Thanks for the memories

Rebooting is a biweekly newsletter about how we can use technology to take better care of ourselves.

It’s never directly been brought to my attention, but I’m certain I’m bad at giving gifts. On the painfully rare occasion that I remember someone’s birthday, my mind will go static and I’ll forget everything I know about that person. Of my bad qualities, this one really bums me out—I’m working on it.

For the last few Christmases of his life, my tata always asked for a pair of wireless headphones he could use with his TV so he could actually hear what was going on. He loved his first pair, but his pups thought they made a better chew toy than playback device. No matter how many times he got the same gift, he’d always open it with excitement and gratitude, which he’d follow with a thank you card.

The first one read “Many thanks for the headphones! They sound great! - H” Even though it was a gift from the family, it felt good to finally get it right. More than that, though, seeing how stoked my tata was to get something so trivial was a nice reminder that there’s a lot of joy to be found in tiny moments and interactions.

It’s been about a year since my nana and tata died, and I’ve been trying to focus on the moments I’m grateful for rather than the ones that make my heart sink. It’s been hard, but using my journaling app, Day One, as a dedicated gratitude journal has helped me keep those moments at the front of my mind, rather than in an emotional first aid kit. I wrote about this last year, but mostly from the angle of keeping my petty thoughts at bay before my mouth gets me in trouble. A journal is much more than that, though. 

There’s no shortage of journaling methods to try, but there’s plenty of research showing that gratitude journals in particular can have some pretty great benefits when you start using them. Aside from the generally acknowledged positive feeling that comes with routinely doing gratitude checks, they can make you more optimistic and even improve your sleep. According to the Greater Good Science Center, that’s because gratitude journals give us a space to acknowledge and reflect on the things that make us feel good, and thinking about things that made us happy, well, makes us happy.

Starting a gratitude journal may seem pretty straightforward (and it can be!), but it’s important to go into it with the right intentions and an idea of how often you’re going to do it.

Greater Good has a useful rundown of how to approach gratitude journals:

So now you just need to figure out how often you’re going to journal, and how you’re going to do it. You can grab any number of paper journals online or in your favorite book store, print and download one of these templates, or even just do it free form. I prefer using Day One and its templates feature for my journaling to streamline things a bit and make sure I can get an entry in wherever I’m at. (Google Docs also has a template feature if you’re looking for a free way to do this digitally).

It’s recommended that you don’t do a daily gratitude journal, which I mostly agree with, but I’ve sort of incorporated it into my daily journaling while still having a separate entry every week dedicated to gratitude. I have a template in Day One called “Daily Jump” that I use for an entry every morning before work. The first prompt asks me to list three things I’m grateful for. This isn’t something I put too much thought into, just a few seconds to acknowledge whatever I’m feeling particularly grateful for, like my pups or the breakfast my girlfriend and I had together.

I try not to let this just become part of my routine, though, and leave the reflection part of gratitude journaling for Sundays. I’ve made a separate template for that which asks me four questions for every entry: What are you grateful for? What were this week’s gifts? What moments do you wish you could relive? and What made you smile? I’ve messed around with the wording of those prompts, but I try to keep them fairly positive and focused on what makes each thing special. I’ve been trying the weekly reflection since the beginning of the year, and it’s helped keep me present and made me more capable of taking a step back to enjoy when I’m really happy and embrace whatever’s causing it.

Great moments don’t always leave a solid dent on my embarrassingly forgetful brain, so I also have a journal titled “Things that made me smile” where I can just jot down little things as they happen, like a nice text from a friend, a compliment on my Crocs from a stranger, or buying a new fanny pack I definitely needed. I haven’t been doing this for long, but I’ve felt notably better than I did this time last year, and that’s something to be grateful for.

In the News:

How to build healthy habits (The New York Times): Building new habits is hard. It’s easy to get trapped into thinking that you have to just get started and Do the Thing. Turns out, that’s not easy; if it were, we’d never cheat on our diets for donuts that don’t even taste good or text our exes, and we’d all floss every night. Most of us can’t dance through life that easily, though, so if you’re looking to start a new habit you should make sure you’ve got a system in place to keep you on track.

3 surprising ways you might be giving away your personal information (OneZero): As much fun as it is to explore all the cool things our gadgets and apps can do for us, there are plenty of things to be concerned and diligent about. If privacy’s important to you, the best place to start is knowing how companies gather information about you and working to buckle that down. It’s not fun, but it does provide some sense of relief and security.

Something Nice:

The fastest interview ever with Ben Schwartz from Sonic the Hedgehog: I’m not sure if I’ll see the Sonic movie, but this is probably the funniest video I’ve seen this year. Ben Schwartz has to answer every question Patrick Gill asks him in like 10 seconds or less, and it quickly turns into 14 minutes of Schwartz railroading the interview in wild and hilarious ways. Save for a rainy day, or get your morning started with a laugh.

As always, if you have any questions, feedback, or just want to say hello, feel free to drop me a line on Twitter.

My thanks to Medea Giordano for editing this issue.