Good evening. Wednesday. Mental blank then. Oh my gosh. Why do I always say, “Good evening” in a funky way? Weird. Anyway, maybe I need a new intro. Today, I wanted to talk, and tonight I wanted to talk about … I talk about gratitude a lot, and I practice gratitude a lot. Today, I really noticed something that I’m getting better at but still need to do a lot of work on, and that is the gratitude where you act with gratitude and that someone says something to you and you say thank you. Give you an example. When … Women, I got to say, girls, we are the worst ones at this. Someone comes up to you and goes, “Oh. I love your frock,” and we go, “Oh. I’ve had this for years,” or we go, “Oh my God. I got it on sale at Macy’s. It was only $10,” or we say, “Oh. Really? Oh. Oh. It just hugs the wrong spots.”

Why can’t we just say, “Thank you”? I showed you last night … It was Elodie’s birthday. I showed you the cake I made, and I talked about it. Someone shared a photo of the cake in a foodie kind of group I’m in. I’ve had lots of compliments and people messaging me and things like that, and I noticed how I kept going, “Oh. Well, you know, it was good for just like a mum job, but not perfect,” instead of just saying, “Thank you,” and it’s wrong. It is wrong. It is wrong. It is wrong. You can’t … I’ll say it again, I’m analytical with a woo woo rising, so I’m not all about everything you say or do comes like … I think there’s practicalities to a lot of that stuff. That’s just how I think, but I do totally, 100% believe in the power of practicing gratitude. Totally. Totally, totally.

Pinterest - Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless - Samantha LeithSo I’m not being legit. I’m not. I tell you I’m practicing gratitude. I write in my journal, as you know, every single day, five things I’m really grateful for. This week, I’ve … A couple of things I’ve written this week include coffee and my bed. Yet, when someone says to me … The shoes I was wearing last night, someone gave me a complement on my shoes. I’m like, “Oh my God. I got them for $17 at Macy’s,” because I did. That is awesome, but I didn’t start by saying, “Thank you. Really happy I got them on sale. So happy about them. Thank you.” I started with the justification, and it’s what … We shouldn’t do that. We shouldn’t do that, we shouldn’t do that, we shouldn’t do it.

I think we get taught it from a young age, especially when we … I know my mother definitely did. “Oh. You know, you don’t want to be … think you’re better than anybody else,” so if something had cost a lot of money, or something was new, or … you toned it down. You didn’t just say thank you. You always justified something by saying it was cheap or old or a hand-me-down or … And if someone said, even in my performing, if someone said, “Oh. Great show,” “Oh God … Oh God. I missed so many notes. Can’t believe I’ve got so many words wrong,” always are putting yourself down. This is going to lead into … Tomorrow night, I’m going to talk about self-deprecating humor, which has always been a really big one for me, as well that I think I’m getting a handle on.

We have to stop these things. We’re not in our own power. We’re not being true to ourselves. We’re not taking ownership of our lives if we keep putting things down. We’re just not. You know? Thank you for all those people that said to me, “That was, that’s an amazing cake.” Thank you to those people that messaged me and went, “Oh my God. You should start a cake business.” Thank you. But no, I don’t know how people [inaudible 00:04:30] do that as a full time job. Not my jam at all. To people that said my shoes were nice, thank you. To people that told me I look lovely, thank you. You know?

The things I got compliments on last night, my dress, I said it was old, my shoes, they were cheap, the cake, not … good by mom … How ridiculous? Good by mom’s standards but not professional. Really? That’s just moronic, Samantha, like dumb-ass moronic. You are better than that. So I’m sharing. We have to … I consider myself pretty … I’m pretty aware of the dialogues and the language and the self-manipulation inside my mind that goes on, and I’m still putting myself down like that and not just saying thank you.

So tomorrow, my challenge for you all tonight and tomorrow is someone says something to you, “Great essay,” “Thank you.” “Like you cushions.” “Thank you.” “Gee, your house is clean.” “Thank you.” “Fabulous coffee you made.” “Thank you.” Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. If you are starting to do my … Lost the ability to speak. See? I can’t do this late at night. If you are starting to follow how I do my journaling practices in the morning with the five things I’m grateful for, tomorrow, I’m actually going to write down five things that, in the last 24, 48 hours, I needed to just say thank you about. You know? So sometimes, and it’s not tooting our own horn. That’s totally different.

This is when someone genuinely says something to you or offers you a praise or an … Doesn’t even have to be praise. It can be an acknowledgement. You know? Just say, “Thank you,” or, “Danke,” or, “Merci,” whatever language you want to do it in. But just practice saying thank you, because I think that’s the other side of gratitude that I haven’t been getting. So I’m really, really going to work on it. Until then, thank you for watching. I know many of you pop in, and I get messages. Not everyone’s live, and I just, I appreciate everyone that watches this and the feedback and the comments I get so much. I really, really, really do. So thank you, and goodnight.