Gratitude is a popular topic these days. No doubt Oprah had a lot to do with it.
The Cognitive-Expressive Perspective
For the most part, the current discussion about gratitude comes from the perspective of Positive Psychology and happiness research. Research suggests that when we focus on things to be grateful for, feel grateful, and verbally express it, we feel happier. So, it directs us to think about things to be grateful for, keep a "Gratitude Journal", feel grateful, and say, "Thank you!" often. I call this the cognitive-expressive perspective of gratitude.
The Religious Perspective
Some of the current discussion about gratitude comes from a religious perspective of gratitude. From this perspective God/our Higher Power is the source of everything good in our life. Everything good in our life is a blessing from above. Since every blessing is a gift from above we should feel thankful to God/our Higher Power for all of our blessings and verbally express our thanks.
From the religious perspective there is a sense that the more one recognizes and gives thanks for God’s blessings, the more faithful one is and the better one practices one’s religion.
Commonalities Share by both the Psychological and Religious Perspectives
The psychological and religious perspectives of gratitude share some common characteristics.
Both are individualist. They focus on us as individuals and have us do a private self examination of how grateful we are as individuals.
Both lack a clear standard on how much gratitude is enough. The sense is that we could always be more grateful than we are.
Due to the lack if a standard, both judge us as falling short when it comes to gratitude and direct us to take some initiative to be more grateful than we are.
Both have a moralistic tone. They both say that we ought to be more grateful than we are. The psychological view says we ought to be more grateful in order to improve our mental health. The religious view says we ought to be more grateful in order to relate rightly with God/our Higher Power.
Finally, both offer prescriptions to remedy our short comings in the area of gratitude. They both say, "Be more grateful." Positive Psychologists direct us to journal about we can be grateful for. Religious authorities direct us to say prayers of thanksgiving.
Assessing Both Perspectives
There is certainly nothing wrong with having a grateful attitude and practicing saying, “Thank you!”
However, I do question assigning and restricting gratitude to our head and tongue , the lack of a clear standard of how much gratitude is enough, fault-finding, and using a subtle form of guilt and shame to encourage us to be more grateful.
A Third Perspective
In my next post I'll present a third perspective on gratitude: gratitude as a specific kind of pleasure that we feel.
