How Finding Gratitude Will Help You Embrace Life

Finding bliss in everyday life

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First of all, if you're new here, my name is Sophie. I’m on a journey to slow down, reconnect with nature, and live more intentionally. I have moved off the grid and now I’m sharing lessons on rewilding, simplicity, and finding balance in a busy world without any of the fluff.

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Photo by Marija Zaric on Unsplash

“This is a wonderful day. I have never seen this one before.”

Maya Angelou

Picture this: you wake up in the morning, hop out of bed and go outside.

You hear the birds singing their morning tunes in the distance and see the sun rise over the high trees. You feel an overwhelming bliss and gratitude that this life is truly yours. There’s no place you would rather be. People talk about travelling and going places, and all you can think of is, “I just want to be home, enjoy where I am, take it all in.”

That’s been me in the past two years, except for maybe the ‘hopping’ out of bed. I don’t want to be anywhere else, I don’t want anything else — I’m grateful for what I’ve got.

Don’t get me wrong though! I’m not always a positive ray of sunshine, I’m not a ball of optimism. My last post was all about me complaining about the endless rain (it’s still raining by the way). There are days when no amount of cute native birds and rays of sunshine can make me feel alive. There are days when I curse the poor decision-making that led me to think dividing our tiny house into two separate buildings was a good idea.

But this is a story of gratitude, not of minor annoyances.

Living in line with the elements

There’s something about living off the grid that makes you become more attuned to the natural elements. Depending on nature for your basic needs can have that effect I guess.

We’ve depended on the sun’s power for energy and other days we’ve waited for rain to collect our water. Off-grid living truly necessitates a connection with the natural world. You learn to make the most of what nature provides. Everything around you becomes a potential resource; for example, dead trees become valuable firewood.

This lifestyle forces you to become creative and resourceful, not taking anything around you for granted. You learn to appreciate the rain, which provides drinking water and the ability to shower and do your dishes without worrying. You learn to appreciate the endless days of sunshine, too, because they provide energy and that gives us the ability to do our laundry.

Living this way feels less forceful

We’ve adapted to our surroundings. I can’t do the laundry when the sun isn’t shining because there isn’t enough electricity. This means I also don’t have to feel guilty about not doing it.

There’s a natural flow to living life this way. And it’s embracing that natural flow that has been such a game-changer these past couple of years. It’s allowed me to slow down and really appreciate my environment, nature and all the little things.

Gratitude

What stands out is that living in alignment with natural elements cultivates a deep sense of gratitude and awe for the world around us.

Each sunrise and sunset, each gust of wind or patter of rain, serves as a reminder of the interconnectedness of everything. It brings me back to the absolute core of being, and it reduces the noise around me. We are paying so much attention to things that don’t really matter and often fail to pay attention to things that matter most.

We spend hours scrolling through other people’s travel pictures on social media, but don’t see the beauty of the things around us.

This life is too short to be worrying about the little things.

Here’s the lesson I have learned from being ridiculously dependent on nature: stop worrying about things you can’t control, look around you, appreciate life for what it is, and appreciate the beauty that is all around you.

Stop forcing things to happen and instead align with the natural flow of things.

You might think you have nothing to be grateful for. Life may be pretty tough for you right now. I’ve been there. Some days, there hasn’t been much to be thankful for. Some days, my proudest moment was getting out of bed or the fact I actually made it to work.

Those days are ok too, they are part of life.

I started this article with a quote from Maya Angelou. Her life is remarkable. Although she faced childhood trauma, poverty, and discrimination, she always managed to focus on the positive side of things and encouraged others to practice gratitude.

Practising gratitude can change your brain

Adopting a gratitude practice can profoundly impact your psychological and physical well-being.

Studies have shown that people who practise gratitude tend to report higher levels of life satisfaction, happiness, and positive affect. They are more likely to experience emotions such as joy, optimism, and contentment, which contribute to overall psychological well-being.

Gratitude also significantly strengthens interpersonal relationships and social bonds. Grateful individuals are more likely to express appreciation and gratitude toward others, leading to increased feelings of connectedness, trust, and social support.

Lastly, there is evidence to suggest that gratitude indirectly influences physical well-being through its effects on psychological and social factors. For example, gratitude is associated with lower stress levels, improved coping strategies, and healthier lifestyle behaviours, all of which contribute to better physical health outcomes.

I hear you thinking: “That’s great, but do I now need to move off the grid to get those positive effects?”

Of course not!

Here are a few ways you can practise gratitude

• A simple gratitude practice can deepen your appreciation of what’s around you. Start or finish each day by naming at least one thing you are grateful for. My husband and I often finish the day this way and ask each other about one thing that we were thankful for during the day. It started as a joke when we were at a pretty low point in life, but in fact, it helped us focus on the positive.

• Gratitude journaling is perhaps the most well-known method of practising gratitude. It can come in all shapes and forms, but the essence is to adopt a regular habit of listing things you are grateful for in a journal. Don’t make the mistake I made and go out and buy several pretty journals in the hope that this will somehow automatically instil a habit. Just open up a Word doc, a Google Keep note, a Notion page or grab a good old-fashioned piece of paper, and you are good to go.

• Grateful contemplation is similar to journaling but doesn’t require writing things down. You can do this anywhere, just sit down, close your eyes and think about things you’re grateful for and just allow yourself to feel that gratitude. There’s something about visualising that gives this type of practice a little boost.

• Shifting attention. This technique works well when you’re feeling particularly down. It’s similar to the Stoic practice of focusing only on what you can control. You shift your attention away from the negative and instead direct all your energy towards the positive aspects of your life.

• Expressing gratitude directly, i.e., going to someone and telling them why you’re grateful for them or something they did, is probably the most tricky but also most rewarding option. It’s more tricky because it means getting over potential anxiety and giving others feedback, but it’s so rewarding to tell someone why you genuinely appreciate them.

Whether you’re off-grid or living in a big city, the lessons learned from living in alignment with the elements are invaluable. Embracing gratitude has made a big difference for me, and I hope it can do the same for you.

Something that inspired me this week:

I just finished Michelle Rahurahu’s debut novel Poorhara. I’m still digesting this one, what a beautiful book that truly leaves a mark and leaves you thinking. I copied this bit from a review on ketebooks: “Poorhara, the debut novel by Michelle Rahurahu (Ngāti Rahurahu, Ngāti Tahu – Ngāti Whaoa), is a powerful and haunting exploration of family, cultural identity, and the scars left by intergenerational trauma. It speaks to those who consider themselves ‘cockroaches’ of Aotearoa—those who have grown up in poverty, in environments of neglect, fighting for survival and resilience. This poignant novel reflects the experiences of the true poorhara of the world. The novel follows cousins Erin and Star as they road-trip across the North Island in a 1994 Daihatsu Mira, seeking to reconnect with their whenua, which ‘was a fabricated memory’ to Erin. As they travel, Rahurahu invites readers to explore not just the physical landscapes of Aotearoa but also the emotional and cultural terrains of the characters. The backdrop of small, unnamed rural towns emphasises the universality of Erin and Star’s experiences, places that are familiar yet starkly neglected.”

Truly enjoyed reading this. It’s one of those books where you hope they turn it into a movie one day!

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