I would like to offer the following tried-and-true ways to foster receptivity to and cooperation with the grace of gratefulness, both personally and culturally.
1. Keep a gratitude journal or write a gratitude letter to someone who has done you a favor. Record in it the reasons you had to be thankful today.
2. Train yourself to see in every obstacle an opportunity to shift from a negative to a positive outlook.
3. Relish moments of achievement as well as the mistakes you've made, since from them you learned so much.
4. Practice appreciative living on the best and the worst of days, and be thankful for the least sign of progress you've made.
5. Appraise the grain of truth in every criticism.
6. Clear the clutter caused by fear and frustration, and opt instead for freedom sustained by the guidance of God.
7. Rather than asking why something happened that crushed your expectations and halted your push to attain self-imposed outcomes, beseech God to show you the meaning of what just occurred.
8. Trust that the ray of goodness hidden behind every cloud of discouragement will sooner or later reveal itself.
9. As the shadows of depreciation start to be dispelled, welcome the chances God gives you to turn from being a sour-puss to becoming an epiphanic presence.
10. When the warning signals of depreciative thinking flash with neon intensity, pay attention to them – never deny the dissonance you feel, but search for its source in pursuit of the deeper consonance with Christ you desire.
11. Change your perception of time from chronos (clock-bound) to kairos (the inbreaking of the Eternal), and grow in trusting surrender to God, whose words of truth have the power to touch and transform your life.
12. Take time, despite the functionalistic pressures that may impinge upon you, to unearth the goodness, truth, and beauty embedded in the fabric of daily life.
— Susan Muto in Gratefulness