I think humility and gratitude are directly connected to each other. As one rises, so does the other.

When I gained humility, I was able to recognize many things in my life to be gifts, so my gratitude increased.

I had started gaining humility when I went through a couple twelve-step programs. It was then I began to understand the value of humility.

The view of life is vastly more enjoyable when looked at with humility and gratitude in heart and mind.

I mean, in my opinion.

I know having a positive mindset is critically important. Not just me, because I hail as an alumnus of a suicidal-ideation detox facility or anything. I mean, this is for everyone.

The number one key to any survival situation or manual is to have a positive mental attitude.

I know at one point I had a very negative mindset, and I realized a lot of it was out of habit.

I had a “victim mindset” governing my thoughts and perspectives.

I built that growing up in a dysfunctional childhood combined with an adult life filled with PTS and trauma as a veteran and first responder.

I understood I had a certain way of thinking and viewing life through a certain set of rules I created to manage my thinking processes.

The Rules of Life, and whether things are good or bad, as written by myself.

Life According to Larry.

How life is appearing to me right now is being presented to me through the filter of those rules that I constructed.

With humility, I learn to offer grace where I previously would gather resentments to carry.

I gained a lot of humility by being of service to help process or eliminate suffering in the lives of others.

I am not suggesting one ignore one’s problems. What I am saying is that once I saw some of what others are struggling with, my own problems sometimes shrink in comparison.

I started being more grateful for everything in life, even for my own problems.

When I was able to help eliminate some sort of suffering in the lives of others, I experienced gratitude for being able to be of service.

As I said, I hail from a suicidal-ideation detox facility. I know it’s a miracle that they took me into their program.

That gratitude generates humility, see?

The two are connected.

I know how real suicide got for me. They got me in the nick of time.

I also know it is only with humility and gratitude that I was able to rewrite Life According to Larry so that it has a positive view.

Helping others stay away from the cliff keeps me away from it.

I’ve seen the view from the cliff edge and knew there was going to be nothing but regret on the way down.

I had to learn that humility was different from self-hatred.

Self-hatred was easy for me. Like I said, my recovery started at a suicidal-ideation detox facility. It wasn’t an accident that I was there. I had a lifetime of self-hatred under my belt.

What helped with that was, again, twelve-step programs.

I had to learn to love and forgive myself, which was difficult in the beginning, but necessary.

I was told it was impossible to love others unless one first loves themself. I didn’t know if that was true or not, but I did know the feelings of love were new to me.

Humility was the idea that I would place the needs of others ahead of my own, without neglecting my own.

Humility, as I studied myself, involved examining myself for significance and letting go.

As my humility increased, so did my level of gratitude.

As both increased, so did my enjoyment of my overall life experience.

Practicing Gratitude

Realizing the value humility and gratitude added to my life experience, I worked to gain both in my mindset.

To increase gratitude in my thinking processes, I made a commitment to write someone a “thank you” note every day for 90 days.

This definitely had a bigger impact than merely writing in a journal for a couple reasons.

First, I gave my word to another person that I would complete such a task.

I’ve heard the only true thing of value one has is the credibility and value of their word, so gave my word.

Now I just needed to honor my word for the 90 days.

I would write a note, figure out the person’s address (or, as a last resort, email address) and mail them the thank-you note.

The first few notes were easy, as I could easily identify a few individuals that I owed notes to.

I kept a list of who I mailed notes to so that I wouldn’t lose track and double up on someone. I wanted 90 notes to 90 unique people.

So the first few were easy.

Then, after a while, I noticed I had to do an inventory of my memory in order to keep my word of one note per day.

After a while, even that was difficult.

And so I noticed that throughout the day I was keeping my eye out for someone who did an act of kindness so that I could keep my word and write the note.

I had effectively trained my mind to look for and focus on gratitude.

The feedback I got from some of the notes was also astounding.

Some said that the words I wrote in the notes were the nicest thing anyone had ever said to them, and that the note came to them at a critical time of immense suffering in their lives.

They stated my note energized them to get through whatever they needed to get through.

So not only did my thank-you notes help me in training my mind to be more grateful, the exercise also helped others.

The blessing was two-fold.

I still like to journal one thing I am grateful for each morning before I start my day.

One day, I realized the thing I was grateful for was the potable water coming from my faucet.

Allegedly potable. I still use a filter.

But I could turn a faucet, make the water any temperature I wanted, and stand in it for as long as I wanted.

I realized that, from a worldwide perspective, I am quite prosperous and fortunate.

Not everyone has access to this luxury.

More Will Be Given

I imagine that’s what the Bible was talking about when it said, “To he who has, more will be given. To he who has not, even what he has will be taken away.”

It’s talking about that grateful mindset!

When I have a humble and grateful mind, everything appears as a gift.

I’ve seen the opposite also.

I’ve noticed many people with a constant string of problems in life often seemingly lack any sort of humility or gratitude.

Not being judgy.

Me too!

When I don’t work to keep a positive mindset by means of a spiritual practice, my life fills up with negativity and problems.

That’s why I’ve made a practice of gratitude as part of a daily morning routine.

I have a better day when I do.

I know now that a lot of how I experience life depends on the rules through which I am viewing it.

Life According to Larry.

Some of those rules were written a long time ago. Some came from pain. Some came from resentment. Some were simply habits of thought that I repeated for so long that eventually I stopped realizing they were rules I had written at all.

They just looked like reality.

Humility gave me the ability to question some of those rules.

Gratitude helped me rewrite them.

Service helped me see beyond myself.

And strangely enough, the more I have tried to help eliminate suffering in the lives of others, the more grateful I have become for my own life.

Helping others stay away from the cliff keeps me away from it.

I’ve been close enough to that edge.

I know what the view looks like.

Today, I would rather look for the gifts.

Humility has enormous spiritual value.

Who’d of thunk?

Thank you for reading.