Hello and welcome to Radio Headspace and to this brand new Friday. It's Eve here. So to finish the week, I wanted to talk a little bit about gratitude.

And how if we can cultivate gratitude even when things are testing us or we're being challenged, it can help us experience a greater sense of balance and stability in the mind.

So a few weeks ago we got a knock on the door saying that water was pouring into the downstairs apartment.

Now I'm sure many of us have been in this type of situation before and we can probably all agree it's not a good one. There is disruption on both sides of the aisle.

Anyway, the leak was identified and it was coming from our kitchen sink and dishwasher. So it's meant for the last few weeks we haven't been able to use either of these.

We're actually still no further forward as parts of the wall need to be knocked down to actually get into it and the job is rather complicated.

But I'm not here to talk about the plumbing and the building part of this. What I'm here to talk about is counting our blessings even when things are causing us disruption.

Of course, like all things in life, none of this happened in a vacuum. Work's been very busy, we've had my mother in law staying and we're looking after a friend's dock.

The cherry on top is that we have to wash the dishes in a bucket in the bathtub.

And there was a moment when all of this transpired and I was washing the dishes in the bucket and I could feel the frustration rising. This is so unfair. Why now? Why to us? It's taking so long to sort out.

And in that moment, I really caught myself and used it as an opportunity to actually just be with the process of washing the dishes, feeling the soapy water. It actually helped me to slow down.

And I had a moment of gratitude, gratitude for the fact that I still have a roof over my head, food to eat, dishes to wash. And that is simply not the case for billions of people around the world.

Now, this does not mean when things go wrong that we can't get annoyed or upset about them. Of course, we can. They're irritating, but it's how we process and manage that frustration that matters.

I think particularly in Western society, we live in an instant gratification culture. This also got me thinking about how much of the time we're in doing mode on autopilot.

I totally took for granted that I could just fling the dishes in the dishwasher and then get on with something else.

There is a lot to be learned from having to adapt our behaviour in the midst of disruption. And we face disruptions all of the time, some bigger than others.

So something that can help this shift is to start embodying feelings of gratitude when things are perhaps going well, when you're not being challenged.

You can start experimenting with this today, taking a brief moment, whether it's after you finish listening to this, or perhaps before you go to bed tonight.

Bring to mind two or three things that you're grateful for. Even when things are going relatively well, it can still be hard to bring these qualities to mind, as so much of the time we're in doing mode.

But gratitude is something we can choose to feel and experience. In cultivating these qualities, it helps to bring new meaning to situations, even when they feel really tough.

So I'll leave it there for today. I hope you have a lovely weekend, and I'm so grateful to you for joining me on this journey and look forward to seeing you back here on Monday.

Oh, and one final thing, if you would like to learn more about my journey with meditation, you can find me on Instagram, at Meditate with Eve.

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