My 8-year-old daughter keeps a gratitude journal and she doesn't even know it. It's one of the features that I built into MindFeast. Here's how it works:
- MindFeast ships with a gratitude slide enabled.
- When my daughter opens her tablet the MindFeast lock screen triggers a slide. Sometimes the slide that's triggered is the gratitude slide. When this happens, she inputs what she's grateful for in the text box.
- Her answer is logged to a gratitude journal in MindFeast that I can see whenever I want.
The thing I like about a gratitude practice, such as keeping a gratitude journal, is that it helps you reframe things in an optimistic light, and this causes positive thinking in general. People often have negative biases which can lead to negative thinking, which can compound into a negative outlook on life and general negativity. None of this is good for the individual and it's certainly not good for the development of a child.
Take this simple example: you're taking a 3 hour road trip to visit a terminally ill family member in the hospital when your car suddenly breaks down. It would be pretty easy to say something like, "Why did this happen to me?" (negative interpretation) or "Why do these things always happen to me?" (generally negative outlook). One might think, "All these bad things are happening. My family member is terminally ill. My car has broken down. I always have bad luck. I'm being targeted by fate, God, and the world." Negativity compounds.
A generally positive and optimistic worldview is better than a generally negative and pessimistic worldview, for people who are grounded in reality. An optimistic worldview will serve you. A negative worldview will not.
But someone with a gratitude practice, might choose to interpret the events in entirely different way. Aiming to focus on what you're grateful for, is a way of choosing what positive parts of your day or life to highlight. This compounds in the opposite direction. Imagining the same scenario as above, you might reflect on your day and think, "I'm grateful for the stranger who stopped to help me when my car broke down. He didn't even know me but he took time out of his day to help me out", or maybe, "I'm grateful my relative was in high spirits in the hospital and that we were able to joke and reminisce about good time past", or, "I'm grateful for the good care my relative is receiving in the hospital", or "I'm grateful I can afford the care my relative is receiving" etc. Suddenly, life looks like a generally positive experience where things are good and people are helping each other, doing positive things. This is a better outlook to impart upon our children.
To be clear, I'm not saying that we should ignore the bad things, or act like there isn't evil in the world. Nor am I saying that we shouldn't take precautions. Life isn't a utopia, and a gratitude journal isn't going to reframe all bad things into nonexistence. It's also important not to be willfully overly optimistic to the point of fantasy, however, what I am saying is this: a generally positive and optimistic worldview is better than a generally negative and pessimistic worldview, for people who are grounded in reality. An optimistic worldview will serve you. A negative worldview will not.
We want to impart positivity onto our children, not negativity. I designed the MindFeast lock screen to include a gratitude practice to help parents do this. I use it with my oldest daughter and so far I've been happy with the result.