The inspiration for this challenge came from an episode on the Modern Wisdom podcast. I believe the guest being featured was Derek Sivers. However, even if I am misremembering the contribution, I do know that listening to this conversation resonated with a lot of the thoughts and challenges I have been experiencing over the last few years. Focusing on believing and doing things because they are useful instead of because they are “true” has become very central to the way I wish to operate.

I have kept a gratitude journal on and off for a few years now. The benefits of gratitude have been widely studied and reported. However, I personally have experienced that without engaging in underlying personal validation, expressing gratitude can feel a bit inorganic and performative.

This month is all about establishing and maintaining a more positive and healthy emotional baseline. I believe doing so will make gratitude more spontaneous and less transactional.

Here are the particulars of the challenge:

• Write 3 “good job” entries to myself each day using the Gratitude app journal –
  These could be done all at once at the end of the day, or singly as I recognize wise action in myself throughout the day. I can get more creative with the entries as I progress, but I want to start out simple. E.g. “Good job taking a few minutes to sit with the unpleasant agitation you felt after 8th period instead of giving in to avoidance.”
• If possible, focus on times during the day where I consciously used middle way –
  
  In addition to supplying daily doses of personal validation, my other goal is to create a ritual that affirms my empowering spiritual beliefs, primarily consciousness conservation and karma. As I believe good karma is acquired by living in middle way, I want this to be the main emphasis. This could be on a more macro systems-level or micro situational-level.
• Share one of these entries with someone else at least once per week – As valuable as INTRA-personal validation is, I want to also cultivate opportunities for INTER-personal validation as well. I have several obvious venues I can think of for this: Unitarian fellowship, Secular Buddhism zoom call, affirmative prayer sessions, or weekly blogs. However, I want to think about sharing in other contexts as well when appropriate.

I am incredibly excited and optimistic about this challenge. I am hopeful about this expanding to include expressions of validation about other people and related events around me as well. Maybe this will become an actionable way to appreciate the Universal Self.

Namaste.