Gratitude, Abundance, and Manifestation
My meditations this morning were on gratitude and its connection to abundance and manifestation.
So often when we express gratitude, it is almost half-hearted and flippant, when we remember at all the be grateful. When someone does something for us, we say a quick “thanks” and continue on with whatever we were doing. When someone gives us something, a quick “thank you” is our usual response. When we pray, we have a quick list of all the things we are thankful for and we go down the list before asking for the things that we want. We are so busy with our lives that we barely see who or what is around us. And it is all mental. We live in our heads, as the patriarchal society that we live in has taught us to do. We are goal-oriented, competitive, impatient and demanding. It is all about “me.”
But what if we were to take a moment, take a deep breath, and pause to do a reset? What if we pause for just a moment and think about gratitude?
When we come from a place of scarcity, we never have enough – enough time, enough money, enough friends, whatever it is that we don't have enough of. We are constantly thinking about that lack, and it dominates our thoughts. We focus on our needs – we need a new car, we need some new clothes, the kids need Christmas gifts, the list goes on and on. We are always in the past or in the future. We are never in the present. These thoughts keep us locked in a never-ending cycle, keep us blind to the present moment.
But the present moment is all we ever really have. It is the only moment in which we can change, in which we can make a difference in our lives and in the lives of those around us. In this present moment, we are neither in the past nor in the future. What is the most important thing we can do in this present moment?
I suggest to you that the most important thing you can do in this present moment is to be grateful. Even if you don't have enough, even if your needs aren't met, even if there are things that you desperately need, be grateful. Grateful for what you do have. Grateful for the blessings already received. Grateful that things can change.
And even if you are not focusing your attention on things that you want to happen, negative thoughts prevent the Universe from sending you positive outcomes in your life. So if you are constantly thinking about how much you hate your job and how awful the people you work with are, you are preventing yourself from receiving the things that you do want. It is like building a big brick wall and each brick is a negative thought. The blessings from the Universe, or God, if you will, can't get through. Positive thoughts, however, remove the bricks and allow the blessings from the Universe to flow into your life.
But more, gratitude assists you in manifesting the things that you want in your life. When you get really good at feeling and expressing gratitude, start being grateful for the things that you want in your life that you have not received yet. Dr. Joe Dispenza's quote that “Gratitude is the ultimate state of receivership” is true, because when you express gratitude for things that you have not yet received, you are telling the Universe that they are already yours and the Universe will bring it to you. This is a powerful tool to manifest abundance in your life. Can you be grateful for something that you have not yet received? It isn't easy, but when you do it, you will change your reality. Visualize yourself already in possession of whatever it is that you desire and feel the emotions that you will feel when it is yours. How will you feel when whatever it is that you desire is yours? Call up those feelings along with the feeling of gratitude and see how much faster you are able to accomplish your goals. It is not about thinking. It is not about posting pictures of what you want on your refrigerator. It is about spending time each day to pause, take a breath, and feel the joy of abundance and be grateful for it.
November 18, 2025
But more importantly, learn to be grateful for the blessings that you desire but you have not yet received. You see, this existence is controlled by your thoughts. Yes, that is correct. What you think creates your reality in each passing moment. So if you are worried about things in the past, you are telling the Universe that you want more of what you had in the past. The Universal Consciousness, or quantum energy field, is alive and conscious and is deeply connected to you. It is the energy that creates our reality and it is directed by your thoughts and emotions. “As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he.” Proverbs 23:7. The Universal Consciousness does not understand negatives. So if you are thinking “I don't want the car to die on the way to work”, the Universal Consciousness hears “I want the car to die on the way to work.” With negative thoughts like that, chances are really good that the car will die on the way to work. You have to learn to flip the script and focus on what you do want, not what you don't want.
The second most powerful emotion that you can feel, next to love, is gratitude. Everything and everyone responds positively to gratitude. When you sincerely thank people for the things that they do for you or give to you, it makes them feel appreciated and they will want to do more or give more to you in the future. When you are sincerely grateful for the things that you have, you tell the Universe that you want more of the good things in your life. That is the key to abundance.
Dr. Joe Dispenza famously states, "Gratitude is the ultimate state of receivership". This quote means that when you feel genuine gratitude, you are in the best emotional and energetic state to receive what you desire into your life. It is considered the "ultimate state of receivership" because it aligns your internal state with your intentions, making you open and receptive to manifesting those intentions into reality. Practicing gratitude on a daily basis strengthens your ability to be grateful. You might even want to create a gratitude journal to record all of the things on a daily basis that you have to be grateful for. It is a very powerful practice and can help you to move away from negativity into abundance and true joy.
