I believe that the more grateful we are for the good things that come our way, the more that we attract good things in our lives. In truth, I don’t just believe this to be true. I KNOW this to be true because this has been my experience for many years now.

I used to write my blessings in a notebook. I tried to write every day but I’m a busy woman. So, there are days when I’m not able to do this. I would try to get back into the habit as soon as I can. But, it usually fizzles out before the last quarter of the year. And yet, at the end of each year, I still get to write a LONG list of blessings before New Year’s Eve. Imagine if I had been consistent all year round. I love this new twist to our old practice because I know very well that we tend to forget our blessings, both big and small, especially the small ones, when we don’t write them down immediately.

Last year, I saw a post by Jen, one of my friends on Facebook. She shared about writing your blessings on post-it notes. I liked the idea right away. I thought that it would be nice to make this an activity for the entire family, including our small kids who already know how to write. So, I assigned colored post-it notes to each family member and told them that we would write our blessings on these papers. My color is pink.

My eldest son chose the bottle for our activity/project. He chose a big Gatorade bottle instead of a glass jar as recommended. He said that we need a big bottle because we have a lot of blessings. I agreed with him and his choice. Another plus for this choice of bottle is that it’s made of plastic. Since my kids are still young and tend to bump many things as they play inside the house, this is a safe choice for our family.

I integrated this activity in our homeschool lessons. It served as the two older boys’ writing and spelling practice. It helps them develop their memory also since they need to remember the things that happened during the day or the past day. My boys do not like doing activities without an end in mind. They don’t like doing drills for the sake of practice. They need to know that what they are doing has an end result that is important to them. With this project, the end in mind for all of us is to see how our bottles fill up with different colored post-it notes.

It has become one of my bonding activities with my kids. They don’t get to write every day yet. But I do my best to motivate them to write at least every Sunday or as soon as something good happens to them.

Since my kids and I are visual people, we were encouraged and delighted to see our bottle of Gatorade fill up fast. The first month is not yet over. Yet, our big bottle is almost full! And to think that I write several blessings per post-it note instead of one blessing per sheet because I wanted to save on paper.

I’m glad that we made this new twist with our old practice of writing our blessings in a notebook. I have become more consistent in writing my blessings. There are still days when I miss to write my blessings. But it’s usually a day only. Thus, it’s still not that hard to recall the good things that happened to me the day before. Plus, I am able to get back into the habit faster.

I put our gratitude bottle on top of my home office table so I see it every day, every morning. I am reminded of how blessed I am daily and many times a day. I am also motivated to write my blessings as they happen.

I still write the date when the blessings happen, just like in my notebooks before. This way, when I open the paper again comes next New Year’s Eve, I would know when that happened.

It’s Sunday today as I write this blog post. I have yet to write my blessings for today and there are still two more days before the first month of 2017 is over. Yet, my heart is overflowing with joy and gratitude because I am reminded that I have so much to be thankful for as early as now.

Let me share some of my major blessings for this month.

1. I got THREE (3) new venue sponsors for my upcoming talks and workshops this year. We’ve actually started promoting them already on Facebook. You may read more about these here and here.
2. We have already booked our hotel for my birthday celebration this year.
3. I found a new client and we are about to close our transaction regarding a strategic planning and team building workshop that they want me to conduct for their company.
4. I was able to design my own planner/planning pages.
5. I have a very effective and reliable virtual assistant (VA) who helps me accomplish more for my business.
6. I was able to update this blog of mine. This is my 7th post so far for the month. My goal is to write at least 2 each month.
7. I was able to attend a Bible study again (after around 7 years) with my mentor in Scared Scriptures, Fr. Jun Lingad, SDB, a Bible scholar.

 

One of the devotionals that I use has these words today:

Like a flood, His favor can overtake you… Dare to BELIEVE.

(Remember this is my One Word this year.)

God wants to give you something to talk about.

And all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you

if you heed the voice of the Lord your God. – Deuteronomy 28:2 AMP

I am indeed overtaken by blessings as early as this first month of the year! I’m excited to be inundated even more as the coming days and months unfold. By the way, the title of the reflection today in the devotional that I use is Overtaken.

How about you? Do you have new habits or new traditions for 2017? Or like us, dis you make a new twist on your old habits or traditions? I would love to hear from you in the comments.

Cheers to more reasons to be thankful this 2017!