The Magic of Sincere Gratitude.

Those who know gratitude and how to give it sincerely knows it's a cheat code, it can give unusual access to men or places. It is not a mere word, it involves action and intentionality.

"Gratitude is a proof that a man has not lost his memories" ~ Rev. Wale Akinronbi.

My pastor here in school will always emphasise the importance of gratitude, I think he is one of the people that has best explained thanksgiving / gratitude.

Gratitude is something I chose to learn myself two year back. It was birthed from a place of pain, confusion and inability to understand how ungrateful some humans can be. There was a time in my life where I got pissed and disturbed each time I help others and they don't seem to appreciate it in same degree to which I went out of my way, it was always painfully: I understood that some might not know how much it cost me to help them, but give a genuine appreciation at least. Somehow, I got to see from another perspective, which was how exactly do I react to help from others, how grateful have I been, was it sincere ?.......

I stayed on these questions for a while and I realised I don't do it well enough. I started by appreciating little help from my friend's and family, then I extended it to many people as possible. I took to an extent of always saying "thank you so much" every time someone get to help me. Now, I barely say "thank you" alone, I also add so much be because I really do appreciate it. Besides, I do not know how much it cost the person to help me,little or big.

Benefits of Sincere Gratitude

It compounds and comes with big interest

Gratitude pays, but sincere gratitude pays more: don't just show appreaciation once, do it 3 times. I've received unexpected help from quite a number of people because I thanked them more than once for what they did. They felt happy and proud that their effort was acknowledged and worth it, so later on they did one more. Guess what, I did same thing, I thanked them again and again. Now these people will help me as fast as they can as long as they can.

It gives you access to (the heart of) men

Gratitude can get you access to people and these people can get you access to places. If you've expressed gratitude for long to a person for everything they do to you, it automatically make them trust you to a reasonable level to want to tell you about something's you didn't even ask for, show you something you never thought of, give you a bigger chance to something that will change your life. Showing gratitude can cause a person to like you, thereby giving you access into their life or a part of their life.

It can buy for you what money can and cannot buy

Just like getting you access to a person, it can be your cheat code to get what you ought to pay for. I have a friend who has helped me with things my money cannot get. He has given and bought me stuffs just because I am always appreciating his help enough. He has done a lot like food, money and gifts that were not asked for. A person you've showed deep appreaciation to for their kindness can vouch for you in front of other people that have the capacity to help you.

It can last and extend beyond the grateful

I love helping others and I learnt it overtime from my parents who would always give out about 70% of every plantain we harvest from our backyard. I and my siblings love plantain a lot and I couldn't comprehend why they do that whenever we harvest plantain. They give out other things but plantain was what they used to teach us the lesson of giving. They actually didn't teach us directly, we grew up and figured it out after many years.

One major reason why my parents always give more to these set of people was because they have always expressed their gratitude genuinely. So, it got to a time when my parents started fending for these people's children. Some of their children can walk freely into our house to stay, sleep, eat and interact with us like we are same family. I like it and they also in their own way try to render help to us. We literally are a family now, one into the other.

Gratitude works like magic when you do it sincerely and continuously. An adage in my mother's tongue says "He who appreciates what was done to him today will get another one tomorrow". Sincere gratitude increases your chance if being helped, liked and favoured: and not once but as many time as possible (that's the magic in it).

Thank you for reading till the end

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