Continuous Thanks

Cultivate the habit of being grateful for every good thing that comes to you, and to give thanks continuously. And because all things have contributed to your advancement, you should include all things in your gratitude.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

The Daily Stoic has an article about “The Daily Art of Giving Thanks ” which is also where this week’s quote comes from. “The reason we find real gratitude so difficult is that we’re each constantly focused on our own obstacles and difficulties in achieving the things we are pursuing—getting our fair share of the goodies in life—things that are often out of our control and have no power in themselves to advance our progress as human beings…What we give to others is far more valuable than what we might try to take for ourselves.”

About the author

Ralph Waldo Emerson , (May 25, 1803 – April 27, 1882), who went by his middle name Waldo, was an American essayist, lecturer, philosopher, abolitionist and poet who led the transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century. He was seen as a champion of individualism and critical thinking, as well as a prescient critic of the countervailing pressures of society and conformity. Friedrich Nietzsche considered him “the most gifted of the Americans”, and Walt Whitman referred to him as his “master”.