With the month of November arriving, I couldn’t help but think about the gratitude practices we do around Thanksgiving. The holiday season is a great time to be thankful for the blessings and people in our life. But as someone who writes a lot about love, it also made me wonder…how much does being thankful help our love life?
And I was quite surprised at what I discovered.
Why is gratitude important?
the quality of being thankful; readiness to show appreciation for and to return kindness.
Gratitude, Definitions from Oxford Languages
It’s no secret gratitude, or being thankful and appreciative of things, is beneficial for our lives. People who express more gratitude tend to be happier, have more positive emotions, better physical and mental health, and yes better relationships.
Our relationships are so much better when we take the time to be grateful. In fact, research shows that grateful couples are more satisfied in their relationships, feel closer, and PREDICT which couples would stay in their relationships vs breaking up in nine months.
On top of that, the more grateful the couple was, the more likely they were to still be together.
Gratitude seems to be an important ingredient in a healthy relationship.
Why is that? Why does gratitude help so much?
Gratitude helps you feel more compassion and empathy for your partner
Gratitude develops an appreciation for your partner. You’re thankful not that they did the dishes, you’re thankful that you are with someone thoughtful enough to do the dishes they know you hate doing them.
Gratitude helps you think about and appreciate your partner’s best traits, which helps you understand them more. Understanding breeds compassion and compassion breeds compassionate empathy.
Compassion also helps widen our perspective, allowing us to see our partner. Compassion also allows us to better understand them in times of conflict or difficulty. We are grateful for the good parts too, not just focused always on the negative.
Gratitude builds a greater connection between two people
Research shows couples who take time to express gratitude feel more positive towards each other and more comfortable expressing concerns about their relationship. Imagine if you knew all the ways your partner appreciated you, you will feel more loved and safe to address challenges and concerns.
Additionally, expressing gratitude is linked to the release of the “love hormone” known as oxytocin, which is actually beneficial for both the giver and the receiver of the gratitude. Both the receiver and the giver feel more loving and caring towards their partner after expressing gratitude. Talk about a win-win!
Gratitude increases feelings of self-worth
When you are more grateful for what is in your life, you have greater feelings of well-being and self-esteem. This pours into your relationships as you feel happier and worthy of your life that you are grateful for.
Grateful people tend to have higher self-esteem and this may be because they intentionally notice the things they are grateful for and notice the ways people are good to them. This helps them develop a stronger sense of their own value.
Building up your self-worth is important for relationships because people with low self-worth tend to have more difficulty in their relationships.
Gratitude helps you have a more positive, supportive attitude toward others
Gratitude makes you more grateful towards people which increases your chances of wanting to support and help them. Gratitude makes you happier because you notice good things, but it also makes people happier who receive it.
Gratitude increases your chances of wanting to support your partner.
Psychologist Dr. Gordon describes a gratitude loop where:
When you feel more grateful…you want to keep the relationship…and when you want to keep you relationship…you work to keep your relationship…and when you work to keep your relationship…your partner feels more appreciated and grateful.
Gratitude makes us more generous and forgiving
If you are more likely to express gratitude to a partner, you are more likely to see them in a positive light, which is great for the health and longevity of a relationship. If you are able to see the good in the partner too, you will be less likely to hold grudges, resentment, or contempt which are all things that negatively affect relationships. You remember and are thankful for the good in your partner too.
Forgiveness is like the flip side of gratitude. You respond positively to a transgression by letting go and no longer holding resentment (how to actually forgive here!). Gratitude helps you see your partner in a more positive light and allows for greater room for your ability to forgive. Forgive doesn’t mean forget, but it’s just easier for you to understand your partner and see the good in them to help you release resentment.
Image by iStockPhoto.com
How can we be more grateful then?
With all those benefits in your love life that come from gratitude, how can we be more grateful and practice gratitude?
- Create intentional gratitude. Get real and personal with your gratitude. Go beyond the “thank you for doing the dishes” to “thanks so much for finding the time to do the dishes during your busy day. I appreciate you helping me as I’m having a crazy week.” Let your partner know you value how they meet your needs. This kind of praise is more effective.
- Try to set a daily gratitude routine. The consistent repetition of gratitude will rewire your brain to look for gratitude more in the future. Having just three things you are grateful for that you recite or write down every day can be a great first start to getting used to practicing gratitude.
- Share compliments out loud. You ever think of how much you appreciate what your partner did or who they are? But then you don’t say it? Say it! Practicing sharing more compliments out loud. Your partner will feel more appreciated and this can help create a relationship pattern of more compliments given to each other.
You got this!
Gratitude is so important for a healthy relationship and love life. In fact, gratitude helps relationships with coworkers, friends, family, etc. Practicing gratitude can increase your well-being and lead to higher overall relationship satisfaction.
So what are you grateful for today?
Let me know in the comments! Feel free to share or follow me on Medium or Twitter for more posts about love, relationships, and self-empowerment.
❤,
N
Want to buy me a coffee? https://ko-fi.com/purposeistolove (I’d be very, very thankful! ❤)
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This post was previously published on medium.com.
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You may also like these posts on The Good Men Project:
White Fragility: Talking to White People About Racism | Escape the “Act Like a Man” Box | The Lack of Gentle Platonic Touch in Men’s Lives is a Killer | What We Talk About When We Talk About Men |
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Photo credit: iStockPhoto.com