About fifteen years ago I had the world’s most boring job. There were days when I had nothing to do. Nothing. So I stocked my office with stationery and started most Mondays writing letters and thank you notes. 

I left the job, but I kept those habits. This week my first task each day is to write a few thank you notes for the gifts and hospitality I received over the holidays — all of which I wrote down in The Nice List. 

My word for 2019 is gratitude and writing thank you notes is one of my gratitude practices. I am not always perfect about doing it, but I feel so much better when I have. Not out of guilt but because it is good to meditate on your blessings and the gifts of time or talent that your receive from others. 

So this is my thank you note to each of you! Thank you for supporting me in this new venture. Thank you for buying copies of The Nice List — and for telling me how you have used it! Thank you for being good friends and cheerleaders! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!

On one of the opening spreads in my 2019 planner, I wrote this quote: “It is not joy that makes us grateful; it is gratitude that makes us joyful.” Brother David Steindl-Rost made that observation, and I encountered a version of that quote in AJ Jacobs’ latest book — Thanks a Thousand — where Jacobs sets out to thank everyone who made his cup of coffee possible. 

I have a whole new section of my website devoted to gratitude this year where I have a guide to writing thank you notes, a review of Thanks a Thousand, and much more!

I would be most thankful if you would drop by and check it out! 😉 

XOXO
Angela