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Sometimes people who are high achievers begin to believe that they must only focus on the future target in order to achieve more. Focusing on what you already have and showing gratitude for it, they think, can leave you feeling complacent and would dampen ambition. In other words, "If I have enough, maybe I don’t need to achieve more."

This prevailing but unproven idea has been debunked by the research done by rock-star gratitude researchers Robert Emmons and Anjali Mishra.

This particular study involved students listing goals they hoped to reach over a two-month period. One group of students were asked to maintain a regular gratitude practice and the other group was not given this instruction. Ten weeks later, when the researchers checked back on the students’ progress, they found that grateful students were closer than others in the study to reaching their goals.

Emmons and Mishra concluded that "gratitude enhances effortful goal striving." In other words, it makes...

Research shows that gratitude activates our parasympathetic (the calming part of the) nervous system and this results in decreasing cortisol (the stress hormone) levels and therefore reducing stress.

The connection between gratitude and stress may not be immediately obvious. After all, why would my stress go down when I feel grateful for something?

Here are some possible explanations:

The directing of attention: Our brain can generally only focus on one thing at a time. When we intentionally move our attention away from stressful thoughts and instead direct it to a positive memory or experience, it can create a sense of wellbeing and cause us to let go of stress.

Recognizing support:When we direct your gratitude towards people, we recognize that we have been on the receiving end of love and support from people. We realize that we are not alone and that we have resources to deal with stress.

Switching away from automatic negative thinking:Stress is often caused by catastrophizing and...

Yesterday, we discussed how insomnia is a common ailment in modern times. Today’s let’s talk about another very common ailment of life in the 21stcentury: anxiety.

If you ever worry, have nervousness, or unease, typically about an imminent event or something with an uncertain outcome, know that you are not alone.

As humans, we are naturally inclined to worry about things. It may help to understand that although it does not feel good at the time, worrying can actually have a calming effect on the limbic system of the brain. When you are worrying, your mind feels like it is "doing something" about the situation by trying to see all of the possibilities or figure out a solution (often obsessively).

However, although understandable, worrying is uncomfortable and generally not productive. So do you want to consider a way both to feel good AND give your brain something to do to keep it occupied? If so, consider interrupting the anxiety/worry spiral by asking yourself one or...

Do you have trouble falling or staying asleep? So many of us do, these days. Sometimes the insomnia is caused by our busy lives, by thoughts about what went wrong during the day or what might go wrong the next day. These thoughts spin around in our heads and stop us from relaxing so that we can drift off to sleep.

Here is how gratitude can help.

Various studies have found that people with sleep disorders responded well to a gratitude practice. A gratitude practice such as journaling improved both duration and quality of sleep.

In research, gratitude was related to having more positive thoughts, and fewer negative ones at bedtime. This, in turn, was associated with dozing off faster and sleeping longer and better.

So it seems that when you cultivate gratitude throughout the day, and practice it at bedtime as well, you're more likely to have positive thoughts as you're drifting off to sleep. Rather than ruminating over the friend who let you down, you are more likely to think of...

In case you need some motivation to start a regular gratitude practice, we will explore some of its benefits over the next few days.

There is a lot of solid research showing that gratitude is a key component to help people live happier, longer lives.

Here are just some of the positive impacts on physical health that various studies have found:
Keeping a gratitude journal caused participants to report:

- fewer physical symptoms
- more time spent exercising
- less physical pain
- Patients with hypertension reported a significant decrease in their systolic blood pressure.
- A gratitude practice increased levels of energy and vitality experienced by the participants.
- Keeping a gratitude journal increased the participants likelihood of self-care and wellbeing-boosting behaviours such as healthy eating, going to the doctor and exercising.

Given these results, it appears that gratitude has both a direct and an indirect impact on our physical health. It makes sense that we incorporate a...

Today inshallah we start a series on the emotion and practice of gratitude: what it is, why it matters and how we can cultivate it.

Before we go any further, let us explore what we mean by gratitude. Here are some ways that psychologists and social scientists define gratitude:

"[Gratitude] has been conceptualized as an emotion, a virtue, a moral sentiment, a motive, a coping response, a skill, and an attitude. It is all of these and more. Minimally, gratitude is an emotional response to a gift. It is the appreciation felt after one has been the beneficiary of an altruistic act" (Emmons & Crumpler, 2000).

"[Gratitude is] a thankful appreciation for what an individual receives, whether tangible or intangible. With gratitude, people acknowledge the goodness in their lives … As a result, gratitude also helps people connect to something larger than themselves as individuals–whether to other people, nature, or a higher power" [Harvard Medical School ]

Robert Emmons, is...

Despite our best intentions, things can get heated when we are in the midst of a conflict. The other can say things in a way that triggers us and potentially make us lose our emotional balance.

This verse from Sura Fussilat advices us to not react when others fall short of respectful conduct.

Repel [evil] with what is best. [If you do so,] behold, he between whom and you was enmity, will be as though he were a sympathetic friend [Quran 41:34].

Scholars explain that the absence of a direct object after repel in the above verse means that the verse is open to many meanings and possibilities: we can repel anger with patience, error with truth, ignorance with clemency, and the commission of evil with pardon.

In other words, instead of reacting to people’s behavior out of anger, we can practice responding in a way that is aligned to our value system.

When we do this, it gives the other person a chance to calm down, it diffuses the tension and the aggression and allows the...

In the following verse from Sura Nahl, Allah says: 

Then speak to him a gentle word haply he may mind or fear.[Quran 20:44]

This verse from Sura Taha is addressed in the first instance to Prophet Musa (Moses) (as) when he was going to address the Pharaoh Almost counterintuitively, he is told that instead of being harsh, standing his ground or telling the tyrant off, he should speak to him mildly and gently.

The principle of speaking gently to those who are on an opposing side and most likely to trigger you is, in fact, the most intelligent and brilliant way to communicate.

When you are talking to someone who you do not have a relationship with, or someone who has very different views, our tendency is to criticize and stand our ground. This can seem like an attack to the other person, almost guaranteeing that they will not hear you or consider what you have to say. While you are speaking, they are busy thinking of ways in which you are wrong and how they are going to defeat your arguments.

If, on the other hand, we start by...

Have you not considered how Allah sets forth a parable of a good word (being) like a good tree, whose root is firm and whose branches are in heaven,Yielding its fruit in every season by the permission of its Lord? And Allah sets forth parables for men that they may be mindful.[Quran 14:24-25]

The verses for today’s reflection are from Sura Ibrahim and they compare the impact of words to that of a tree.

So what is a Kalimat Tayyabba, a "good word"?

In the first instance, it is a word that calls to righteousness, to the Truth. But it is much more than that.

The Quran compares a good word to a good tree (and later an evil word to an evil tree). It is interesting that we consider trees to have solid psychical mass while we rarely consider our words in the same way. We think that they are spoken into air and disappear in the next moment. (And sometimes we wish that they did!)

On the other hand, we have all experienced the power of words to connect and heal people and also perhaps...