.

About this time a year ago, I took four random photos. The first photo was of my husband, me, and our plane — I wanted to commemorate a moment that signified who we are and something we enjoy doing together. The next day I took a photo of a chef who was willing to cook me a gluten-free breakfast to remind me how one act of kindness can inspire compassion and happiness in others. After that, I came across a crooked street that reminded me of my best friend in San Francisco, so I took a photo to commemorate friendships that make life joyful. And on the fourth day, I took a photo of my favourite cafe — as they bide by fair trade standards, I feel this act of nobleness represents the "kind" in humankind.

By Day 5 I was hooked on taking photos of small moments that mean a lot. The idea came to me: "what if I do this every single day for a year? I wonder if it can give me an insight to the Big Question about the meaning of life?" I mean, we have a thousand things a day that entertain us, inspire us, humble us and teach us, but there should be at least one stand-out thing to be grateful for every day. Right? There was only one way to find out — attach a camera to my hip and hunt down things that make me go mmmmmmm. And so, from that day, I began writing a gratitude journal accompanied with simple photos, with the intention of making an entry every day for a year.

The conscious act of taking a photo meant I had to be actively looking for and recognising things to be grateful for — ergo, the attitude of gratitude became a conscious act. Over the 366 days of my personal project (including a leap day), counting my blessings became an intentional state of mind as I searched for "daily blissings" throughout each day.

I estimate it took me three months before I stopped searching for my daily blissings, and instead they began throwing themselves into my path.

"Look at me! I'm a blissing!" each moment shouted at me. Even the act of washing dishes could reveal a sacred moment of joy — all I had to do was be aware and ready to receive the glimpse of happiness hiding beneath the mirage of monotony.

By the end of my year-long project (last Saturday), I can honestly say I had trouble choosing only one photo or one moment to blog about. I literally had dozens and dozens of "little big moments" to be grateful for every day.

In times of impossible petrol prices and escalating mortgage rates, I believe this daily act of being consciously grateful has saved me from falling into a perpetual state of gloom. It has helped me trust even further that the Universe is benevolent and, in the words of my favourite astrologer and philosopher Rob Brezsny, conspiring to shower me in blessings.

If you are interested in looking at my daily gratitude journal, you can start at the beginning here. If this experience inspires you in any way to begin your own gratitude journal, here are some resources to get you started:

* Journals For Empowerment are beautiful writing journals created by one of my Goddess Playshop Facilitators, Nicole Graham. The journals come with companion meditation CDs that encourage you to go on a journey of self-discovery and empowerment. Nicole has kindly provided some tips for successful journaling here.

* Start an online journal with a free service such as PhotoBlog.com (as I did), or shmick it up a bit with a professional service such as TypePad.


* If you have a website and want your visitors to join in this project with you, PhotoPost is an easy bit of software that lets your website users share their world. Once you've installed this software you'll have easy photo uploads, auto-thumbnails and interactive user comments. The more the merrier I say!

Good luck and bright blissings as you start your journey of gratitude! At the end of it, I hope you are able to look back on as many happy memories as I was able to — four weddings and a baby, as it turns out. It's interesting that not one of these happy events were planned before I began my journal. Just goes to show that in looking for blessings, blessings manifest.

——————-

Anita Revel is the creatrix of igoddess.com, a resource portal for women's wellbeing. You can click here to read more of her columns with United Press International. © copyright 2008 by Anita Revel.
.