Just like most things in life, expressing gratitude comes more naturally for some than for others. Typically, the average child has been told to say “thank you” from a very young age; I’m willing to bet, however, that if they, like many other young children, require constant prompting to say those two words, then they don’t truly understand their significance. In time, without the attention needed to teach them otherwise, a child can develop into a ‘gratitude resistor’ – i.e. someone who believes that expressing gratitude is cheesy, unnecessary, stupid”¦or all of the above. With this sort of outlook, a person can become more pessimistic and rude, hurting not only the people around them, but also themself. That’s why it’s so vital as parents to teach your children (from a very early age) both that being grateful is highly important, and about the various different ways to express gratitude. And it all starts from making sure that you, as the parent, are not a ‘gratitude resistor’ yourself.

Why is Gratitude So Important?

Your parents and your parents’ parents and your parents’ parents’ parents etc. have, through the generations, said that saying “thank you” is a must – after all, it’s just basic manners, right? But expressing gratitude goes so much further than that in terms of its benefits both to you and to those around you.

Here are just some of the scientifically proven benefits of gratitude:

1. It is good for your mental health. Leading gratitude researchers have found that gratitude reduces many toxic emotions, including envy, resentment, frustration and regret, effectively increasing happiness and reducing depression. The American Psychological Association also found that teenagers who are grateful are less disruptive at school and more hopeful than their less-grateful peers, translating to higher levels of positivity and optimism in an age group that is one of the most vulnerable to poor mental health.
2. It is good for your physical health. This is a lesser known, but important, fact – gratitude has plenty of benefits in this regard! A 2012 study showed that grateful people are ill less often and feel healthier than those who are less grateful. Moreover, a 1995 study in the ‘American Journal of Cardiology’ showed that appreciation (a result of being grateful) is likened with changes in heart rate variability, which may be beneficial in treating hypertension and reducing the likelihood of sudden death in patients with congestive heart failure and coronary artery disease.
3. It has been linked to better performance at school. A 2010 study found that grateful high school and college students overwhelmingly tend to have higher GPAs combined with better social integration than their less grateful peers. This is because it’s been found that gratitude allows for a clearer mind and better focus.
4. It allows for better and more friendships. Saying “thank you” is not only polite, but showing appreciation is also likely to win you more friends as people instinctively realise you are more likely to be a positive person who they would like to be around. Gratitude can also boost pro-social behaviours, increasing your desire to help others and your abilities to lend emotional support to another person, making you a better friend.
5. It improves self-esteem by reducing social comparisons. Rather than becoming resentful or feeling bitter towards people who have more money or better jobs – a major factor in reduced self-esteem – grateful people can appreciate other people’s accomplishments.
6. It helps you sleep. Researchers in a 2011 study published in the journal ‘Applied Psychology: Health and Well-Being’ found that people who spent 15 minutes writing down what they’re thankful for in a journal before bed fell asleep faster and stayed asleep longer. Since sleep has its own multitude of benefits, it’s well worth trying this out.

Teaching and Practicing Gratitude

Christine Carter of the Greater Good Institute has suggested some great ways in which you can teach ‘gratitude resistors’ to change their inhibitions about gratitude and learn to express it. These methods would likewise work in teaching your child from a young age how to express their gratitude so that they do not become a ‘gratitude resistor’. There are two main ways in which to do this, but it is important to note that both stem from you, the parent, being very open in expressing gratitude yourself:

1. Persist by modelling the expression of gratitude in many different ways – being grateful about other people, oneself, nature or maybe something we take for granted – e.g. clean air. Eventually this will foster a positive emotion in your child and make them feel good – a taste of this feeling will make them want to continue expressing gratitude.
2. Let them design their own expression of gratitude – there are lots of ways that we can foster this in ourselves and, as your child gets older, you can even share some of the science behind the benefits of gratitude while you let them foster their own understanding of the word and feeling.

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The pace of thought-building has been changed through overstimulation, which can be the unlimited access to smartphones, social networks, video games, gifts all the time, or TV excess. Now, children and teenagers are losing the most important socio-emotional skills: putting themselves in another’s shoes, thinking before acting, exposing and not imposing ideas, and learning the art of thanking.

In fact, overstimulation has damaged this generation, raising frustrated children and teenagers, who care little about social issues around them, and complain more than they thank. However, there are still things parents can do to reverse “• or at least attenuate “• this situation, and the solution lays upon gratitude.

A study by Psy.D. Jeffrey Froh and his team shows that grateful young adolescents aged 11-13 are happier and more optimistic, have better social support, are more pleased with their family, school, friends, community, and themselves, and give more emotional support to others than their less grateful counterparts; besides, they also found out that grateful teens aged 14-19 are more pleased with their lives and more engaged in their schoolwork and hobbies. They also use their strengths to improve their community, have higher grades, and are less depressed, envious and materialistic.

All these benefits lead parents to wonder what they can do to foster gratitude in kids. The truth is that gratitude grows whenever love can be felt, and there are strategies to make it clear to children that they are indeed loved, and to teach them how to be grateful for everything they are and posses.

1. Be a positive example to be followed

We are the image our children want to reflect, they see us as a mirror. For this reason, it is our role to start growing gratitude in them from simple day-to-day actions, like saying kind words such as “thank you”, helping them value benefits they receive from others, or also talking to them, telling them what we feel and what we have been through.

According to Cury:

Parents need to talk to their children about their tears, their difficulties, their failures. But instead, parents are leaving their children with a tablet, a smartphone, and are placing them at full-time schools. Parents who only give products to their children, but are unable to convey their history, transform humans into consumers. It is necessary to sit down and talk: Son, I also failed, I also went through pain, I was also rejected. There were times when I cried.

When parents cross their world with that of their children, powerful healthy files are formed in their minds “• memories capable of bringing children and adolescents to work pains losses and frustrations.

Furthermore, at the end of each day at the dinner table, you could encourage everyone to describe something they are grateful for on that day. Or you can also build a “gratitude box”, in which everyone in the family can write in a paper something that happened to them and that they felt grateful for, and deposit it in the box; at the end of each year, this box can be opened during a family time, and everyone could read a paper so to remember all the good things that happened at that year. This way, you will be teaching your children to value the good aspects of life rather than the bad ones.

2. Be attentive to your children and spend time with them

Time is the most precious gift you can give to anyone. When you give time to a person, you grant them a piece of your life which cannot be taken back. Children enjoy spending time with their parents, and that is essentially what they need. You must be attentive to your children and make time for them, for this way you will be helping them develop empathy “• an indispensable emotion for developing gratitude and moral behavior.

Pick a time each day to turn off all the technology, and to simply exercise the primitive human tool of communication and affection. Cury says:

Parents who do not cross their world with that of their children and who only act as rulebooks are able to deal with machines. It is necessary to create a real intimacy with the little ones, a true empathy. Family cannot only criticize behaviors, point faults. Emotion must be conveyed in the relationship. Parents should be the best entertainment for their children. Emotional nutrition is important even if you do not have time, for time must be qualitative. Fifteen minutes a week can be worth a year. Parents have to be teachers of their children’s lives.  

3. See what your child’s strong points are and help them use it

Pay attention to your kids and try to identify what their strong points are. Once you do that, encourage them to develop these good features more and more, and to use them for promoting the wellbeing of others around you.

Instead of pointing out faults, parents should promote successes. Every day, children and students have small hits and smart attitudes. Parents who only criticize and embarrass provoke shyness, insecurity, difficulty in undertaking. Human beings have been pointing out wrong behaviors and not promoting healthy characteristics, says Cury.

4. Encourage kids to nurture relationships and to help others

We live today in a liquid modernity, marked by the superficiality and volatility of human relations “• as Zygmunt Bauman, a Polak sociologist, would say. To go against that, you must teach your children that other people matter, and that relationships are a priority. When children help, they feel more connected to those they are helping, and that then helps them to develop and nurture friendships and social relationships.

Tell your kids that being an altruist is a virtue, and that it is a true greatness to be thoughtful of others, to thank others regularly, and to be cooperative, helpful, and giving.

Copyright: KonstantinChristian

5. Help your children see what things touches them the most

As long as we have a purpose in life, there is still a reason to breathe. Dreams are life projects, and they are what keeps us moving forward. For that reason, it is a parent’s task to assist children in finding their passions and social interests, so that they can learn as much as they can about society’s problems and injustices, and discover ways they can make a difference.

Cury says that:

We need to teach our children to take breaks and contemplate the beautiful. This generation needs a lot in order to feel pleasure: they are addicted to receiving many stimuli to feel crumbs of pleasure. The result: intolerant and superficial individuals. Suicide rates have increased. A family must remember consumption makes nobody happy. Youngsters need to be encouraged to venture, to have contact with nature, to delight themselves with astronomy, with the slow, steady, and deep stimuli of nature, which are not as fast as social networks.

The Power of Gratitude

By now we must all have the conscience that grateful children are decisive for a kind future, and for a world of compassion and care. It demands time and effort, like anything that is worthwhile requires; however, when the best is brought out in our kids, a better world can be built.

It is a parent’s job then to help grow gratitude in children ever since their first breaths are taken, making them look around at their reality, and not just be stuck into their own world. Make it known to them there are people out there who need their help, and that they hold the power to change a life, and even a whole society. Help them be grateful for who they are, what they have, and what they can become.

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There has been much research done on the topic of raising kind, mindful children.  Many sociologists and adolescent psychologists believe that gratefulness and kindness largely contribute to human health, happiness and positive, long lasting social connections.  Mindful gratitude can foster altruism in children as young as toddlers and a great sense of empathy in adolescents. According to Dr. David Schonfeld, the director of development and behavioral pediatrics at the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, “the desire to help is innate.”

Children are predisposed and compelled to helping those around them; it’s their nature.  However, this positive quality can eventually diminish if not nurtured and exercised.  It is up to each child’s parents, guardians, or other adult role models to have frequent talks with their children about kindness and compassion and to also provide opportunities for them to practice and demonstrate these traits. Equally important is the modeling of these traits by the caregivers on a consistent basis, since we know that children learn through imitation.  Research shows that children who regularly express acts of kindness and who are taught to be grateful from a young age, grow up to be not only happier and healthier adults but ultimately form closer social bonds.

Copyright: Christin Lola

• Remind your children to share and appreciate what they have

It is important that parents or caregivers consistently remind their children to share and appreciate what they have.  Children who learn to share become generous adults. Praising children from a very young age for even the slightest display of empathy sets the foundation for a child who grows up to be a kind individual.  Cultivating an attitude of gratitude and kindness, like so much of the teaching parents do, is about the little things.  A simple act of kindness or consideration yields a child who is respectful of himself, as well as reverential of others.

Children learn by watching, listening and doing.  Parents need to regularly demonstrate gratefulness and kindness.  It is an invaluable exercise to tell your child what you are grateful for; even the small blessings can have a huge impact.  Children learn best by example and will quickly learn the value of compassion through demonstration.  It is also imperative that children feel valued, wanted and respected themselves.  Parents should insist on politeness and respect all around to further inspire selflessness.

Copyright: Africa Studio

• A kind gesture or a simple thank you, reinforces thankfulness

Finding teachable moments throughout the day is another way to positively engage children.  A kind gesture or a simple thank you, reinforces thankfulness.  Repetition is a remarkable way to impart gratitude into your child’s life as well.  Encourage children to “give back” and look beyond themselves.  When children complain or gripe, try pointing out the silver lining.  Teaching kids optimism early on aids them in becoming resilient and more positively focused young adults.  Sharing moments of gratitude will ingrain a positive disposition in children.

Ultimately, the values that kids embrace are the ones they see their parents living out.  The simplest words or actions can have the most powerful influence in children’s lives.  It’s essential for parents to set good examples at an early age, and perhaps even more important to consistently model kindness and gratitude throughout the child’s life. There is no doubt that there is a link between kindness and happiness, and there has been much research proving that grateful children are kind children.  

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