Have you ever seen the film ‘Pollyanna’ or read the book? If you haven’t, it’s the story of an orphan who has to go and live with her maiden aunt in a dreary small town in America, and how she transforms the townspeople with her boundless optimism.
It might surprise you to know that as a child I loved ‘Pollyanna’. Even the cynicism of my siblings couldn’t ruin it for me. I loved Pollyanna’s hair ribbon, her effervescence, her eternal joy and I LOVED the ‘glad game’ she played.
What I’ve only just realised, as I start to think more deeply about gratitude and gratitude practices, is that I have been playing the glad game all my life. I just hadn’t connected the glad game with the concept of gratitude or even realised how powerful and seminal it had been to me until now. I’ve unconsciously been playing the game since childhood.
This doesn’t mean that I’m always glad or always grateful. I’m not. I’m frequently miserable, negative and unreasonable just like the rest of you. AND just like the rest of you, I do my best to present myself in my best possible light. And I consider that a blessing for us all.
The glad game is all about finding the good in un-ideal situations. For example, imagine you have broken down on the side of a road on a very hot day. Not at all ideal.
But if you were playing the glad game, you would be glad that you had something to drink. You would be glad that you are a member of the AA or RAC. You would be glad that your phone was fully charged and that you didn’t need the toilet. You might be glad that you didn’t have your small child with you or that you had a good book to read as you waited. The possibilities for finding gladness/gratitude are endless.
Yet finding appreciation or thankfulness is really only one half of the gratitude coin. According to Robert Emmes, a professor of gratitude at Berkeley University California there are two components of gratitude:
The first component is ‘an affirmation of goodness’: that is, we ‘affirm that there are good things in the world, gifts and benefits we’ve received’. This is the part of gratitude that the glad game incorporates. This is the ‘appreciation and thankfulness’ part.
The second component is about acknowledging where that goodness comes from: that ‘other people – or even higher powers, if you’re of a spiritual mindset – gave us many gifts, big and small, to help us achieve the goodness in our lives’.
So, I challenge you to spend a week playing the glad game. Every time you find yourself in a situation that is less than ideal, find something to be grateful for.
I’ll start the ball rolling…
Most of you will know that I’m just back from a trip to the USA and Canada. The journey back was awful. It took more than 30 hours to get back home from Canada to Bury St Edmunds. It took three flights, four trains, and two car journeys. The journey was full of hassles and glitches and holdups and hiccups. Airline security was slow and long. My bags were pulled for inspection twice. We walked miles in airports and railway stations and I’d taken a rucksack instead of a case with wheels and my back told me that was a bad mistake. We almost missed out first flight. We almost missed our second flight. There was no overhead locker space for our luggage. We had to change airports in New York and that took four trains. And did I mention the journey took 30 hours?
So where is the ‘glad game’ in all of this? Well:
- I am glad that we had a great holiday.
- I am glad that I ate pizza in New York.
- I am glad we all got home OK and have great stories to tell about the journey.
- I am glad my friend Emma is so happy living in Canada.
- I am glad that our connecting flight from Montreal to New York was delayed by an hour. If it hadn’t been, we would have missed our connection.
- I am glad that although we had to take four trains to get between airports New York, it was the one time that we arrived in plenty of time to get through security.
- I am glad that I can be glad.
You might be so sick to death of hearing words like ‘gratitude’ and ‘positive thinking’ being kicked around. I know I am. But beyond the shallow ‘woo woo’ noise is something powerful and real that has the power to transform all of our lives for the better.
I am pretty poor when it comes to understanding science. But the science behind gratitude seems easy enough that not only do I understand it, I can explain it too. So look out this month for more from me about
- why gratitude is important
- the science of gratitude
- how being grateful creates greater happiness
- how to cultivate and practice gratitude; and
- the benefits that being grateful will give you.
I hope that this is a month that you find many things to feel grateful for. If you want to hear the story of how I lost all my money traveling in Vietnam and came home to find my two best friends hospitalised read my blog ‘How I lost my money but found gratitude’.
Yoga Pathways 
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