jamie pate: How Gratitude and Creativity Are Similar

Gratitude and creativity.

I think it would be safe to say I am passionate about both gratitude and creativity.

I think it would be safe to say I find similarities between both subjects.

I think it would be safe to say I believe both are necessary in a life well lived.

The album and pages in this post are the beginning pages of this year's October Days Album

Gratitude is a habit I have been cultivating for years now. Creativity snuggles right along side gratitude. The two go hand in hand for me.

The exercise of gratitude has become a sort of crucial way of life. As I shared recently at She Loves Color during our guest panel, gratitude is probably what can now be described as a mantra for my life. As I wake each morning, after the coffee is made and brewing, I sit and immediately begin the day with gratitude. How do I do this? I keep a morning journal. In that journal, after listing the date and day and even the current temperature (yeah, kind of quirky like that) I then write out five things I am thankful for. And I begin each sentence just like that: “Thankful for…”

As I shared on that guest panel at She Loves Color, this is more indepth than just writing ‘thankful for my family…thankful for my health…thankful for my home.” Rather, I have taught myself to actually journal these gratitude situations with a bit of detail. Not just a simple jotting. More like:

‘Thankful for the incredible sunset of last evening. The sky was what I can only describe as Villainous Potion and Dried Marigold splashed against the horizon while light and sunrays pushed back through."

Now, can I say something? If this is something you are considering, please do not allow my more detailed gratitude listing to make you think you can’t do this. Because you can. I have been making this a practice for literally years now. The five in the morning has been in play since 2019. Just in time for 2020 I might add. I was not always detailed in my documenting. This habit has ebbed and flowed as well through the years. Please do not compare if this is something you might want to start for yourself. Not only that, your approach, by virtue of it being ‘your’ approach, is going to look different from mine. And that’s O.K.

Another thought here: sometimes there are photos to go along with what it is that I have documented for my gratitude. When that happens, I feel like I am double lucky. Well, maybe even triple lucky. First, I have looked for and found a thing in which to be grateful for. Secondly, my life is enriched because of that purposeful practice. Third, that ‘thankful for’ can now be a prompt for a story.

Very often the story telling now found on my pages are a manifestation of gratitude. While seeking the good in my day I will take photos of what speaks to me. How lucky we are to then print those photos and place them lovingly in a safe album. Then, we get to make even more pretty stuff by hand that surrounds the image that is prompting gratitude for us.

This is why I think gratitude and creativity are so similar. These two elements cross over and engage with each other all the time. As storytellers, we have tapped into the making part of gratitude, so that now, it's not just an intangible thought...but rather a tangible idea layed out in an album or scrapbook page. That is just one way gratitude and creativity are similar virtues.