise to the Lord today?
– Psalm 95:2
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Breathe in. Center your heart on music. Give thanks.
What music changes you or inspires you to change the world? FOR KIDS: Give thanks for music.
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Music can change the world because it can change people.
– Bono
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Breathe in God’s grace. Breathe out your thanks. The movement of grace toward gratitude brings us from the package of self-obsessed madness to a spiritual awakening. Gratitude is peace.
– Anne Lamott
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Give thanks.
What peace have you found in gratitude? FOR KIDS: Give thanks for things that bring comfort.
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Breathe in. Focus your gratitude on your personal progress. Give thanks.
How does gratitude for your progress inspire compassion?
FOR KIDS: Give thanks for learning.
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The greatest moments in life are not concerned with selfish achievements but rather with the things we do for the people we love and esteem.
– Walt Disney
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Breathe in God’s grace. Breathe out your thanks. Enter the Lord’s gates with thanksgiving and courts with praise. Give thanks to the Lord, bless God’s name.
Give thanks.
What are you thankful for today?
- Psalm 100:4
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Breathe in. Give thanks for the church. Give thanks.
Who can you share your gratitude for the church with?
The Church exists to connect people at the level of their hunger for a new world.
– Rowan Williams
FOR KIDS: Give thanks for church.
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Breathe in God’s grace. Breathe out your thanks. I don’t have to chase extraordinary moments to find happiness - it’s right in front of me if I’m paying attention and practicing gratitude.
– Brene Brown
Give thanks.
What moments of happiness are present in your daily life? FOR KIDS: Give thanks for having fun.
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Breathe in. Center your heart on wonder. Give thanks.
What in your life fills you with awe and wonder? FOR KIDS: Give thanks for creativity.
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I would maintain that thanks are the highest form of thought; and that gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder.
– G.K. Chesterton
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Breathe in God’s grace. Breathe out your thanks. Give thanks.
For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected, provided it is received with thanksgiving; for it is sanctified by God’s word and by prayer.
What are you thankful for today?
– 1 Timothy 4:4-5
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Breathe in. Give thanks for challenges you’ve overcome. Give thanks.
How have you grown by overcoming challenges?
FOR KIDS: Give thanks for hard things.
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People grow through experience if they meet life honestly and courageously. This is how character is built.
– Eleanor Roosevelt
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Breathe in God’s grace. Breathe out your thanks. ‘Thanks’ is a huge mind-shift, from thinking that God wants our happy chatter and a public demonstration and is deeply interested in our opinions of the people we hate, to feeling quiet gratitude, humbly and amazingly, without shame at having been so blessed.
Give thanks.
What quiet gratitude can you offer God? FOR KIDS: Give thanks for toys.
– Anne Lamott 9
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Breathe in. Focus your gratitude on God. Give thanks.
How can your gratitude for God be shared in the world?
The whole earth is a living icon of the face of God.
– St. John of Damascus
FOR KIDS: Give thanks for God.
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Breathe in God’s grace. Breathe out your thanks. Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.
– 1 Thessalonians 5:18
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Give thanks.
What are you thankful for today?
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Breathe in. Center your heart on this day. Give thanks.
What can you offer thanks for in the gift of this day? FOR KIDS: Give thanks for today.
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In ordinary life, we hardly realize that we receive a great deal more than we give, and that it is only with gratitude that life becomes rich.
– Dietrich Bonhoffer
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Breathe in God’s grace. Breathe out your thanks. Gratitude begins in our hearts and then dovetails into behavior. It How are you inspired almost always makes you willing to to give because of be of service, which is where the joy your gratitude? resides. It means that you are willing FOR KIDS: Give to stop being such a jerk. When you thanks for sharing. are aware of all that has been given to you, in your lifetime and the past few days, it is hard not to be humbled, and pleased to give back.
Give thanks.
– Anne Lamott
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Breathe in. Focus your gratitude on the little things. Enjoy the little things, for one day you may look back and realize they were the big things.
– Robert Brault
Give thanks.
How do the little things compound in your life for the good? FOR KIDS: Give thanks for small things.
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Breathe in God’s grace. Breathe out your thanks. Give thanks.
What does wholehearted thanksgiving look like?
FOR KIDS: Give thanks for animals.
I will give thanks to the Lord with my whole heart; I will tell of all your wonderful deeds.
– Psalm 9:1
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Breathe in. Center your heart on a mentor. When we honestly ask ourselves which person in our lives means the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a warm and tender hand.
Give thanks.
How can you share the gifts they’ve given you?
FOR KIDS: Give thanks for a teacher.
– Henri Nouwen
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Breathe in God’s grace. Breathe out your thanks. As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them.
– John F. Kennedy
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Give thanks.
How do you live out your words of gratitude?
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Breathe in God’s grace. Breathe out your thanks. Give thanks.
How will you incorporate a practice of gratitude into your daily life?
It is often the simple daily practices that influence our lives in dramatic ways.
– Alaric Hutchinson