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- [00:00]
A
All agents, This is all of it. I'm Alison Stewart live from the WNYC studios in soho. Thank you for spending part of your day with us. I'm grateful that you're here. On today's show, we're launching a series go local about keeping your money in your community. We're partnering with the locavore herself, Caroline weaver to shout out places where you can buy gifts at local independent stores. Today, we'll take on staten island. So get ready to call in with your favorite store in Sheldon. Then we'll kick off another installment of our series, full bio. This week, it's a deep dive into the life and legacy of movie star martial artist Bruce Lee. Then deb Pearlman, smitten kitchen founder, will adjudicate the best Thanksgiving side dishes. And of course, we'll take your calls. That's the plan. So let's get this Thanksgiving week started with gratitude. Being thankful is an important part of the holiday season. Taking a few moments during the next six weeks to be thankful for friends and or family, it's wonderful. But embracing and expressing appreciation daily is something you might want to practice. Kristy Nelson is a writer who says gratitude is her guides her life. She's the author of many books, including wake up grateful the practice of taking nothing for granted. And Christy is with me now. Welcome to the show.
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B
Hey. I'm so happy to be here, Alison. Thank you.
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A
So we're going to talk about your story in detail in just a little bit, but I want to have a sort of a definition here. What's the difference between the gratitude and gratefulness? Because you use those two terms differently.
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B
I do. I'm a big proponent of gratefulness. I think gratitude is. It's kind of a light gratitude. Light is kind of how I think of it. It's a fleeting feeling. It's something that we are accustomed to associating with a response. It's a reaction to getting what we want. And when things go our way, we have gratitude. And so we kind of count those as our grateful moments. Gratefulness is actually. I call it gratitude for life. It's kind of the. It's more unconditional. It's a way that we can not be grateful for everything but be grateful in every moment. It's an orientation. It's a way that we live when we really do take nothing for granted. And it's kind of a radical calling, in a way to say, what does that really mean? To live in a way that takes nothing for granted. And I think that's really worth the conversation. It's a much bigger expression than just gratitude in the way that we become accustomed to using it.
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A
Why can gratefulness be a good thing to do for oneself?
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B
Super good for our bodies, super good for our minds, you know, mental health right now and physical health, such big issues, you know. And we know that when the more that we feel grateful, so they've kind of measured it scientifically, the more that we feel grateful, the more that our body has strong immune responses. We supposedly sleep better, you know, all of this stuff they can test. And it's kind of like it's like gratitude is the great medicine, you know, and so. And yet it's super fleeting, you know, and it's highly conditional. So if you want to have all those benefits, it's better to have it as much as possible in every moment than just to say, what are the three good things that happened for me today?
- [03:43]
A
Right, listeners, we want to hear from you. What are you thankful for these days and why? What are you grateful for? Give us a call, 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. It big. It could be small. It could be for someone in your life. Ahead of Thanksgiving, we want to know how are you showing your gratitude or your gratefulness? Our number is 212-433-WNYC 212-433-9692. You can call in, you can join us on the air, or you can text to us as well. Let's talk about your story. You were hit with a difficult health issue. What happened?
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B
Got super sick when I was 32. They didn't really find out what it was for nine months. By that time, it had metastasized. I had cancer and it had worked its way through my body into my spine. So by the time they diagnosed me, I was a stage four and I had an atypical Hodgkin's lymphoma. And the prognosis was not super optimistic, not looking so great. But at 33 years old, by the time I kind of came out of surgery and went through all the treatments that for another year, I realized what it was like to live in a way where I didn't take life for granted. I really did. I didn't take almost anything for granted. It was just amazing to get to get a second chance at life. Right. In a way when I thought it was not going to be granted to me. And what I realized was that also goes away after time, you know, in a way, we start taking things for Granted again. And so what I realized was, oh, this is. We get a second chance at life every day, every single day that we wake up. How can we cultivate a way of going through life that actually appreciates so much more than we typically do? Because we're. We're so socialized to want and want and feel scarcity. But what if we actually looked at everything we have as extraordinary?
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A
Like any habit, it can be hard to maintain a grateful or attitude or to express gratefulness. What are some of the biggest obstacles that you find with people who can't seem to be consistently grateful?
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B
Life is challenging. And so being a human being alive on the planet, you know, poses its challenges. So it's basically a universal. And I think that's important. You know, we all struggle with practicing anything. And so that's why I wrote the book was it's loaded with practices because I think we have to remember so illness, profound illness, loss, sometimes almost losing something that you really love and getting it back. You know, we all have these reference points for things in our lives, those I call wake up calls, and they give us perspective. And so part of what we have to look at is what are the practices that give us perspective too, right? So that we. How do we remember the things that are most important to us? Because when we have a wake up call, we remember what's most important to us very vividly. So many people do, and then it flies by the wayside. It just kind of dies on the vine. And so for me, that was my curiosity was how do we develop practices so that at moment to moment we can return to that feeling of gratefulness and not taking things for granted.
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A
Let's talk to Katie on line one. She's calling in from Manhattan. Hi, Katie, thanks for making the time to call, all of it. You're welcome.
- [07:19]
C
Thanks for taking my call. I don't have a specific example for this week, but I have a tip that I sort of came up with on my own. Having to do with an inability to find gratitude originally and being somewhat resistant. And I would focus on the negative because that's how our brains are hardwired. And I started focusing on the things that weren't going wrong, little things. I was grateful I don't have a hangnail this week. I'm grateful my hip isn't hurting because it did once. I'm grateful that I don't have a stain on this shirt or I don't have a rip here. Just looking at all the areas where things aren't wrong. Tiny, tiny little things, but just it was just a way to sort of, you know, refocus and get a little perspective and ease my way into the whole practice of gratitude and gratefulness.
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A
Yeah. Katie, thank you so much for calling. Did you want to weigh in, Christy?
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B
Super great example. Thich Nhat Hanh, who's a Vietnamese Buddhist teacher, mindfulness teacher. He says when we have a toothache, all we can focus on and notice is the toothache, but we don't notice the non toothache. So when the toothache goes away and part of what we have to do is exactly what Katie's saying, which is notice what isn't broken, what we can do, not just what we can't do, what is present here. And don't wait to lose the things that we value, to value them when we have them.
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A
I have a question. This is from Allison Host. First time caller, first time question. I used to, during the course of the year, I would write down what I was grateful for at the end of the day in a notebook. And I found it harder and harder to do. And I wondered, should I switch to mornings? Should I do it anytime? Am I forcing myself into this? I'm curious what you think.
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B
So I advocate the book is called Wake Up Grateful because I think it's really important before anything has even happened yet, what can you be grateful for? And that's kind of. It removes it from the circumstances and conditions that we typically tie gratitude to. Right. So it's like, oh, I got this great thing. No. Well, what happens if you wake up in the morning and you are just blown away that you can open your eyes? What happens if you can wake up in the morning and move your feet out of bed? What happens if you had a good night's sleep? What happens if you had a roof over your head? Right. So that we start to, in taking nothing for granted. It's much more powerful first thing in the morning to enter your day and to kind of lay a foundation and cultivate that perspective that says if I really take nothing for granted. Wow. This is extraordinary. Maya Angelou says this is a wonderful day. I've never seen this one before. And I love that because it's like every single day is this new opportunity. And can we be curious about what it is that makes it so wonderful to wake up every day?
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A
That's what I've been doing the past four or five months. And it's definitely worked.
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B
Oh, see, you were ahead of me.
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A
It definitely worked.
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B
That's a good question.
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A
My guest is Kristy Nelson, author of the book Wake up. The Practice of Taking Nothing for Granted. Ahead of Thanksgiving, we're talking about the benefit of gratitude and gratefulness. And we are hearing from you. What are you thankful for these days and why? Ahead of Thanksgiving, we wanna hear how you were showing gratitude or who or what you're thankful. Give us a call or text us now at 212-433. WNYC 212-433-9692. This is TJ from Harlem. They wrote I am so grateful for podcasts this year. I've been really enjoying listening to science topics, spiritual content, funny shows like Good Hang, and I feel empowered knowing more, period. And I include all of it.
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C
Well, thank you.
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A
Let's talk to Katie from Greenpoint. Hi, Katie. Thank you so much for calling all of it.
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C
Hi, Allison and Christy. I'm so happy to chat with you both. I'm a huge fan and this is my first time calling. I'm calling because my brother passed away unexpectedly in July. And as Christy was talking about her cancer diagnosis. And even though it's really hard, I'm extremely grateful for grief because this deep grief allows you to live more beautifully and really appreciate every moment of every day. So thank you, guys.
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A
Katie, thank you for calling in. We really appreciate you and we, we, we feel you.
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B
Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you, but that's so, so moving and just brave. Thank you for calling. And right in the midst of grief and grief and gratefulness actually are very kin to one another. And it's interesting how many people who are really working with grief are so drawn to gratefulness. It's deep. It's, you know, I think there's this shared universe where they belong to each other. And it's about being open hearted and being committed to feeling everything. When we're brokenhearted, we're open hearted. And so I think this idea of really feeling and taking nothing for granted, it's awakened in grief a lot of the time. So I work with a lot of people who are dealing with grief and I think you're just brave to call. Katie, thank you.
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A
The world can be a really turbulent place, Christie. And you might be in unfortunate circumstances and you, and you aren't feeling grateful. You're not particularly feeling thankful. What would you say to someone who doesn't feel grateful at this very moment?
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B
Oh, yeah. And there's, there's a lot. And we're all, you know, we vacillate in and out. I think this, it's important for me. One of the things that's the most dangerous thing, I think, is there's people who have written about gratitude, saying that if you feel grateful, you can't feel any other feeling, negative feeling at the same time. And I believe that's a dangerous misnomer. I think it's a really unfortunate way that it's been billed. And it's not the panacea. It's not for Pollyanna Ish, it's for me. Gratefulness holds everything, and it's. It's not mutually exclusive with really difficult feelings. So for me, it's about adding so to the scale of what we walk around with in our lives. How do we add the awareness of what is working, what is beautiful, allow ourselves to open our hearts? And I think sometimes, to be really honest, we feel that it betrays our grief and betrays our upset and betrays our frustrations in the world. If we focus on what is good and what is beautiful and focus on love and joy, it's almost like I need to be true to my frustration and my upset. And what I think is it's actually very meaningful as a way to. To help us there. I have a quote that I'm just going to say out loud, which is so funny to quote myself, but when I fill my eyes with wonder and my heart with love or joy, I do not betray my concerns for the world or for myself or for other people. I nourish my capacity to attend to them. So when we cultivate beauty, wonder, joy, love, kindness in our lives and generosity and those things, it's not that we're taking our eyes off what's hard. We're actually making it easier for us to cope with what's hard.
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A
Let's talk to Lenore, who's calling in from Men.
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C
Hi there.
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A
Hi, Lenore.
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C
Thank you very much for taking my call. So I often. I don't. Can't do it all the time, but I often listen to your program and I think you're a very, very positive person and appreciate what you do. So I'm Orthodox Jewish, and the morning when Orthodox Jewish people wake up, one of the things we say, and other people would say it too, is I thank you, God, for the fact that I'm here and it's all. So thank you, God, that I'm here. And a friend of mine who's my senior, I'm 81, but a friend of mine who's like in her 90s, she pointed out, she said, when you say this prayer in the morning, not only are you expressing your thankfulness that you're Here. But you're also keeping yourself in good health because a lot of times people have heart issues. If they jump right out of bed and, you know, try to go on with the day, then they can have a serious problem. But by taking the time in the morning to say that simple prayer, it helps to, like, condition themselves from one position of lying down and sleeping to getting up and going on out into the world. And I think that's a very interesting health point about it, too. So thank you very much, Lenore.
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A
Thank you for calling. Dan has a question. Dan's calling in from Brooklyn. Hey, Dan, what's your question?
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D
Well, if you watch salmon going against the stream and you keep seeing them, you know, they fall backwards, the water pulls them backwards, but they keep trying to jump against the water. And the whole issue is where you are versus where you're going. If you have a goal in life, if you have something, you could be grateful for where you are. But all the time there's a certain uncertainty about where you are relative to where you're going that could really make you unable to see what you're really grateful for. And I just wonder how you deal with that.
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B
Wonderfully said. Love the salmon. Okay, so, Dan, thank you. I would say that one of the things that's really interesting is we get so aspirational and achievement oriented and, oh, I'm going to be grateful when certain things happen. And what really is sad about that is it denies and removes us from the present moment. There's something that's so critical about figuring out how to really be where we are and not tie everything to drive and ambition and goals. And I have to do this and I have to do that. And a lot of people tie their happiness or their gratitude to the accomplishment of those things, which makes the journey just terrible. So Andrea Gibson is a wonderful poet and a heroic poet to me and. And passed away this summer in July at 49 years old. And Andrea has a beautiful line in a poem, and it says, worry, or you could say almost any focus on the future is a time machine to the future, and regret is a time machine to the past, and gratitude is a time machine to the present. So when we can get ourselves really here now, it's such a powerful way of really experiencing life and also expanding life. People say, like, oh, how do I live longer? Well, you know, that's often something that we can't completely control, but we can live bigger in the few moments that we have right now, every single moment. How can you live more in this moment?
- [18:46]
A
My guest is Christy Nelson, author of the book Wake Up Grateful, the Practice of Taking Nothing for Granted. Ahead of Thanksgiving. We're at, we're talking about the benefit of gratitude and being thankful. We'd like to hear from you. What are you thankful for these days? Our number is 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. We'll have more with Christy and more with you, our listeners, after the break. You are listening to all of it on wnyc. I'm Alison Stewart. My guest is Kristy Nelson, author of the book Wake Up Grateful, the Practice of Taking Nothing for Granted. Christy, a lot of people are gonna be heading to Thanksgiving gatherings and seeing family and friends that they might have a difficult relationship with for various reasons. How do you suggest we balance, want to be grateful for our family while also having these challenging relationships?
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B
Yes. Yeah. Polarity is alive and well, and it's really important for us to figure out also, too, what's the common ground that we share. And one of the thoughts that I have is just also to say, you know, if people talk about what they're grateful for and kind of keep it in a certain way, I think it's also, it's a very rich conversation. It does bring people right back to the present moment that in, in some ways. So I think one of my suggestions is always, and I get asked this is, is just to go deeper, you know, like in some ways to take it out of the conversations that are up here and go more toward the shared humanity. Figure out how you can read things at Thanksgiving that kind of speak to the common heart, the common heart of people. You know, read a poem, read a blessing, read things that help catalyze conversations that actually reveal common ground. There's lots of time for us to talk about what makes us different and where we sit. Ideologically, that might be different, but I think that, you know, part of it is also going in. You know, I love that saying 1% more curious than afraid and 1% more curious than judgmental. 1% doesn't take a lot. And so I think we can really shift things in our lives and in our dynamics with people by being just 1% more curious than we are making wrong something. And, and that anticipation, that anticipation of things being wrong also is kind of a setup. And it's a really, it feels like a really awful, burdensome way to enter a family occasion that's supposed to be focused on thankfulness.
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A
Let's talk to Susan from Lebanon Boroughs, New Jersey. Hi, Susan. Thank you so much for making the time to call all of it.
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C
Hi. I just love this topic. It's very near and dear to my heart. So not too long ago I went through something called treatment resistant depression. And it was pretty awful. And, and as I was getting well again and things were getting better, I just came to realize how wonderful just ordinary things are. And I promised myself that when the time was right, I would go to a jewelry store and have a little charm made for myself. Well, on that charm, I have written the Wonderfulness of the Ordinary. And it's just a reminder every day. I wear it all the time. Sometimes I show it to people and we get into the story of it all.
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B
But.
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C
I'm just so grateful to be living in the land of the wonderfulness of the ordinary. And you can imagine all the things that would go on my list of the ordinary that, you know, sometimes we overlook.
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A
Thank you so much for calling in. Our next caller is Lorraine from Eatontown, New Jersey. Hi, Lorraine.
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C
Hi, Allison. Long time. Whenever I can.
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B
Love that.
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C
Okay. Hi, Christy. Christy, you came to the Unitarian Church in Lincoln in Monmouth County.
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B
You got it.
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C
That's right. In Monmouth County. And so now we have a group. Maxine, Gunther and a couple of others got us together and we meet monthly and we read individually, but when we come together once a month, we talk about the chapter, we write some.
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D
And.
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C
And we marvel at the difference that gratitude, that gratefulness versus gratitude has made in their lives. So thank you so much. Love you much. I can't wait to tell the group I talk to you.
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B
Thanks, Lorraine. I love it. You guys have a book group that's so. That's beautiful. They took the book and turned it into a book group after I was there.
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A
Let's talk to Lisa in Nyack. Hi, Lisa. Thank you so much for calling, calling all of it.
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C
Hi. Yeah, thank you. I've almost changed what I was calling in for, but I just won't take too much time. But my son passed away 13 years ago and we go every year we go to his grave. And for 13 years I just put it out there that if anyone's interested in coming, we'll be there. And for 13 years, and it happened right this time of year. We were just there on Saturday. People show up every year and I'm so grateful to them because I dread this time of year and I have so many mixed emotions and people show up and I walk away from there so uplifted and they just come to express their gratitude for what my son, the place he held in their heart and just for having known him. And so it's a really beautiful thing and I just immensely grateful for that. And then just one little thing. I've got you. There is, is one thing I try and practice myself and it's been highlighted. My other son had a stroke two months ago and he's doing really well and getting back to doing normal things. But I remind myself all the time, instead of saying, you know, I have to go and do this, I have to go and do the groceries, I have to do that, I say, I correct myself in my mind and out loud I'll say, you know, I get to go and do those things. And it's something that I used to try and do and I've been reminded of it in a harsh way, but just to be able to say, you know, I get to go and do, I get to go and run in, I get to drive, you know, an hour to do whatever I need to do and that some. And you know, it's just a reminder of how lucky and grateful I am for all that I have in that, in the small and in the large things. But I just have so much gratitude for generous, warm hearted people.
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A
Lisa, thank you so much for calling. It was interesting in our last two calls, Christy, people talking about expressing gratefulness in a group.
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B
Yeah.
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A
And not just by themselves.
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B
No, it's so important actually. And that's why I was saying, like, Thanksgiving is an opportunity. What can we, what can we turn around at Thanksgiving in our conversations that we usually have by putting gratefulness right at the very center of the conversation. And, and yeah, there's lots of opportunities for that. And I think collectively it's a really powerful way that we can heal grief is when we acknowledge that we're so many of us are holding grief. And then when we get together and do that together, it's much easier to be grateful.
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A
Let's talk to Thomas in Tom river on line eight. Hi, Thomas, thanks for holding. You're on the.
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C
Hi. You can hear me?
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A
Yeah. You're great.
- [26:34]
D
Oh, good. Thank you. The word practice in the title of the book, it reminded me of something that I wanted to call in about because I practice Spring Forest Qigong every day. And part of that practice is we bring positive emotions in, like happiness and joy and contentment and of course, gratitude. And you know, it's a little bit hard to just find joy all of a sudden, you know, where happiness or gratitude. But I think that if you practice every day trying to find gratitude, then suddenly it starts to Become easier and easier and easier, and you start to feel gratitude for lots of mundane things that are all around you. And it's really helped me and someone else mentioned that earlier in the show, and I just wanted to mention that.
- [27:21]
A
Thanks so much for calling in. Yeah. Let's get down to some nuts and bolts ways people can express gratitude or gratefulness. What are a few things people can do in the next couple of days?
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B
One of the things that. I think there's so many things, but one of the things is to write. To write, actually handwritten notes to people, to leave them for the people who are. I always say, look at the people whose love and labor keep you alive, keep you flourishing in any way. People who pick up your trash, people who. Who deliver your mail. What could we do? Like all the love and labor that's involved in keeping us thriving and keeping life going for us. So I love handwritten notes. I think the practice. I think it was Lisa who said, I get to. That's a really powerful way to turn around everything, because we feel beleaguered a lot of the time. So one of the things, it's like, I get to take care of people. I get to do all these errands. I get to, because I can, you know, and I think that's important. And, you know, this is a time when I think every gesture of generosity and kindness and thoughtfulness can go a long way. And we have a great excuse right now because of the holidays. I wish it was a practice every day, but, you know, one of the things would be to choose someone and to express your appreciation to them every single day.
- [28:49]
A
I think we have time for one more call. Let's talk to Mark in Manhattan. Hi, Mark. Thanks for calling, all of it.
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D
Thank you for doing this show. What a wonderful show. So nice being reminded of how much we have to be grateful for. I've been working with homelessness for over 40 years. I'm now almost 75. So most of my life. And actually, every Thursday night, we reach out to homeless folks on the street, provide food, and help them get into shelter. And this Thursday, we have different groups providing food. This Thursday, the United Sikhs will be providing food. And we switched them from the third Thursday. And when I said to the man, can you serve on Thanksgiving? And he said, mark, Thanksgiving is my birthday. I can think of no better way to serve. No better way to celebrate my birthday than serve. And I am. And the people who come are so grateful for the food we give them and for the shelter we're able to help them find. And I am just so richly blessed every day reminded of how much I have and how grateful I am. And I just wanted to mention that when I just started this work, I met a man by the name of Brother David Steinlrast who's a Benedictine monk who will be 100 years old next July 12, who talks about gratefulness and gratitude and he's still active and such an inspiration to anyone who is interested in learning to more about this might look up Brother David Steinl Rast and his really changed my life. Every moment. Yeah, there's an opportunity to be grateful.
- [30:29]
A
Mark, thank you so much for what you do and thank you for calling in. Christy, did I forget anything? Is there anything we should mention to people before we wrap up?
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B
There's so much more we could say, but I want to also call it, you know, bring it to a close and just say this was a wonderful show and you're the people who listen are so rich with ideas and whys and I think just to say it is a practice and how can we remember what really matters to us and keep reinforcing that? And I love this idea of service because the ripple effects when we give to other people, when we express our appreciation to other people, the ripple effects are so powerful and good for everybody and the whole earth and we really need that right now.
- [31:08]
A
My guest is Kristy Nelson. The name of the book is Wake Up Grateful the Practice of Taking Nothing for Granted. Christy, thank you so much for your time today.
- [31:18]
B
Thank you so much, Allison. I love it. The holidays mean more travel, more shopping, more time online and more personal info.
- [31:26]
D
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