In Part 1, I shared 5 tips for using gratitude to create a better relationship with your dog and reach your dreams. Now, in Part 2, I’ll share some advanced gratitude strategies to accelerate your progress!
Gratitude and Goals in Harmony …
While it seems that being grateful for who we are and what we have right now is contradictory to the idea of setting goals for a better life experience … they can indeed coexist. I believe that practicing gratitude is a simple way to accelerate the process of reaching our heartfelt goals and dreams.
Being grateful for what you are and have right now doesn’t mean you don’t want to grow and create change in your life. If you’re like me, you love to create change, learn new things and make life more brilliant for yourself and your loved-ones.
Accomplishing your goals is even more possible when you start with a foundation of gratitude. Instead of feeling frustrated, you’ll feel happy about where you are … while eagerly anticipating your adventure ahead.
Being grateful for all you have now sets the stage for realizing your goals in the future.
When we feel and express gratitude for what we have in our life, we are automatically attracting more of what we love.
Goals give us purpose and keep us focused on what’s truly important to us. Goals bring us to greater clarity about what we want … and they keep us inspired to keep taking those baby steps toward our ‘prize’ every day.
Whether you have a goal for attaining something special with your dog … or for a non-dog something that you feel inspired to bring into your life … a gratitude journal will keep us moving in the right direction.
Goal Acceleration Tips:
When you are working toward a training or trialing/showing goal with your dog, (or any goal really), you can use your gratitude journaling to speed up your results.
Here’s how:
- Include 1 or 2 Goal Gratefuls in your daily practice. When we are working toward a goal that challenges us (as good goals do), we often get caught up in a cycle of ‘it’s not happening yet’ or we question ‘when is it ever going to happen?’ or ‘will it ever happen?’ and we forget to celebrate the little wins.When we can include 1 or 2 of those little baby steps we take that keep moving us toward our goal … the more we focus on the things that went right … the more we are accelerated. This practice is so reinforcing to us, and it keeps us inspired and motivated to carry on through the struggles we will likely encounter along the way.
- Include 1 or 2 Future Gratefuls in your daily practice. When you can include feeling grateful for what is about to come … surrounding future events with an air of expectation, like it’s already done … you will be adding that positive energy to the mix, and that will accelerate your journey even more!What you’ll want to do is to use your imagination to pretend that your goal/dream has already happened … that you are living it right now. Paint a full and vibrant picture of living your dream. Allow yourself to experience the feeling you will have living your dream.Now, simply find one or two things that you are grateful for inside of your imagined life. There you have it – goals on steroids!! 🙂
Some Examples of Gratitude Journal Entries:
Goal Grateful:
“Wow! Max actually looked at me for ‘what’s next?’ today! First time in class he offered that! I am so grateful that our partnership is finally getting there!”
Future Gratefuls:
“I am so grateful knowing that next week’s trial will be fun and we get to practice and learn together in a new place.”
“I love that by this time next year, we are going to be an amazing team, really brilliant together! My heart swells with joy and gratitude for all we will experience together.”
Comment below and tell me:
What is the #1 Goal/Dream that you would love to accelerate?
Ever grateful,
Kathy xo
BONUS TIP:
Join us for the 2019 Creative Alchemy Passion Plan program…you’ll be so happy you did!!
13 Responses
I want to partner with my collie to his herding tested title. I want to partner with my dachshund for his TD.
I want to become the best trainer for my dogs for whatever venue they are working in. For my own personal life, I’d like to get out of debt.
I want a closer connection that includes a rock solid recall with my free thinking hound.
I want my newest rescue to be able to be consistent on a leash and become a therapy dog.
I am so grateful that this time next year, I will be able to have visitors come inside my house and actually visit, and my dogs will be calm and relaxed and friendly.
I want to be able to continue with Paddy’ agility training and to be able to graduate level 3 agility. I wish to also get his Champion Dog Trick title in 2017.
I am grateful for my berger picard’s progress in agility and want her to do her first contests this year
I would love to be able to connect with all four dogs on an individual level as well as a group level. I finally made that connection with my first Aussie, Mabel, but have since let it become sparse with the other three, especially the two newest additions.
This time next year I will no longer stress or become anxious anticipating a behavior.
I’d like to accelerate my goal to work with my year old aussie/maremma mix to pique her herding instincts with my small flock of icelandic sheep. I’d love to be intentional about my own confidence to work on building hers with the sheep. I can just see her instincts waiting for confident direction!
“What is the #1 Goal/Dream that you would love to accelerate in 2017?”
★★★ I would like for my Rhodesian Ridgeback, Jessie, and I to be able to consistently work together as a team on courses, walks and in all of life’s distractions. ★★★
I want to build an amazing partnership with my first puppy and use the skills I learn along the way to incorporate dogs in my life in a much larger capacity.
I would like to improve Gibbs state of mind at trials to be more like it is in training & seminars, lessen the over arousal. I would also like to teach a class, or seminar in dog agility or canine fitness.