As a child I was frequently admonished for being ungrateful. My mother told me often how good I had it because I wasn’t born during the war (WWII) and that I should be grateful we had food and a roof over our head. In later years, our GP, the ‘family doctor,’ echoed this sentiment when he suggested how fortunate I was and how grateful I should be for studying at university at a young age rather than having to wait for years as he had, and once again because of ‘that war.’
And of course, there was much – and then some – to be appreciated. I remember the sun streaming in through the curtains one Easter morning, bringing the promise of Spring and warmer weather and Easter eggs. And even though I was ashamed and embarrassed at first, I appreciated and loved my godfather for pointing out my competitiveness in a board game. Nobody else had gone to the trouble and I would never forget.
I so enjoyed spending time with him and his wife in their beautiful house; I loved that she was elegant, even though I did not know the word as a little girl. I loved that she wore perfume; it preceded her wherever she went and suited her to a T. I adored that she was an artist and could create beautiful things every day, with such ease and poise.
But what was it about being grateful that didn’t sit right?
Was I just plain callous and ungrateful or is there more to it?
Reading the first paragraph about being grateful again, do you also get this sense of how sticky, servile and guilt-ridden this much-touted virtue of being grateful is? I must have felt it as a child; the unfairness of being asked to extend a sentiment towards something outside of me, something I had no personal and felt experience of. How come I was born when I was born? Was that my fault and was there a suggestion that I should have been born during the war? What had I done wrong?
There was a feeling of being made beholden to strange people and unknown situations and there was the threat of guilt when being asked to be grateful for something nebulous and unfathomable that seemed to have to do with ‘fate’ – if there is such a thing. And what could I possibly do about that?
Being grateful felt like a yoke and imposition, something that was wielded against and over me to put me in my place lest I forget my inferior position in the overall scheme of things. In later years I would hear the expression ‘being grateful for small mercies’ and it confirmed the implied servitude and the pecking order: beware, your place is at the bottom of the heap and be grateful for what you have. In other words: stay in your place and don’t you dare step out of line!
And to top it all, there was the guilt of being ungrateful, knowing full well that to be a good person means to not ever be ungrateful.
In the second paragraph, the words ‘appreciate,’ ‘love’ and ‘adore’ appear: can you feel the expansion and the spaciousness they bring? Can you feel that appreciation carries no demands, impositions or implied servitude? Can you feel that appreciation does not ask anything of us but is an offering that supports and confirms us? Can you feel and do you know from your own experience that appreciation is felt in your body and can’t help but express and share itself around?
Is it possible that appreciation is part of basic self-care, supports our vitality, is joyful and does not need to put one person down at the expense of another/others?
Can you feel that appreciation does not play power games?
So, what is it about two seemingly very similar words that sets them worlds apart? Did you think they meant the same?
What are we buying into when we just accept what is thrown at us and comply?
What do we subscribe to when we are grateful? Is it that which asks us ‘to be grateful for small mercies?’ Are we saying ‘yes’ to servitude, belittlement and guilt?
And furthermore, what do we know innately as children that we then discard to fit in?
What happens to this inner compass that can feel and knows exactly which direction the wind is blowing from?
And finally, would it be fair to say that we can easily be led astray if we don’t feel, discern and stay with what feels true – regardless of the prevailing winds?
By Gabriele Conrad, Goonellabah, NSW
Related Reading:
What is the Science of Appreciation and how does it Evolve All of Our Relationships?
The Art of Appreciation – Helping to Break the Cycle of Self Abuse
Appreciation, Appreciation, Appreciation…..
The Truth about Serge Benhayon 
When we re-connect back to the constellations 💫 and understand the True meaning and purpose behind the word appreciation and how intimacy is inherently connected to appreciation we start to get an understanding about our relationship with heaven and divine-appreciate-ive-ness.
Yes there is a different between gratitude and appreciation. The body feels the difference. Gratitude leaves you thinking of another and thoughts in your mind. Whilst appreciation leaves you with a fulness in your body and no thoughts of consuming your space.
Gratitude is guilt ridden because of other people’s past’s. Appreciation leaves you with more than what words can describe, and in this, more is offered to you by being of service to others.
Appreciation is part of settlement and ties up loose ends, providing a platform for the next step/s up.
Thanks Gabriele, there were a couple of key things in your writing that highlighted the difference between appreciation and gratitude – one was how do they each feel in the body? Gratitude definitely feels to me to be a heavy feeling and a lowering of position, but appreciation feels very light and from within my heart, very strengthening also. You also mentioned gratitude often coming with a pecking order, how true! To receive what we have been given in relation to others experiences and positions, with a big dose of comparison, whereas appreciation is just felt from within and feels very free.
Thank you, Melinda; so well dissected and brought to the point.
Yes Melinda there is an entitlement in gratitude. Whilst appreciation is just is, with no impositions, or expectations.
This is super powerful to clock: “appreciation carries no demands, impositions or implied servitude” and “appreciation does not play power games.” – so simple and free of contraints, and room for expansion and growth and endless inspiration.
There are many who hold or write a ‘gratitude’ diary, perhaps this would be better changed to an appreciation diary to allow for true growth and expansion of expressing our appreciation, rather than a subservience that we have been conditioned into from a young age by expressing gratitude?
Gabriele, this is a very powerful blog that really explores the difference between Gratefullness and appreciation. The former is about subservience and belittlement, whilst the latter is all about equalness and expansion.
Reading this I can feel the grating in my body with gratefulness and appreciation invites me to be aware of all I have to appreciate.
Appreciation for me always feels lovely, opens me up to more appreciation.
Understanding energetic appreciation, as there is a Joy we live in before we can live the true appreciative-ness, and as we are blessed by the way we appreciate life as it is about our connection to our Soul / Essences and the deeper understanding we all equally can be connected.
Having gratitude for something is loaded with guilt and imposes ideals and beliefs onto us, whereas apprciation for ourselves and others builds everyone without imposition.
Just reading what you share about gratitude feels very heavy in my body, gratitude comes with a heavy draining energy.
It’s great to be aware of the words that we are using in order to communicate to/with each other. Some words do seem to have gathered a lot of dust so to speak and the way they have been used can hold an energy that is not healthy nor something we would want to spread around and perhaps some words were born in this energy. I know I often re-read what I have written and see how I have perhaps used a preposition, a very small word, but that in itself can change the flavour of my message – just as here using the word to or with after communicate – can make a difference.
Our choice of words is often haphazard, near enough is close enough, she’ll be right, mate. But it is not, we hurt and dishonour ourselves and others with this casualness.
Exactly.
I agree Gabriele, ‘Our choice of words is often haphazard’, something I am still working on to be more precise and true with what I am expressing.
It’s like we let come out of our mouths whatever and as though it didn’t matter; when in truth it does in fact matter, both to the recipient and the one who uttered the whatever.
No question – being asked to be grateful is an imposition… a command from the outside that you have to be a certain way. Appreciation on the other hand wells up from inside and comes directly from you. What is even better is that like no other resource, the more you give, the more you have of it.
There is certainly an available abundance of the qualities of our true beingness which sustain us by engendering more of themselves as we express them; in this case and as you mention, appreciation given makes for more appreciation. The more you give, the more you have.
Gratitude is heralded as something that is good for our wellbeing. Being thankful for the things we have in life. But it feels like a mind based activity. Talking ourselves into something that we should be thankful for. Appreciation feels much more open, yes I know we can also turn that into an activity where by rote we can say I appreciate this or that, but there is much more to appreciation. There is a quality that comes as we begin to appreciate choices we are making. There is a feeling in the body when we observe a change within, when we observe something we have not done before. This to me is appreciation. It does not necessarily depend on what’s going on outside of ourselves, whereas gratitude is based on the externalities of life.
I love how you have teased this apart and clarified it – appreciation to me feels all-encompassing and it confirms our part within the All.
This is a lovely example of appreciation Jennifer, ‘There is a feeling in the body when we observe a change within, when we observe something we have not done before. This to me is appreciation.’
Being told to be grateful in that way suggests you don’t deserve or should not enjoy what is before you – brings in a lot of unworthiness and contraction whereas as you say, appreciation is very different and feels like a confirmation from which you can expand.
Being told to be grateful also feels as though it comes with a touch or at times even a truck load of resentment and possibly bitterness, harking back to a time in the person’s life when they were doing it tough. And thus, this request is not realy a simple question but feels more like being scolded.
So basically you get abused and have to say thank you and be grateful 😦
Yes, as mirrored by our legal system in plentiful abundance. It seems we are yet not ready for even the most basic levels of respect and decency.
We have made the world so much so about function that we apply concepts and ideas from the outside onto us and meanwhile forget and ignore the deep well of wisdom and knowingness from within where we simply know the truth of things.
I have fallen into this trap of wanting my children to be grateful for the opportunities they have and to appreciate who we have in our lives. I could see for many years that this was an imposition by their reactions to me whenever I did it, yet I still felt it was important to make the point! There was a clear implication that they didn’t appreciate and that they weren’t grateful, which also exposed that I had a picture of what it should look like!! Yet if we live that appreciation in our movements then perhaps there is a natural appreciation that comes from that way of living that is not going to fit a picture but would not hold anyone or anything less than equal.
Appreciation is in how we move and not in what we say so much; only movement is infectious, should we seek such a response, i.e. have a picture of how it should be. Any expectation or demand denotes a dissatisfaction with how things are, possibly frustration and even resentment.
My experience of kids is that its not what we say that influences them, its what we do. They are soaking that up in every moment, every interaction…. so if we genuinely appreciate our lives, the people in them, our kids etc then its only natural that they will feel the health in that and do it for themselves as well.
Reflection coupled with consistency speak louder than a thousand words.
Well said Lucy and your experience is certainly one I too can relate to – but now that I can feel in more depth how imposing it actually is, I am really more acutely aware of when I can fall into the trap of wanting my son to be grateful – it actually feels super arrogant and certainly does not treat the other as an equal. This is not something I would want to continue doing and so it is time to change my movements to bringing appreciation to the fore.
This is a wonderful article goes to the heart of so much dysfunction in our so-called civilised society… With true appreciation everything will turn around.
True and heart-felt appreciation turns everything around from the inside out, with utter simplicity and ease – no protest marches needed.
Appreciation comes with a sense of freedom and expansion whereas gratitude comes loaded with guilt and reductionism. I also remember feeling guilty because I felt ungrateful for what my parents had given me.
Gratitude and the expectation that it should be forthcoming set up a strange emotional bind and reductionism or contraction are indeed apt descriptions of this unhealthy state of being.
Grateful feels like I am somewhat undeserving, like I have to make myself smaller in order to know the value of what I am given, and that I owe myself to it.
We are beholden to something outside of us as well as being disempowered when being grateful is asked of us.
Appreciation is not just being grateful for something you have received, there is something deeper about this word. Do we truly acknowledge the impact a behaviour, a tendency or a quality we have has? Do we understand how this trait of ours can actually be used in the world to reflect truth? If we do, if we connect to the power of our essence, perhaps then we can truly say we appreciate what we bring and have on offer.
Appreciation has depth and comes from within and of one’s own volition whereas gratitude can be shallow in comparison and is oftentimes expected if not demanded from another/others. Gratitude can be expansive and genuine if appreciation is its founding quality.
Wow what a great way to explain the difference. I hadn’t really thought about the possibility of appreciation being the founding quality of gratitude and what impact that may have. Thank you Gabriele.
‘Is it possible that appreciation is part of basic self-care, supports our vitality, is joyful and does not need to put one person down at the expense of another/others?’ True Gabrielle, apprecation is felt in the body and develops into a new standard, it confirms where we are at with ourselves and to develop further. This indeed is a very joyful way of living.
I love that – appreciation as an expression and movement of basic self-care; it makes sense, not only on a personal level but also for society at large and the way we regard and treat each other.
I agree, it is a standard we set that we then live for ourselves and for others equally.
In a world geared towards function and being ignorant of energetic quality, it is no surprise that two words which denote two starkly different energetic qualities have been bastardised as being seen to mean the same.
Grateful feels like something we are expected to do to make others feel good. Appreciation is just a feeling that shines from within us, like the rays of the sun warming us from the inside out.
True Fiona. We can also use gratitude to make ourselves feel good. Something also I am feeling is that with the expectation comes the imposition of pulling whatever we are truly feeling.
In other words, appreciation is effortless and allows the expansion of both!
Appreciation feels complete, whereas gratitude leaves you feeling like you owe someone something.
Gratitude is disempowering and leaves us feeling like we are beholden to something or someone, ‘Being grateful felt like a yoke and imposition, something that was wielded against and over me to put me in my place lest I forget my inferior position in the overall scheme of things.’
How much can come with a word. It is like a a little bomb that explodes from our mouth. We can be so careless in our expression and communication that we can be releasing harmful time bombs or we can deliver love bombs. How we are with ourselves determines the quality of our expression. How we treat others is, on some level, how we treat ourselves.
In my experience it is not just ‘on some level’ that we treat others like we treat ourselves but that it is an exact carbon copy, an identical twin. We might not like to admit or acknowledge it as such, but that doesn’t change the fact. If I hurt another, I hurt myself first and keep that same energy forever circulating until I change what I align to.
You can be asked to be grateful or appreciative. Or you can be grateful or appreciative by your own accord. When you are asked to be by someone else, you are asked to move in a way that is not part of your movements. It is an imposition. When it comes from you, you move (with) it, naturally so.
When we move to please others, we contract and make ourselves into something that is not who we are in order to be recognised, even applauded.
True
Just lately there have been little incidences within the home that have stood out with the actions of my family and what occurred to us in these moments; there had been a lack of appreciation, either for the home or what others do for us. As an example, some drawers were tidied up, but very quickly things were put in the wrong place and what transpired was the fact that there was lack of appreciation. Once this came to our notice, there has been a transformation of how the drawers are stocked and cared for. Now other areas within the house have been highlighted as needing the same care.
Without appreciation we lack the foundation for moving forward and it is then very easy to relapse and go into free fall.
I was intrigued by the title of this article. When I consider the difference, it feels like gratitude is directed at another person or thing and holds the ‘gratidudee’ as less than the other ie. without you I wouldn’t have…Whereas appreciation is more like a feeling or quality for me. It doesn’t belong to anyone and can be used anywhere, anytime.
Appreciation can’t be used as a pawn, as something another can hold over us; appreciation is very personal and goes from within out, not the other way around.
Appreciation feels much more expansive and embracing of everyone, whereas gratitude feels like it is about ‘self’ and is imposing and needy. Great call Gabriele to make the distinction between the two, as they are vastly different.
After reading this I can understand how the two words can easily be mixed up. As I pondered on the word gratitude it kind of felt I owed something for their success or existence.
Whilst appreciation is more personal to the person and can be felt in observing the smallest thing in its grandness. And yes I can feel the expansion of this word – it is beautiful.
Gratitude is like a servitude of some kind, it makes us be beholden to another or to circumstances and played into the hands of notions such as fate, chance and powerlessness.
We do not appreciate nearly enough the details of our day to day life and the people in it that build us up and teach us what we need to learn.
Yes there is a feeling of stickiness, a feeling that there is a superior and inferiority aspect in the word grateful. Appreciation allows space and is well worth adding to the daily routine so it takes front and centre attention in our lives.
I love appreciation. Its something I did not have much of a relationship with when younger and that cuts one off from the world in some way. It makes the experience of being here narrow and we miss out on the richness of our being ness. By that I mean it is so simple to appreciate, it costs nothing, is limitless and is a great source of wealth to share. It can be of the tiniest things that might go past unnoticed. It can be with anyone, including ourselves (and perhaps most importantly to start with ourselves).
Gratitude does imply trying to make someone beholden to us for oner reason or another; it feels like perpetrating a huge imposition and loading another up with strong suggestions of guilt and wrongdoing.
Thank you Gabriele. I grew up with the same sentiment that I had to be grateful for what I had and essentially conform to my parents and grandparent’s beliefs. Do as they say with my feelings not being honoured and met. Life was about blood family and not the bigger overarching love I had for all. I had the opportunity to express my feelings equally and bring me to everyone but whatever it was to keep the older ones ‘happy’ and not rock the boat that was the way it was I had to conform by being grateful.
Appreciation… We can let it shine through us, like the rays of the sun, and when we do that, it shines on everyone.
I feel we do not stop and truly feel words like you have asked us to do here. After all a word is just a word right!!! No! I was doing this the other day breaking down words young people use (especially boys towards girls) with a young women and feeling what did it mean and why do we allow certain words to have such power over us? All very fascinating. And sitting here first feeling the word ‘gratitude’ in my body and then ‘appreciation’ what I can feel is similar to what you have shared in that gratitude asks us to look outside of ourselves for something and even if it does not feel true for us we have to make it a truth! Whereas appreciation comes from within the body, there is no imposition … it just is. It comes from our truth, the truth within.
I remember grateful as a child also being used to toughen you up, like if you twisted your ankle and lay on the ground in agony you just had to be grateful you hadn’t broken your ankle instead of caring for the injury you had sustained.
That is absurd, it is cruel. It is abuse, no less.
Ouch – that approach sounds more damaging than the initial injury and totally misses the point of looking at how we were behaving to cause the injury in the first place.
Being grateful’ is in imposition to be a certain way, whereas appreciation is a responsibility to live.
Gratitude is making us be beholden to someone or something, to circumstances outside our control whereas appreciation enriches and contributes to all of us and the field we live within.
Yes… When we are told to be grateful… And the energy behind what we’re told is loaded with resentment, anger, even bitterness, we really need to feel what true appreciation is like and to reconfigure our awareness so that our children are not encumbered in the way that we were.
Great point in regards the responsibility we all have to not pass the unresolved issues we grew up with on to our children; there comes a point when we draw a line in the sand, forsake comfort and declare that enough is enough, no more lies and impositions.
The strain is only there when we limit ourselves and hold back our love.. Appreciation is instant and should be our foundation, this is a different depth than gratititude is offering us.
Appreciation is freely given and costs nothing. It is a currency like no other, and the rewards ripple out from you (rather than the focus on bringing it back to you) having an effect that we can never fully comprehend on the outside world (much like your Grandfathers comment about the board game). We could always appreciate more….. and more…… and more!
A prime example of compounding interest is appreciation; the more there is to go around, the more there is and then … there is more and even more and then some.
Appreciation is foundational for our evolution. For appreciation is a confirmation of love in activity through our movements, as such encompasses the truth of one and all, allowing us to deepen our awareness as to what is of this truth and what is not, in order for us to live more freely all that we are.
“Appreciation as the confirmation of love in activity through movement” is divine expression = the confirmation of love in the activity of expressing appreciation.
Being told to be ‘grateful’ for something, as another does not have it, goes nowhere towards addressing the said issue, as there is always someone seemingly ‘worse off’, or ‘better off’ than you. And we buy into the current temporal ideal of what is ‘good’ or ‘bad’.
It’s definitely a common thing amongst families to be told to be grateful for something because others didn’t have it. Maybe it is a previous war it’s relating to, or that children in other countries don’t have enough food, so “be grateful for what you have and eat everything on your plate”. These kinds of statements seem to sweep through generations and become quite commonplace without anyone questioning them.
Being told to be grateful does seem to sweep through families, great to call out how yuk it feels, ‘Reading the first paragraph about being grateful again, do you also get this sense of how sticky, servile and guilt-ridden this much-touted virtue of being grateful is?’
It is a horrible feeling when pressurised to express gratitude because of another’s needs. What is worse is the picture that is set up to make us feel guilty and the bullying that can come because of a group alignment to that picture. Yet we know truth, it doesn’t go away and the more I allow myself to accept truth in my life as a loving movement towards myself the more I can hold steady and not fall into a way of being that is not who I am and this includes being grateful. It is also worth mentioning that when I do feel imposed upon to be grateful it doesn’t come with a reaction and a hardening of my body… to read the situation and the bigger picture accepting what is on offer to evolve are key.
The impact of appreciation is super powerful and absolutely necessary for us to grow.
‘Can you feel and do you know from your own experience that appreciation is felt in your body and can’t help but express and share itself around?’
I feel the whole intention of the word gratitude is to change our movements, from true movements in rhythm with our bodies to movements that are out of sync and don’t expand us.
Appreciation was never mentioned to me as a child, yet gratitude was emphasised – “you should be grateful for….xyz.” Even recently at a dinner I expressed appreciation and invited others, including children, to take part, but the host turned it into a gratitude event. Interesting…..
Now that is interesting; it would have been fascinating to observe how people’s posture and general demeanour changed over the course of this gratitude event.
Yes, I wonder if it would have been clocked by anyone else?
Blimey, I was taught gratitude was an all important virtue one ought to live by meanwhile appreciation was held with far less importance almost at the bottom of the pile of ways to live. It is deeply worrying how we are being educated with the opposite of the true and healthy way to live life.
I have been connecting with my inner quality as I am moving in my day, and appreciating this as I move, I love the feel of appreciation and how it brings so much.
Appreciation is a way; it is a movement. Being grateful is not a way but a moment where you pay tribute to someone else you owe something to.
I have been working on deepening my appreciation for some time now, it always has a gorgeous and at times joyful feel to it, especially when shared with another, ‘Can you feel and do you know from your own experience that appreciation is felt in your body and can’t help but express and share itself around?’
Reading this it feels like gratitude came as one big guilt trip and feels as though it only serves to keep people as less. My parents experienced the blitz and were poor growing up and from time to time stories would come up about how hard it was for them growing up under those conditions. Thankfully they did not hold this over us.
I am sure most of the planet can relate to your blog Nicole, how many of us have found ourselves completely wound up trying to do many things at once and fighting the clock. It has become societies norm to rush anxiously around wanting to fit more and more in.
What of cause we are missing out here when we are like this is the quality, when we rush we miss out on true quality and without quality and presence we have to ask ourselves is it worth it even if I do get all boxes ticked.
There is such a difference between being grateful and truly appreciating another. I know for me when someone appreciates me for being me I feel it in my whole body as opposed to it purely being a mental exercise. I find that when gratitude is expressed it comes with a need usually for approval or a wanting of something from the other.
I agree James, I have found appreciation is a whole body experience and gratitude seems to be a purely mental one.
It is amazing how confirming and freeing it feels to be truly appreciated for being me. I know it takes away all the incessant trying and need or want for any recognition knowing that I am already more than enough.
I just did a little googling on gratitude and found a short video. Its seems to be promoted very strongly in the positive psychology arena’s. What I noticed from the video is that gratitude and how its referred to is a seeking outside of oneself, being grateful for what is around us , events, people etc. A lot of what is presented on the outside looks very positive. But there is a realness missing. It feels like a great partner for the word ‘hope’. They are both words that sound like they are offering us something more, but are they really?
Very interesting, this comparison between gratitude and hope. Both look to the outside to bring us something and perpetuate the myth of randomness, chance, fate and a general disempowerment.
That is really interesting Jennifer about gratitude focusing on what is outside of us. I find that appreciation is to do with the qualities of my being and what I bring to the world and how others respond to that, and appreciation is something I feel inside myself with my whole body. Even if I appreciate a sunset and it’s beauty, or another person, I still feel the appreciation as a beautiful quality within me. It seems that gratitude is is for things and events outside of ourselves and is often felt in comparison to what another didn’t have, and it also does not acknowledge the being in any way. Based on that it’s possible that gratitude, as described above in the positive psychology arena, is used when people are disconnected to themselves and experiencing an emptiness and to try to fill it with a ‘positive’ take on their outer life. But the reality is until the inner emptiness is truly addressed by people reconnecting to their essence gratitude is just another band aid for their ongoing misery, and quite frankly it feels like another tool that is based on a consciousness that sees human beings in a very reduced view and excludes their being. It’s another ‘doing’ activity instead of enjoying the being we are.
I love the distinction raised here with appreciation and gratefulness. The former is simple and there is no ask, no expectation, it’s just a way of deeply seeing is there and honouring that. The later is a demand, and the word duty comes in, there is an expectation of pay-back in some form or other, even if just slightly and often it is something that is done by us or another to be recognised or needed. It’s not about offering something or just being used just because. Appreciation is expansive and all feel included, gratefulness is about measuring and payback and becomes about an individual or a group not everyone.
Gratitude is certainly narrow, tunnel-like even while appreciation encompasses the much bigger picture. And, as we know, the bigger picture is bigger than big, it is vast and then some.
Appreciation is an expansion and a confirmation all rolled into one movement. Showing us that through an appreciation we are not only valuing who we are in essence but all others also which then highlights the power of brotherhood within it also.
Love this blog. As a child I was often admonished for being ungrateful and it felt awful. We all get exactly what we need in order to evolve. Our choices are reflected back to us in every interaction and every moment. We need to appreciate it when we’ve chosen or recognise the truth and observe what happens when we or others do not, without judgement.
That seems to be a common theme, demanding gratitude from a child, the thin veil over a jealousy of their lightness and joy.
Gratitude is forced to please the outer world, appreciation is inspired from within ourselves.
It feels like the self in gratitude comes from either its provider, the need to be seen in a certain (grateful) frame of mind and/or the one who requested the gratitude for their own self-gratification. Appreciation on the other hand enriches us all and feeds back into the all.
I have never stopped to feel the difference between those two words. What I feel now is that with the word gratitude, there is a movement to the outside in which somehow I give my power away. Whereas with appreciation word, the movement goes in the opposite direction. It goes towards me and expands through me, as it is the expression of something that is confirmed and celebrated within me.
Thanks Gabriele for this opportunity of going deeper with the understanding of words and its impact in our life.
Very true – appreciation has a feedback loop that gives back, nourishes and replenishes wheres gratitude has a dragging and draining kind of quality,
There is a natural enjoyment with appreciation. No matter what it is that we are doing its enjoyable because we are doing it and moving in a way that remains connected, delicate and sensitive. There is a sense too that their is more within, more to feel. Gratitude feels like being put into a box, its set and bound by walls, that you can’t move beyond.
I was pondering on the word grateful lately and feeling that it was something demanded of me, not my own expression, it was as if I was unworthy of what was being given and therefore has to be grateful. Where as appreciation carries with it no imposition or demands just a sharing of the joy that is felt in that moment.
Yes, grateful and gratitude definitely feel uncomfortable and imposing, they grate.
I used to feel guilty about not feeling grateful for things, feeling bad about being ‘ungrateful’ for things that had been given to me but I’d often not asked for or wanted in the first place. The word grateful feels like a state of being subservient, while the word appreciation has a totally different sentiment and quality: a grandness that incorporates an understanding and an enjoyment of something or someone.
That is exactly the point – demanding gratitude leaves the recipient either diminished and belittled or feeling guilty because they cannot possibly comply or understand what they are supposed to be grateful for.
The childhood sensor we have of what is not right is very well attuned. If only we were confirmed in this as kids so we would not give it up as an unwelcome nuisance. Even though it may be ‘right’ what the adult is saying, if it comes laden with judgment, resentment etc. it is not true to the child (or anyone else!)
Very true Gabrielle, for without discerning there is no observation, no space and hence we wield in the pravailing winds than our own breath. A beautiful reminder of how important appreciation is. To take it forth now.
In this article I have been able to gain a deeper insight to the behavior of many, myself included. For years the ‘be grateful for what you have got’ belief held me and kept me in a space that allowed only a depression. Seemingly life was amazing and I should be grateful, but it lacked my presence, my spark and any allowance of my sense of true self to be a who I was. To be grateful for a life with out our essence is a trap of the deepest proportions.
So true Leigh, you have explained exactly why gratitude is so disabling.
Beautifully said Leigh. The bastardisation of gratitude is very harmful. True appreciation and gratitude are given freely and there can be no imposition to ‘have them’.
Being grateful or expressing gratitude feels like it has strings attached, an alternative motive, whether that be to keep someone in their place. It feels finite. Appreciation is never ending, what we can appreciate is endless. The important thing here is that it is not a mental exercise. Its an observation where something about the way you move stands out and is recognised. That moment is appreciation. When that shift becomes everyday we are then confirming that very way of appreciation.
True, gratitude comes with an ulterior motive, something the person who asks for or demands it is after, usually some kind of recognition. Appreciation on the other hand begets appreciation and is never-ending, like an eternal spring.
How much True Joy would we have in our life if we had and held a never ending flow of appreciation?
I have heard it said that far greater than the nuclear bomb is the bastardisation and redefinition of word. And it applies so well to this context because in truth being grateful and being appreciative are miles apart in their quality yet in our language they are synonymous by definition. This in effect allows us to hide the truth of what is really going on because to be grateful means to be good and to be good is definitely to not be who you truly are.
Interesting that both examples offered here of a demand for gratitude are comparing the current to the hardships of WWII. There seems to always be a play on guilt, lack of deserving and the threat that the item could be whipped away. So very different to appreciation with the recognition, confirmation and joy in the perfection of the moment.
Gratitude feels to me like something we are in servitude to, like a ball and chain we respect is there, like an activity we need to make time for. Appreciation is not boxed or constrained this way but is a warm and full enjoyment of everything that is around. Like a river it flows and has no end – the only difference is if we are swimming with or against the stream. Living contra to the tides of appreciation takes its toll as we obstruct and get in the way of heaven in this world. Your words here Gabriele confirm for me that this simply isn’t worth it.
‘appreciation carries no demands, impositions or implied servitude?’ So very beautifully said Gabriele. True appreciation is a grace that holds all.
Yes no matter the prevailing winds, it is the step we need to make. Appreciation comes from our inside. Blame from the outside – which is never true neither serving any ounce of a person!
Danna that is so true when we appreciate based on the quality of the movements, our feeling inside then to me it is totally different to appreciating what we do. As I spent my life trying to appreciate what I do and that now so different in-appreciating who I am.
It is great to distinguish between appreciation and gratitude. Realising the difference between observing, claiming and being in the joy of the vastness of ourselves and what we are part of, as opposed to holding ourselves less and inferior to something, brings home the fact that at times we may think we are appreciating something but there is a flavour of gratitude at play.
I find appreciation offers much more than gratitude because it is an expression of expansion and confirmation all rolled into our movements. It’s also lovely to feel an expression of appreciation because it is the sharing of appreciation that we can be inspired and confirmed by one expression and one then unfolds this expression can expand our lives through the learning and connection it offers. Appreciation is forever beholding of all.
The thing is, if we just say something but do not feel it it’s like we are lying to ourselves, and if we do that often enough it becomes a habit and then a normal way of living. But it has nothing to do with how we really feel, we simply then have unlearned to feel and know how our actual state of being is deep down.
Gratitude always seems to be associated with something ‘good happening’ or avoiding something ‘bad’. Appreciation can be applied to everything as every single thing we experience is a reflection that we need to help us evolve.
I appreciate the expansion here – gratitude is supposed to be for something good, possibly or quite likely in the eye of the beholder alone whereas appreciation is much vaster and can encompass a lesson learnt, an experience never to be repeated, a mistake that we have learnt from.
Reading this blog again it has suddenly occurred to me that true appreciation comes from within for even when we appreciate something or someone else we are actually appreciating the same quality in ourselves that we are noticing. For to know the quality of something we have to have that same quality in us also.
In many ways we’re asked to apologise for what we have been given or have accomplished in life… Recently I asked someone if I should talk about a specific event/person I’d worked with in an application I was writing, and they replied “just remember not everyone has had the same opportunities”, and although this is true, does this overpower our own personal commitments to work, projects and actually finding these opportunities to contribute to?
Appreciation does not play power games… This is an extremely beautiful and revealing statement and just understanding this could possibly inspire people to experience appreciation on a whole new level… And it is certainly worth experiencing.
Great point – true appreciation is a huge support to relationships and l can see that it leaves no room for manipulation or dishonesty.
Yes it is a beautiful foundation for any relationship, be it family, friend, or work
Having gratitude has been hailed as something positive and something to aspire to, yet it leaves everyone feeling less and disempowered.
The fact is that for many our upbringing has been like this, that we were told how we should feel and what values of life we should adhere to while we already did know all of this but then from the inside. How ridiculous is that when you are being asked to discard that which you already know and replace it with a surrogate of it? It feels like a degradation of our being and in fact this is exactly what we do.
To be ‘grateful’ in the energy you describe Gabriele, leaves nowhere for us to appreciate the Gloriousness of who we are, as we are always handing ourselves over in lack of self worth.
‘Can you feel that appreciation does not play power games?’ yes, reading this blog really highlights this and how being grateful keeps us small where as appreciation holds us equal.
A beautiful blog sharing the beauty and openness of appreciation in our lives and the responsibility this allows us to see. It brings a fullness richness and beauty from within of all we are to the world but it is also easy to see the deminishing of ourselves through gratitude so subtely and something well worth looking at to be able to change it in ourselves lovingly.
This is a great blog Gabriele, and as I read it again I came to appreciate how I was so looking forward to be given presents at christmas time that I would wake up early all excited! This was not my normal way of waking so I am now feeling how being grateful left me feeling empty after such a heightened experience. This has set me up for a way of living where I was always looking for that next big event in my life, which was always outside the true me. This became all about me and what I wanted for christmas and never about true sharing and appreciating the Love that we can bring to others.
I experienced being grateful recently, after reading this blog it was interesting to observe how in the feeling grateful towards another I was actually completely dismissing what was there for me to appreciate within myself.
I can very much feel the difference between gratitude and appreciation as you describe them Gabriele. Gratitude has a heaviness, an obligation, a need, but appreciation has a delight to it, a joy and a pleasure. When we appreciate, it supports our confirmation and our development.
The difference between appreciation and gratitude is monumental, yet I wonder if before I felt true appreciation I would have said their is a difference. In any case each day for me seems to be about deepening my relationship with appreciation and as I do I feel stronger the next day.
Awesome to study the true meaning of words like this, gratitude or appreciation, what word would you choose to be part of your life? It is important to know as when we are unaware we can use the words that makes us lesser that what we truly are without knowing that we are doing it.
So true Nico, words and true expression are so empowering as they create a movement that allows us to flow in the most Loving way in all we do there after, so we use a word that empowers us like appreciation we evolve.
Exactly Greg, we choose for evolution or not that is the ultimate choice we make at any moment of the day.
So true Nico, as we evolve our movements change so we are forever expanding then appreciation takes us to our next evolutionary movement!
Appreciation simply follows what has been inspired by love, truth and qualities from the essence of the initial impulse. Gratitude is the section where acknowledgment of something contrived is expected.
I love that – “gratitude is … where acknowledgement of something contrived is expected”. The expectation of or demand for gratitude is fabricated and stems from our own unresolved hurts.
Possibly connected to seeking of recognition, that external approval that we are ok? It’s a bit of a web we weave. Much simpler and more loving to feel what is there to be felt in the first place.
I was talking with a colleague yesterday about an issue at work. When we finished discussing it, I mentioned how many great things were going on around this issue and that there was so much to appreciate. That then put the issue in perspective as a small blip in a sea of amazing things that go on everyday, often unnoticed and unrecognized. Appreciation is so very important, and we don’t do it enough.
Gratitude is limited by our ideals and values of what is right and good and what we have been able to hold onto, in a sense an expression of our need for security. Appreciation feels much more encompassing of the whole of our being and life and allow us to be with the changing nature of returning to who we truly are.
The gratefulness forced upon us by others, stifles our true expression and knowing and demands of us that we give our power away to another person, ideal or event
A great blog to read and have a real sense of how different these two words are energetically.
Expressing from true appreciation feels unimposing, honest, flowing and expansive.
Expressing with gratitude feels heavy, manipulative, insincere and contracted.
Such honesty to pull another up when needed is a Love that we all know and is far more meaningful and inspiring than those who pander to us or support our loveless expression.
I agree, these two words hold such a different quality. You can clearly feel the imposition in being grateful and the freedom in the expression of appreciation. The first feels like a demand and comparison and appreciation feels like an expansion, a growth.
Gratitude reeks of judgement, that we are somehow better than another, which is an absolute lie. Appreciation takes judgement out of the picture and replaces it with Love!
Agreed Susan, so many words carry a love-less imprint and it is up to each individual to bring awareness to the lies without any judgement only a True Stillness that holds a deep level of Love, a Love which is then sharing an equality.
“Guilt” throws us into judgement, whereas appreciation shows the decency and respect we all should be living so that the appreciating we live is forever deepening.
Appreciation feels like it bubbles up from within you, and gratitude feels like it comes from outside and on top of you.
Yes the word ‘appreciate’ means to value so it definitely brings an expansion with it as when you value something it grows . . . it appreciates . . . .it grows in value . . . I realise that I am repeating myself but the point is it just keeps building on itself.
Appreciation is such an important word to work with – I am finding that when I lack in appreciation, my whole days feels much heavier and harder to get through. But when I stop to just appreciate even just the little things to begin with, then my appreciation has space to grow and I feel lighter as I go through the day!
There is definitely a link in the english language as it is spoken today, between gratitude and lack of worth or worthiness. When perhaps the true meaning of gratitude is more closely akin to humbleness with the most sincere and appreciative observation of who and how a person really is.
I used to think of appreciation as a glance back or a retrospective look we can take with kind eyes. But today I feel it has much more to do with feeling at ease and in the groove of the way we move. If I connect and feel the absolute beauty of who I am and then perform every gesture and act with enjoyment then appreciation is a natural by-product. So thanks to your sharing Gabriele I can see I can take appreciation off my ‘to do’ list and focus instead on the way I move.
Beautiful Gabriele the gift of appreciation of ourselves and others is magical expansive and allows joy in our lives . Gratitude brings a smallness subservience and less ness to all we are and simply a different feeling and energy.
Yes, Gabriele, the greatest gift we can give ourselves is to stay steady and connected to what we know and feel to be true, no matter what the prevailing winds bring.
Yes Janet, if we live with appreciation and Love we can not be blown off course!
I love this blog as I have never considered gratefulness as being something that actually so confines us in a lesser way of being while appreciation allows us to be all the glory that we are.
Sometimes the word ‘Appreciation’ can be mis-used especially if it is combined with an imperative as in ‘you must appreciate that what I am doing is for you’ – and that is using it in the energy of grateful and coming from need. This blog has been a trigger for me to be more aware – I hadn’t realised how often I unthinkingly use the word ‘Grateful’ and how little I use the word ‘Appreciate’. They feel very different and, as many have already commented, one feels heavy, the other feels light. Our spoken language can feel lighter when we are more careful how we use our words.
“Appreciation or Gratitude?” – gratitude to me always sounds stunting and feels bitter, whereas appreciation is like a blossoming of ‘fragrance’.
So true Zofia, gratitude has a grating feeling to it as it rubs against the grain.
Could it be that being able to live in a way that is full of being Great-full with-out any imposition on another just a truly humble existence re-turning us to what feels true? Then “would it be fair to say that we can easily be led astray if we don’t feel, discern and stay with what feels true – regardless of the prevailing winds?”
The demand that we feel grateful for something, as exemplified in the opening paragraph, feels like an imposition based on bitterness or a sense of disappointment or loss. Carrying such emotional impact, no wonder the admonishment to be grateful feels like wading through mud.
I love your suggestion of appreciation being a natural part of self-care, there would be no self-worth issues if we all learnt from young to truly appreciate ourselves.
Appreciation has a holding sense of equality…gratitude feels like the other is holding themselves as lesser. I would much rather someone showed and expressed appreciation towards me rather than expressing gratitude.
There is nothing wrong in appreciating aspects of life as long as it is done first from appreciating that inner essence of who we truly are.
So true Susan. I remember as a child almost feeling as though I was being told off if I didn’t feel grateful for something that another thought that I should feel grateful for, so I would end up showing gratitude even if I didnt feel it. But as you say, it was only based on someone else’s opinion and so didnt reflect how I actually felt.
Great point – gratitude as a kind of gratification to momentarily make the inquisitor happy and pacify their hurts.
Appreciation is an awesome tool that makes us feel expansive and open. When I stop appreciating then I know I have lost connection and am shutting down. To open up all we have to do is appreciate, whether it is an aspect of ourselves or something in nature!
When there is no need there is no need to be grateful. Appreciation is open and generous in equality to all.
I wonder if, as an adult, you demand appreciation from a child, are you truly able to appreciate yourself?
I appreciate what you have shared Christoph, it does beg the question are we even open to the deep level of appreciation you are talking about if we demand appreciation from another?
I would definitely agree, that we are led easily astray, because unfortunately in almost every case, we don´t have a reflection around us, that communicates, confirms and supports us, that what we feel is true. That´s why it is very important, if you realized and became aware again, that you lost trust with what you feel and took on pictures or ideals from the outside and to strengthen your innate feeling and learn to listen to it again + unravelling all the pictures that are filtering everything around you and don´t let you feel pure like you once did.
Appreciation is the mortar that holds everything together… Without appreciation you can have very grand ideas and designs in life, but they will, eventually, dissemble
“Is it possible that appreciation is part of basic self-care, supports our vitality” I would say 100% yes. Because when I don’t my relationship with myself and with others sours and quickly becomes draining.
I recently was reflecting on my life and just how blessed it is, and sometimes I feel at a loss as to why my life has turned out the way it has and why I should be so lucky to have landed where I am. And when I expressed this to someone, they suggested that maybe, I deserved it and I really recoiled from this suggestion. I can easily see how amazing my life is and yet I still often struggle to appreciate it and really let the amazingness of my life around me sink into my body and really feel at ease and content and held in the knowing that I love and live an incredible life. Could it be, part of this has been because I have held life at arm’s length, no feeling worth or deserving of the life I have and therefore constantly striving to prove myself in life and show myself to be enough, seeking outside of me for that confirmation rather than looking within.
It’s as if we pay people back for their kindness, generosity or whatever with gratitude. Someone gives you something and the unwritten rule for your response is thank you. I often hear parents say”what do you say?” and working in a shop, “what do you say to the lady? and sometimes a feeble thank you is offered from the child It is most often not from the heart but from a sense of duty to keep on the right side of the parent or carer. Sometimes our eyes meet and I feel in the twinkle of their eye that there is an appreciation but it seems like it is often more for our connection and understanding of each other rather than any toy, book, trinket or piece of clothing
Appreciation is something that can be felt deeply in the body. It’s like breathing something in.
So true Gabriele, appreciation doesn’t play power games, it is very powerful when we embrace and express it. I can feel the difference when appreciation is present and shared, followed by expansiveness.
Appreciation opens our heart and expands our world whereas giving our power away, keeps us diminished and entrapped.
It is an enormous blessing to have transparency in our lives and for people to share the loving truth with each other – when we pit someone or something as greater or lesser than ourselves then we run into all manner of problems and the true equalness and balance between us is lost.
‘And finally, would it be fair to say that we can easily be led astray if we don’t feel, discern and stay with what feels true – regardless of the prevailing winds?’ – absolutely and it now feels very beautiful to appreciate the love, grace and understanding that we are all sharing here together with your blog, in spite of the buffeting winds of time that we have all experienced in our own way.
Gratitude feels like an expectation, a demand even, to enable the other person to ‘feel better’ about their unresolved hurt by asserting their dominance, as though what they have been through somehow makes them more deserving. Appreciation is a beautiful, unprompted and unexpected, expression of love felt for someone or something. The more we appreciate ourselves, the more we appreciate all that we are a part of.
I was chatting to a friend a day or two ago, and asking him about some things in his life that hadn’t gone ‘well’. He replied to me that he totally appreciated them. This made me stop and double take, he could see this I think and explained further – that everything that happened helped him understand more, and how everything that occurs is there for a reason, so all he did was keep returning to feeling how looked after he was in every single way. I got the clear sense his appreciation wasn’t something he called on when times were tough but an ongoing way of living every day. I feel this ties in Gabriele with what you have to say – so I deeply appreciate that he shared this with me and the impulse that lead me to this blog.
That’s a great example of how appreciation continuously supports us to be more of what we truly are, no matter whether it’s been a bit tough or great.
Indeed appreciation does not entail servitude or making one self smaller than other. Instead it allows more space for the expansion and deepening of who we truly are.
The Tenuous hold we have on our “fate” comes down to our obedience to,
“the implied servitude and the pecking order,” which we do not want to know about because ignorance is bliss! So we fights tooth and nail to hold onto any form of recognition, thus being “ashamed and embarrassed” are all about obedience to keep us lesser than the Truth of who we are. Living and being obedient to who we Truly are, is normal as is the case with “Appreciation”.
This is so power-full when you share Gabriele, as you say, “can you feel that appreciation does not play power games?”
Being “grateful felt like a yoke and imposition,” and you end up with egg on your face.
So, “discern and stay with what feels true – regardless of the prevailing winds?” It is normal to Love and appreciate our-self!
Being grateful is something we should do, or are obliged to do. It comes from a forced-ness. In contrast, appreciation is a natural emanation and contains so much joy.
Yes, I agree. The difference is huge, hence why we tend to react when we are asked to be grateful because it goes against our nature.
Thank you for the invitation here to reflect on our relationship with these words. Interesting that I can use both of them in a way that sounds good but disempowers me. Gratitude for the most part only gets used when in one way or another I feel undeserving, or imagine myself not in any way responsible for something that is bestowed upon me. But I can also use appreciation to put someone or something on a pedestal which confirms an imaginary separation between me and what I am focusing on.The great thing is that I have been learning to relate to appreciation of what I witness before me in a way that confirms the equal beauty within me 🙂
I love the way you as a young girl show a natural and innocent appreciation of your aunty, her perfume, her elegance and her natural talents. Such a lovely response – no need to be told to be grateful for staying in their lovely home, just a natural appreciation of it all.
The energy of the word gratitude exposes the fact that gratitude is not love as it feels hard and connected to doing the “right ” thing rather than allowing the true thing to be.
There is certainly a rigidity and a picture around what is ‘good’ or ‘acceptable’ that herein has been swallowed in order to play the grateful game… who even made up this rule to begin with?
And gratitude feels like you have to make yourself small- I immediately get the picture in my mind of a person that bends its head and thanks to a higher power than himself. Horrible feeling.
Appreciation is a very personal relationship with the world that then becomes an outward expression that supports and inspires others.
I have many memories of being told to feel grateful as a child, and even a young adult, for things that I resented feeling grateful for. It was like an order, that I should feel this way whether I actually wanted to or not. So different to what I know now about the contrast between gratitude and appreciation, and how different this feels in my body.
I really appreciate being able to read this again, it is such healing to realise we don’t have to be grateful for what we have no control over, but can choose to appreciate what is there to be appreciated.
I remember as a child having purses lips, red cheeks and being furious inside because I was supposed to be grateful, then feeling guilty because I was suppose to not feel furious…appreciation feels very different, this is great article for pondering our relationship with these two words and their meaning. We often make assumptions in life, this opens up a new angle…well worth exploring.
There are times when feeling grateful actually feels true for me, I feel very humbled and grateful to have met Serge and appreciation doesn’t quite express what I feel.
I was recently both the receiver and the giver of an enormous amount of appreciation that was simply acknowledging doing how I do what I do, and what others were offered as a result. It is deeply humbling and so honouring to share appreciation for one another in this way, and is so very different from gratitude as it asks for nothing in return.
The act of sacrificing our self to make things easier for someone else at our expense is like a curse that self-perpetuates its self throughout the generations! To accept our selves in what we bring to the world without self-sacrifice is something to celebrate with appreciation!
So true Steve, and the family seems to make the most of this and sets up systems without any escape, then like quicksand once we are initiated the curse sucks you in and there is no way out!
What do we subscribe to when we are grateful? Is it that which asks us ‘to be grateful for small mercies?’ Are we saying ‘yes’ to servitude, belittlement and guilt? Absolutely Gabriele, being grateful comes so loaded and has a religious feel, basically asking you to accept less and be grateful for that because who do you think you are to want more?
I love the detail here you bring to words. In this age being so fast paced and with technology I have found that our language and vocabularies are suffering as a result.
With texting and abbreviations so commonplace now, not only is the meaning of our language suffering, it is being reduced so much so that the pronunciation of the words are being totally distorted from their original sound too.
Being made to feel grateful has an imposition, a heaviness around it, and that unless I was grateful as a child, I wasn’t a good person and didn’t deserve the things I had. This squashed any appreciation I felt to acknowledge and fuelled the circle of ingratitude, proving to my parents how ungrateful it was.. and so it continued. Once I move away from home as an adult I could voice appreciation and this broke the cycle.
True appreciation is a joy to live and feel and the lostness of this world is very sad. Being brought up to be grateful under gratitude is very different and allows an unworthiness to fester and grow of ourselves and is well worth exposing for what it is.
True, gratitude is rooted in unworthiness and holds one as lesser and beholden to something (fate) or someone (the one exhorting gratitude). The demand for gratitude feels like a veritable curse.
It is amazing to feel the gigantic difference in the impact of two seemingly similar words. we ought to pay more attention to our use of words and their actual meanings.
Serge Benhayon is a great example of being very precise in his use of words. In fact because of his dedication I am much clearer about the meaning of so many words and the significance of using them in their actual meaning.
If you look at http://www.unimedliving.com/unimedpedia which takes great care to present the true meaning of words, you may well be shocked to find out just how far so many of our foundational words have been nudged away from their truth – from the glorious reflection that they would otherwise bless our lives with.
It is interesting to observe that we are asked to be grateful for things we have nothing to do with like that there was not enough food during the war and what I noticed a lot: ‘children in Africa don’t have enough food so eat everything on your plate’. Like the facts of us having enough food and the other people not are actually not related – of course we should not waste food or overeat but generally famine in other parts of the world and in a the past, is not related to us eating enough as children. With appreciation there is a valuing of the smallest moments like the sun rising or the quality of the food that is made for us, it always seems to have to do with something in the present moment and not with comparing two things. Appreciation is always about the what is.
I remember as a child being told to be grateful that I had enough food to eat compared to others in the world who were starving. On one hand my parents and grandparents had a point in that I should appreciate the blessings I have been given in life and I was probably taking them for granted and they probably remembered a time when food was not so easy to come by, however the way it was presented left me feeling like I was to blame for other children in the world not having enough food to eat. This meant that rather than me truly appreciating the life I had (which I feel is the result of choices I had made in previous lives) and really honouring myself in that, I ended up feeling bad about it and like I didn’t deserve it or that it was just pot luck that I got the long straw. This really disturbed me a lot as a child and has carried on into my adult life, so it is great to have this conversation about this thank you.
While it is clearly great to open up the topic of appreciating where one is at, i.e. with a roof over the head and enough food to choose from on the table, when it is tied in with and presented as a demand for gratitude, it evokes a sense of having done something wrong and especially so for children. It is bewildering at best and severely undermining at worst. Is that because the demand for gratitude comes laced with resentment if not jealousy of a child who has a lot of light?
What you have presented here is something I am have been unpeeling ever since I read this blog the first time. The feeling of heaviness of gratitude – that it immediately makes us less and not part of the learning. “Being grateful felt like a yoke and imposition, something that was wielded against and over me to put me in my place lest I forget my inferior position in the overall scheme of things.”
The invitation to bring our awareness to how words feel opens up a whole new level of relationship and responsibility with language and how we use it… I love this.
My memory of gratitude is that of being grateful you are alive, have food on your table and basically allowed to exist!!! At its core I’ve held a belied that I am subservient to forces unseen that I have to please in order to ensure my survival. This attitude has promoted a victim mentally – anxiety about being at the whim of the external world in which I have no autonomy: a complete abdication of responsibility; a very convenient truth to stay irresponsible and justify being so. But also simply addressed- choosing to be responsible and move accordingly, appreciating every step away from victimhood.
“Sitting right,” being good, holding the high moral ground, fostering your own agenda and living in gratitude all taste of comparison. They also by dint of the comparison belittle the essence, and keep us in contraction of who we are. Thus allowing us to feel good about a lesser version of who we are because we know no difference keeps us happily in the dark.
Appreciation on the other hand allows an openness that warms the body expands the chest and leaves us free to express with Truth.
If you don’t believe me ask yourself if you have ever lived in one of the contracted form above just feel you used to connect to it and feel what it does to your body? Then let it go appreciate that is not you and feel your breath and openness, explore and feel the difference.
For many years I would express my gratitude quite freely and then one day I felt the servitude and the inequality of being grateful – if felt like grovelling and in some ways manipulative – if I am grateful I will get something out of it. Whereas, as you say Gabriele appreciation sounds expansive and truly loving – it is a way of sharing all of us with the world.
I hadn’t really appreciated that Susan – that in the grovelling I would get something out of it – once again quite self-serving.
Manipulative is a word you wouldn’t normally associate with gratitude but it certainly does have that flavour now you have brought it to light. I love how Gabriele has opened up the Pandoras box and exposed the discrepancies for us all to explore and identify. It makes me appreciate appreciation all the more too.
‘Can you feel that appreciation carries no demands, impositions or implied servitude?’ – I certainly can – appreciation asks for nothing in return, it is a deeply loving and beholding quality.
There is a truth to words and how they are used, honouring this bring ones expression more to life.
Until the presentations by Serge Benhyaon I placed appreciation within the same category as gratitude, an obligation. However I now appreciate appreciation as something very different and empowering.
I clearly remember my 3rd grade teacher who “appreciated” and allowed me to be playful, which was my normal. So I went from being the disruptive student to a kind of focus, which proved I had the ability to learn and went from 45th in the class to the top 10 in 6 months. Next year I had a different teacher and my marks subsided again.
Great observation Greg, about the difference of being made to feel grateful to feeling appreciation and being held and supported at school, which encouraged you to study and learn. We can all remember the teachers who squashed us down and the teachers who appreciated our development.
Yes Gill – just the simple fact that the teacher held us all as equals and “appreciated’ without any comparison!
Growing up there always seemed to be this expectation that we should be grateful and that if we did not outwardly demonstrate that then we were bad in someway. I have never given it much thought that this could be linked to my parents growing up in the war, and their parents having lived through the first world war and then the depression of 1920’s. I often heard stories, especially from my father of the poverty they lived through and what they had to do to survive, so it makes sense that these hard times left their mark.
Absolutley Julie. It is easy to judge, but we never know what another has experinced and therefore been scarred with. It is only with the support of true healing and appreciation of another that we are able to begin to shift these deeply engrained wounds and then it becomes possible to make the shift from gratitude to true appreciation.
Appreciation or gratitude? A simple sorry or a self-deprecating abject apology? There are many ways for us to reflect on how we bring ourselves into the world and relationships… open, honest and equal or defensive and de-valued?
‘what do we know innately as children that we then discard to fit in?’ – We know all, but we learn to stop trusting it.
I love this blog – it exposes so much. Enforced appreciation through guilt is not appreciation at all – no wonder we find it hard to truly appreciate ourselves at times…..we have lost true meaning of the word.
Appreciation and Gratitude are both words that can be bastardised away from their true meaning just like any other word of course. What I love about this blog is how Gabrielle helps to bring back the true version of appreciation which is a word that works on far more than appreciating the physical aspects of a situation – it is about appreciating a person as a whole, in their totallity, and not just what they do. Gratitude on the other hand is a heavier form of imposed appreciation, implying that you are not worthy and that you owe the world. And so this shows how important it is that we hold to the true meaning of words so that we do not lose out on any level when we use them.
“Appreciation carries no demands, impositions or implied servitude” – appreciation holds all as equal, where as gratitude is something I can see as someone on their knees ‘giving’ their thanks in a dis-empowering way. A good point for us all to reflect on, and see which one we prefer.
Yes. An invitation to consider how we choose to approach life and our relationships.
Being grateful for me has a feeling of unworthiness, you are not worthy to have it but now you have it, whatever it is, you need to be grateful. The word came up recently when I filled in for someone at work and what I felt from them was gratitude, a sense that she was not worth it, but thanking me just the same. So different to the vastness and expansiveness of the word appreciation.
Great point you make, the fact that gratitude is tied in with a strong sense of unworthiness.That makes it even clearer how deceptive and sneaky the quality of gratitude is.
I remember being told be grateful for the things I had as a child and grateful for the food on my plate (if it was something I didn’t want to eat) and I feel this word comes from WWII which both my parents were affected by. There is something about the word that comes with an expectancy that you must be grateful for what we have been given in a very imposing church like way. And I can remember this too Gabrielle “And to top it all, there was the guilt of being ungrateful, knowing full well that to be a good person means to not ever be ungrateful.” I remember also hearing the word appreciation but it was used in very much the same tone as being grateful, it is only through Universal Medicine and the presentations by Serge Benhayon that I have come to accept the word appreciation as being a true and loving word, once I was able to begin to appreciate my life and what that meant.
When I consider the difference between these two words I get gratitude coming from my head and appreciation from my heart. From my head there is a limited expression that is borne from intellect and from my heart there is a deepening within and an expansion without that appears to be endless. Loving it.
Matilda that’s beautiful what you share, what a simple way to look at it distinguish the 2 different feelings in the body.
Appreciation is what binds us to one another, and lets us see the ocean which is within and around us all, just waiting to be accessed and expressed.
I’m feeling today the reality is that most of the world does know what appreciation is. It has been tarnished and labelled with same brush as grattitude so relentlessly. ‘You really should be thankful you still have your eyesight or some food on your plate’ – that sort of thing is so often passed off in its place. Appreciation to me is understanding the true magnitude of what life is about, how it fits in and relates and is perfectly designed – who we are and what others bring. It’s enjoying and confirming what you know to be true, so to appreciate first it is clear we must embrace our awareness and senses. Without this it’s just well meaning but empty words we go through the motions with. Thank you Gabriele.
Thank you Gabriele. Superb highlighting of the lacing (prevailing wind) that tends to ensnare us away from our natural ways.
If we teach our children to appreciate, we teach them to feel their own innate value and that of others
Yes I feel that’s so important to our children to appreciate. You find that most children including adults don’t know how to appreciate and struggle in life to appreciate even the smallest things.
It’s as though only the big ticket items count and even then, it is hardly ever true appreciation – more a relief and the question, ‘what is next’?
I used to feel I owed people a lot in the past, I would make sure I got my thank you in, to make sure they did not have anything on me, even presents for them came with force to makes sure that my gratitude was felt, and there was nothing left owing. It is with pressure and a push me pull you sort of situation that I was in with a number of relationships. Appreciation however, is free flowing, unencumbered and absolutely sincere with no give or take, it just is…it has been amazing to shift to this way of expressing.
Thanks for sharing this Samantha – it really highlights the contraction in the concept of gratitude. It’s like there’s a giving just to take the pressure off the false expectation that we need to be grateful. How narrow and small does this protection make the whole process of giving and receiving? When we give in truth it comes from a love that needs nothing in return and when we receive it in this way then we are simply letting love in and allowing ourselves to surrender to it in appreciation.
I am tempted to suggest that gratitude grates, doesn’t it?
Appreciation offers the space to deepen and be more of who we are, whilst gratitude feels more like a token acknowledgement of what we have achieved or what we have been given or created for ourselves. Big difference!
In simple words yes appreciation offers the space to deepen and be more of who we are, the love the pure essence of divinity.
” … Can you feel that appreciation does not play power games?…” Yes absolutely, yet there is enormous amount of strength, honouring, no agenda, positive recognition, harmlessness, surrender and love in appreciation, that this ignites natural leadership…. Could this be a more true expression/activity of power?
The generation that grew up in the war had a very different experience then those growing up with out war. Often there was not enough food and people had to leave their homes. Many of them have never dealt with the fear and their unexpressed emotions and have carried these over to the next generation with comments like ‘you should be grateful you have food and a roof over your head’
Gratitude keeps us in line, thankful from this little place we put ourselves in for what we have been given, whatever it may be, because underlyingly there is the belief we are not worthy of it – so thank you, thank you, thank you a gazillion times. Appreciation holds us in the magnificence we are, and we beam that magnificence for all to see. That the latter is not encouraged reveals much about what is going on our households, our workplaces, our schools and everywhere in society today.
This shows how important it is to restore the true meaning of words, true in the way they resonate in us and not just explain something to the mind. I don´t consider being grateful as such as something negative but certainly it is very much loaded and this load needs to be lifted off to come back to what lays in its essence.
To quote my wise sister, ‘Appreciation is the glue that holds us all together’… she is right. Without it, we don’t have the solid foundation to move forward with.
Grateful can be used as a means of coercion, especially in families and organised religion.
You’re right Michael – it comes with a demand and a ransom back. Be grateful for what I give to you because without it you are less. And with that the lie that we need the outside to validate our worth and confirm us for who we are keeps being fed.
Appreciation is such a gorgeous word, it’s limitless and formless, there are no expectations, it’s a personal, heartfelt expression, which will always be different for every single person as we all have our own unique expression, which is very beautiful to feel.
Being asked to be grateful isn’t only a demand, but there is also a suggestion that it’s something we should have already thought of for ourselves and that we are lacking in someway as it has had to be pointed out to us.
What you point out here further clarifies the ensnaring energy that gratitude exudes and is delivered in and with.
Gabrielle, yes absolutely to your question; ‘Can you feel that appreciation carries no demands, impositions or implied servitude?’ Appreciation is loving, holding and almost the opposite to grateful, being told to be grateful feels like one has done something wrong and needs to be different to who they are, appreciating feels much lighter and honours and confirms who we are and who others truly are and feels very loving.
“Appreciation or Gratitude?” – appreciation is being on the front foot and gratitude on the back foot. And so why would anyone really want to be at such delaying disadvantage??
Two words used, often interchangeably and yet Gabriele has presented here how these two words each have very different meanings and beyond, each being very impactful, one negative and one true!
I appreciate whole heartedly this blog.
If we are given everything we need as a child it is so easy to take it all for granted without appreciating what we have. Appreciation is a choice like anything else. We can learn as children to be grateful, or we can learn true appreciation. To be grateful seems to be a duty, whereas to appreciate is a loving gesture that comes from a feeling within.
Being grateful feels as if there is something that is owed in return, like an unspoken contract or arrangement that has taken place, which has its own set of conditions.
The thing is when we are being asked to be grateful it is not something we express that we truly feel but a fulfilment of form and mannerism that only pleases the outer picture but never honours our inner state of being and feeling.
Gratitude belongs to the shallow realm of politeness as opposed to courtesy – it feels like there are a lot more words to explore.
“What happens to this inner compass that can feel and knows exactly which direction the wind is blowing from?” I love this question, and mostly so because it confirms that we have an inner knowing of what is true and not.
Love the last line… yes one could say that the lack of decernment in general of us is what causes so much illness and disease. Ponder about it. If we are not decerning and hence giving out power away are we not then living life to the best of someone else’s drums?
… not just that, are we possibly even living life to the WORST of their drum beat?
I remember being told ‘be grateful for small mercies’ as if I needed to know I didn’t deserve anything more. It feels like there is no end to the amount we can appreciate, gratitude holds us back but appreciation grows and grows.
Yes, Gabriele, this is very pertinent question for all of us – “What are we buying into when we just accept what is thrown at us and comply?” I experienced this last night, and could feel the impact in my body of not speaking up. I did later on, but at the time I crumpled in a heap. There is a lot here to address in terms of the hurts we are choosing to protect, rather than stepping forward with the truth no matter what.
What you say is important Janet. We would not accept half of what is thrown at us if we were not harbouring and protecting against hurts. It is useful to see our hurts and issues because sometimes that is enough for it to start to heal and our relationship with it turned around. And when something consistently trips us up it is time to seek assistance. I have found Universal Medicine modalities immensely supportive in this area.
Yes it is not only fair but true to say we can easily be led astray if we don’t feel, discern and stay with what is true. That is one reason why imposing gratefulness grates because saying you should feel this or that interferes with our development of clear and true feelings and awareness.
Reading it like that makes me feel that gratitude is like a curse even, much stronger even than a bind and humongous imposition.
For some reason this reminds me of how my mother used to say we had to be nice or make up any disagreements before we went to bed in case someone died in the night and we didn’t get a chance later.
“I loved that she was elegant, even though I did not know the word as a little girl. I loved that she wore perfume; it preceded her wherever she went and suited her to a T. I adored that she was an artist and could create beautiful things every day, with such ease and poise” – melting, and how gorgeously descriptive this feels Gabriele, the whole energy of it is scented by your appreciation…it smells so wonderful i can smell it all the way over here in Singapore : )
You would, wouldn’t you? It’s like something has come alive in me, the appreciation of the fact that I could feel and sense it at that age and let it touch and enrich me.
I had a conversation today about gratitude, how sometimes when we feel the comparison and jelousy of others, we feel the need to excuse ourselves or our lives and apologise for how we are – but if we compromise ourselves for the handful of people who react to us, then everybody else misses out on the reflction of a life lived with joy, vitality and true appreication.
The term “Be grateful for small mercies” is so constrictive and limiting compared to the fact that we can appreciate the magnificent Sons of God that we are, the glory of the love that is our nature and the abundance of the volumes offered to us by the Universe we are a part of.
No wonder that we don´t know appreciation to be a very natural and empowering expression when from early on we have been sold gratitude and shame, guilt and recognition to be the social currency. Appreciation doesn´t seek to measure against an outer marker, ie it doesn´t compare but recognises true value in relation to a person´s inner being and unfoldment and hence is confirming of who one naturally is.
I love what you have said here about appreciation – “it doesn´t compare but recognises true value in relation to a person´s inner being and unfoldment”. How amazing would it be if this was the foundation of all relationships, with self and others?
Appreciation certainly holds another in absolute equality and confirms the love we each are, whereas gratitude curses us with its demands.
Spot on. We ask to be lead down the garden path when we don’t honour what we feel.
“I appreciated and loved my godfather for pointing out my competitiveness in a board game. Nobody else had gone to the trouble and I would never forget.” I love this sentence because it reminds me that we have such an incredible influence on our young and we should remember that we are always being watched by them, and so very often our actions speak louder than words.
Appreciation feels so very expansive in my body whereas the word gratitude feels very restrictive.
Yes, Gabriele, I too have always disliked the saying ‘be grateful for small mercies’ as it implies that we are sinners and do not deserve anything other than the scraps of life, which completely negates our divine grandness.
Being taken for granted, is then disguised as lack of gratitude, how messed up is that? Or, just another way to keep us small. We can feel the imposition of gratitude when we fully appreciate ourselves.
Being grateful feels a little like being lucky. Like you should feel this way because of where you are. It discounts the work or effort that the person has put in to get there.
I feel that gratitude denies and tries to negate commitment whereas gratitude felt more like it’s based on a haphazard if lucky lottery win.
If we do not feel there would probably be not much difference to be noticed between the two words but we do feel and there is a world of a difference between the two. Being ungrateful feels like saying we can’t have an amazing life and absolutely be joyful, it says we should make ourselves small and not publicly enjoy it. Appreciation though brings in all that what the people probably are asking for when they want us to be grateful deep down: valuing what we have got but also feeling we deserve it and are allowed to shine and grow.
Gratitude can be demanded. Appreciation can only be offered.
… which explains why appreciation and gratitude are in truth diametrically opposed.
I love this Gabriele, this reveals that the word gratitude is demeaning, it feels heavy, thick and yucky and that we are less – not worthy. Whereas the word appreciation feels uplifting, expansive and joyful with a wonderful open acceptance of ourself, allowing no room for comparison or judgment. I feel after reading what these words represent they have absolutely nothing in common, in fact they feel the total opposite of each other.
What strikes me is that there is no performance required in the appreciation of your uncle, its just for being who they are. No trying, ho hoops.. genuine.
To be ‘genuine’ brings such a quality of integrity to all interactions and is deeply supportive in all relationships.
Appreciation is something all together different to gratitude – to me while gratitude is something to give outside of yourself, appreciation is like a warmth that comes from within and is shared with others.
It is complete poison being told to feel things other than what we truly feel and this is one of the many ways we greatly harm our children. It would be a very different world if we supported them in developing clear feelings (clairsentience) and did not impose ideals and beliefs on them.
It is quite something to consider how much we do that (tell ourselves and each other what to think or feel) in life not just with kids but also with our own internal dialogue which of course developed from what we experienced as kids. Wonderful that you are breaking that cycle with the children you teach Michelle.
Yes, we too readily insist, impose and demand of another and at the same time sit in the arrogance of believing we know better, know another’s feelings and assume to dictate their choices.
There something insidious about the concept of gratitude – just as in the offering of a hand to someone in a patronising way. Such a concept demands of the person to perceive a lack first and foremost. Then they are to be thankful for being rescued out of that lack in some manner. It is hideous. Completely opposite to reminding one another of the joy of equal power, beauty and grace that resides within every one of us.
Appreciation confirms and honours one´s dignity. The kind of gratitude expected by someone lacks that dignity in both parties.
Yes, it says a lot about the person who expects it.
“And finally, would it be fair to say that we can easily be led astray if we don’t feel, discern and stay with what feels true – regardless of the prevailing winds?” Absolutely we can be led a stray if we don’t discern and stay with our feeling, more and more I have been noticing that, where I have just stayed steady and true to me it has felt awesome.
‘Being grateful felt like a yoke and imposition, something that was wielded against and over me to put me in my place lest I forget my inferior position in the overall scheme of things.’ So well said Gabriele.
Grateful means I owe another, or they owe me, appreciation is a the choice to see someone for who they are with no needs or criteria for that ‘seeing’ it is just is what it is, and there is an expanding and unifying feeling in it.
Gratitude is contraction. Appreciation is expansion. Contraction is a movement away from God, expansion is a movement towards God.
The expansion towards God is an inward movement, contraction comes when we seek outside of our own connection to God.
Powerful words of truth Sandra.
Great that you have pointed out that oh so crucial point Sandra, expansion towards God is indeed an inwards movement, which is why life is purposefully set up to keep us seeking and moving in the opposite direction, outwards. Our education, personal development, business, sport and so many other aspects of life are rigged in such a way that we are continually looking to ‘climb ever higher’. And yet in order to arrive back at the beginning, which is, in truth where we all want to be, we need to discard the things that we have taken on that are not us. It’s about relinquishing not collecting.
I too hear this sentences “be grateful that you are not born in war” from my grandparents and I have to admit that I never thought about it ever since. Therefore I love it Gabriele what you have shared about it in your awesome blog. Appreciation or gratitude???? If I chose now I would chose appreciation as it fills me up with joy and love. Gratitude feels a bit like an obligation – a thing I have to do and something that is not straight from my heart.
The word ‘gratitude’ is belittling and full of shame and guilt and feels narrow and mean. The word ‘appreciation’ is like the caress of a ray of sunshine and is full of joy and feels expansive and enriching.
I like your summary of appreciation and the difference to gratitude Gabriele – it points out to be effected by gratitude or the guilt is the lack of appreciation towards yourself. It is a much needed commodity of our growth as human beings, as said here – “Is it possible that appreciation is part of basic self-care, supports our vitality, is joyful and does not need to put one person down at the expense of another/others?”
Gratitude almost comes with a sense of debt and owing, to be used for negotiation and control. Appreciation is more like observing something beautiful and just taking a moment to understand it, with no attachments or strings attached.
Appreciation is a quality that allows for the space to grow and evolve, it is the fertiliser that nurtures and empowers the bud to blossom in full.
So beautiful what you say appreciation being the fertiliser that nurtures and empowers the bud to blossom in full, allowing space to grow and evolve. So simple so clear.
Gabrielle, this is great we have so much to appreciate and all the systems in the world are seemingly set up to distract us from being connected, then “feel, discern and stay with what feels true – regardless of the prevailing winds?”
Sometimes we can hold minimalist versions of appreciation with ourselves and only appreciate ourselves to a point but not go all the way and accept all of us in the moment, because this little voice inside the head says, but what about this or that, so you basically are reacting to what you see and then judgement comes in.
“Can you feel that appreciation does not play power games?” – spot on Gabriele, gratitude is a power play where as appreciation simply just is without any imposition on anyone, and only offers expansion.
If we are ‘grateful’ then we will not complain or call out what we can otherwise feel is not right around us. Gratitude is a platitude that attempts to keep us silent to the lovelessness that is all around us.
You have made a vital point that it is crucial ‘that appreciation is part of basic self-care’. Once we commit to this and the joy that unfolds when we do then we can see clearly how gratitude comes with strings and we have no need to tie ourselves in knots.
“Being grateful felt like a yoke and imposition, something that was wielded against and over me to put me in my place lest I forget my inferior position in the overall scheme of things.” This is indeed a heavy burden to carry for anyone through life. Thank goodness we are coming to know the true value and depth of appreciation thanks to the wisdom and clarity of Serge Benhayon.
Appreciation feels very light, rich, joyful and full… a full-bodied-ness. Gratitude feels like a servitude and something “Gollum” like from The Lord of the Rings, something a bit slimy and dark!
I agree Appreciation feels very light, joyful and full, where as Gratitude feels dull and loaded. Wow as we just connect to the words we can feel the difference.
I have had many people in my life express to me that I should be grateful or see how lucky I am to be where I am, born in the time I was, have all that I have in my life be they material things or opportunities. It always felt like someone was telling me that I was not deserving of my life and somehow had to make myself worthy by showing thanks, by giving and giving and giving to the world to prove I was working hard for the life I had, to try and dull it down and make it look less amazing or joyful than it was, to live in a constant apology that I didn’t suffer the struggles of those in a past generation. But when we make people feel this way about their lives, how will we ever resolve the suffering or create a society where everyone has better opportunities? If we cut others down for the lives they lead and make them dull themselves down then everyone misses out on the otherwise reflection they could be offering the world of what a life a joy and true appreciation looks like.
Appreciation is like a really balanced diet that comes from listening to your body and Only eating what you really need to eat… Sure you can eat anything, but it will not serve your body at all. A really balanced diet is the foundation of our truly healthy bodies… Appreciation is the foundation of self-love.
This shows how important it is to appreciate ourselves for being apart of the universe. When we don’t feel this connection we are then unable to trust our young appreciating all they are incarnated with.
I love this statement …”I remember the sun streaming in through the curtains one Easter morning, bringing the promise of Spring and warmer weather and Easter eggs….” as it reminds me of how I too would notice the sun streaming in though the windows of our house, of the stillness in our street created by the fall of snow and time had no boundary when looking up at clouds in the skies. So many moments of connection brought about by noticing the beauty of our natural world.
‘And finally, would it be fair to say that we can easily be led astray if we don’t feel, discern and stay with what feels true – regardless of the prevailing winds?’ Absolutely, when I stray from what feels true. I slowly fizzle into a whimpy, sooky ball and give up on expressing in life at all.
It is incredible how we have been overlaying false ideals and beliefs onto our words. I wonder if this is how mankind managed to so completely misinterpret the words of Soul-full messengers throughout the ages.
Not that long ago my relationship with the word appreciation involved looking outside of me, being wowed by someone or something, and feeling happy as a result. Thanks to the prompting of Serge Benhayon, I have been reflecting deeper into the meaning and significance of the use of words. I now realise there is no separation between me and that which I appreciate and that the act of appreciating in itself is acknowledging of and confirming the grandness within me and All of us. My understanding of the power and significance of this word is growing daily.
I am as yet unclear of the extent of false ideals imposed on the word gratitude. But I agree with everything mentioned in this blog. What our current relationship with this word reflects is awful.
Both this article Gabriele and one by Fiona Lotherington on ‘Hope’ (https://medicineandsergebenhayon.com/2017/09/04/the-evil-of-hope/#more-990) expose the divisiveness of words and how they can be used – by self or others ,to keep us away from the joy of living connected to our true selves.
Appreciation, or lack of it, is at the root of any relationship – with ourselves, another, or a group of others – without it there is room for all manner of judgement. Appreciation brings out the fullness of us all..
Spot on Gabriele, to be grateful is to assume an inferior position in life before we even begin to acknowledge what it is we are to feel grateful for. Appreciation on the other hand is unrelated and begins with the premise that we are the beauty of what it is we are appreciating.
I can relate to what you say Elizabeth. Writing thank you notes continues today (and a whole industry around it too), especially with children and gifts. It often feels forced, something imposed on them by parents.
A timely article Gabriele. I woke up this morning reminding myself to appreciate all of me and all of life.
I realise now that being told to be grateful actually stifles appreciation. I had lots be appreciative about in my youth but the obligation and demand curtailed it. I love what you say Gabriele that appreciation is not a part of a power game, it is simply deeply felt.
The pressure to be grateful can easily push someone over the edge to feel very negative about life, what happens around them and the ‘hand they’ve been dealt’. True vitality is where we can express a huge appreciation for the amazing details, relationships and lessons we’ve learnt in our lives, and there is a focus on sharing this with the world rather than stressing about being ‘ungrateful’.
I find one of the most challenging things for me is to deeply appreciate not what I do but who I am, yet at the same time this is so natural. Overall this makes me appreciate the importance of building a depth of care, love and appreciation for the little things in life.
What your exploration of gratitude and appreciation shows is how very much we have made life about rules and mannerism, that has however nothing to do with our inner knowing and caring anymore.
Gabriele, I can so relate to what you have written here
“Being grateful felt like a yoke and imposition, something that was wielded against and over me to put me in my place lest I forget my inferior position in the overall scheme of things.”
when I was given something as a child and then told I was ungrateful, because somehow I wasn’t conforming to their picture of how I should be or react. I would wonder to myself then why give it to me if you feel I’m ungrateful? I found adults really confusing because they would say these are the rules and then break those rules they had put in place and when in my innocence I questioned them they didn’t like it and out would come those words.
“You are the most ungrateful child”
I had not thought about it before this blog but yes being grateful does come with a sense of guilt or shame or having done something wrong, where as appreciation feels very different.
‘Can you feel that appreciation does not ask anything of us but is an offering that supports and confirms us?’ Absolutely so. There is something truly ‘wholesome’ about true appreciation that leaves no one lesser or beholden. I had not ‘appreciated’ this before. Thank you Gabriele.
Appreciating our qualities allows us to see and appreciate the qualities in others, which brings a joy and lightness. Gratitude feels forced and harsh in comparison.
Appreciation when demanded can feel forced too. We as a society seem to have bastardised the truth of many words eg love, God, religion, gratitude and appreciation. All words when delivered from the truth they hold that quality just as we have all felt that words delivered in an imposing or demanding or expectant way also hold that quality. Our attention to our quality is key.
‘…would it be fair to say that we can easily be led astray if we don’t feel, discern and stay with what feels true..’ yes, I agree Gabriele, also I feel we can easily get caught up in the emotional dramas and hurts too. It would be very supportive to encourage and allow our children to feel, discern and stay with what feels true for them.
I wonder whether when somebody demands you are grateful for something, then it is something they haven’t resolved for themselves. If it is a true blessing I would be more tempted to say ‘enjoy the blessing’ without demanding that they enjoy it – that would be imposing.
Good point – there is most likely a lingering sentiment of resentment and bitterness when someone asks another to be grateful for something; which makes the whole exercise of gratitude even more imposing and forceful than it already is.
Gabriele, reading this I can feel the vast difference between gratitude and appreciation, gratitude feels like we should be grateful for whatever we have and however things are, even if they are not loving, supportive etc, whereas appreciation is appreciating the love that is there and the qualities of ourselves and others, appreciating feels true and gratitude feels false.
‘being grateful for small mercies’ is a curse that is expressed unintentionally yet still is a curse.
When something has been addressed or nominated the wind has been taken out of its sails and that has what has happened here to our old friend gratitude.
Appreciation makes the heart glow with love.
Yes indeed Rowena and how differently life feels and is seen from this.
‘It’s an ill wind that blows nobody any good’ but, we always have a choice where we sail too.
When I think of being grateful, I picture a person bowing down looking submissive and seeing themselves as less than anything else and that they should be grateful for whatever they get or are given in life. There’s also a feeling of having no control over or say in what happens to you. Where as when I think of appreciation and feel it in my body, it feels full, expansive and aware. Appreciation connects us, we see ourselves in each other, where as being grateful feels individual and separating.
Yes, it is a picture of somebody who allows others to impose on them.
Yes, so true Aimee being grateful disconnects us from one another, it feels like it creates a void and a dis-ease that we know is not true.
It is common practice that a way to love in many cultures is to berate and criticise, believed that forced humbleness and servitude, imposed guilt and being not enough is going to encourage people to be better. But needing to be better is already leaving behind our innate preciousness and worth as well as ignoring the appreciation of who we already are. Every time I hear criticism disguised as love, my whole body would be alarmed, it took me a long time of reaction to come to the now understanding of why people express this as love and in-truth they are just wanting to love, but not knowing a true way. No one can force another to appreciate themselves, but when we know this is true and our bodies confirm the loveliness of it, we can keep this consistency with ourselves and others.
“In the second paragraph, the words ‘appreciate,’ ‘love’ and ‘adore’ appear: can you feel the expansion and the spaciousness they bring? Can you feel that appreciation carries no demands, impositions or implied servitude?” – totally Gabriele, the second paragraph you can feel the expanse of freeness, of love, and in the former first paragraph restriction and the pretence of love.
Great blog Gabriele! I was brought up with a similar dialogue and can remember when I decided to express how depressed I was as a teenager to my father (which was huge for me at the time) my father’s response was that I should be grateful for what I have as there are children starving in parts of the world and my problems are nothing compared to theirs. I know now that it was hard for him to deal with the emotions of a teenage girl and that he was not equipped to deliver me the appreciation of who I am because he had little appreciation of his own worth. I also know now the importance of building a strong foundation within no matter what your age. One that is based on a connection to who you innately are so that you learn to appreciate yourself as being this and not rely on the appreciation of others from outside of yourself.
It does grate when someone tells us that we should be grateful. When we express gratitude it needs to come from within us otherwise it is simply false as it has not been felt.
Absolutely. This is very true. It is about the how these words are also used. When something is felt and said from the heart it is genuine.
Exactly Rebecca, very well said and we can feel it when gratitude is expressed from a sense of duty instead of from the heart. I am now more aware of how much our world is expressing from a place of emptiness and not from true appreciation or from the fullness of who we are. With more awareness I am learning to observe and not react to.
When I appreciate, I feel light and often a smile comes very naturally to my face. When I do gratitude, it feels heavier in my body and like it is something that I need to “do”.
I notice when I appreciate the true qualities in myself and others daily it builds a foundation of seeing life from people’s essences and the true flavour we are each here to bring.
Yes gratitude feel like a penance, it is very laced with false religiosity.
Yes this is what I have experienced growing up and leaves many people feeling more levels of guilt. A combination of both can be harming on ones knowing that was far from living what we know is our truth.
Gabrielle, this is great, could it be when we are asking someone else to be something, then that what-ever is what we are lacking in that area of our life? So then is it possible we are not looking at our unresolved issues around gratitude for what our lessons in life are, which places ungrate-full as something we should appreciate and learn from and not impose upon another? Then when we do come to the realisation we are responsible for the finer detail we are immersed in this is great, and being great-full or gracious has a humble-ness and can be appreciated.
I didn’t consider until reading this article how gratitude is in fact laced with remnants of guilt and even the begging of forgiveness almost. And we use this term commonly and flippantly in our everyday language.
I’m similar Katerina, it is only recently I have had these words and its full consequences brought to my attention, and it does stir memories of times where I have felt imposed on to be grateful, it can be such a horrible imposition. And yet there is always room for more and more appreciation, that feels like it enriches everyone’s life and asks nothing of us we would not gladly offer.
yes Katerina me too, it really highlights the importance of the words we choose when communicating and the energy they carry.
Appreciating is our foundation for when we wobble. We go back to appreciation to steady the ship.
Yes Michael I am also sensing this more and more in my daily life – how much appreciation can steady the ship as you say when things get intense or there are the inevitable wobbles along the way.
Appreciation is like a bedrock foundation for us to always come back to.
I like that, Michael, as when we wobble it is so easy for us to go into self doubt and critique, which makes us wobble even more! Daily appreciation feels like good medicine.
To be ” grateful for something, the word sends me shrinking and I feel a pulling in of my light. A feeling of having done something wrong and needing to be taken down a peg or two as you mention Gabriele. Appreciation on the other hand is expansive and light filled. A wonderful sharing Gabriele thank you.
It also feels that when someone asks us to be grateful for something or towards someone that their request or instruction in some way contains either a judgement or a reaction of some kind.
When someone says, be grateful, you can really feel how it pulls you down a few pegs instantly, whereas appreciation comes naturally and just has to be shared, with love at its core.
Yes, this word comes so incredibly loaded and feels totally yuk, which makes me contract – there is a judgment from that, I have been selfish, thoughtless and loveless. However, if I am invited to appreciate I am being given the opportunity to expand and become more all encompassing.
Gratitude is a mental activity. One that we use when we know something does not feel right, but rather than address this for ourselves we say, “but I should be grateful for what I have” There is a real capping here, a living less and not connecting to the more that we all are. Appreciation is endless, there is always room for more and it supports us to see and feel that not only are we more but that all others are that very same more. Its true its the foundation to self care and self love and allows us to feel our inherent worth without even having to do anything.
It is amazing the difference in the feeling reading the way you have describe these two words – I very much get the sense of belittlement in the way the word grateful was being used and with appreciation there feels like there is an equality there, a confirmation of yourself and others and inspiration with that to be all of who you truly are.
Gabriele thank you so much for writing this as I can feel the remnants of guilt I picked up and pocketed as a child for not being grateful. It came with such admonishment when it was said, such accusation that I was bad for not being grateful. And yet these accusations came as such a surprise to me, I was unaware that someone had gone out of their way to give me something and expected gratitude as payment – though I wasn’t aware of the contract or asking for anything.
I felt unloved when I was called an ungrateful little so and so but actually I had chosen to personalise what was really going on: my ease at accepting the flow of how things were coming to me was making the adults around me jealous. They didn’t like that they’d lived through an era that they found challenging and and whatever lessons that still were presenting themselves to them. I chose to want to be loved, to want to get approval and not have the jealousy coming at me. So what did I do? I became subservient to what other people think I should feel and be like. I made my life one of struggle so no-one would be jealous, a life where I had to work incredibly hard to get anything so I could never be accused of being ungrateful. This is huge and something I hadn’t actually realised before reading this. But these choices to avoid being labelled ungrateful and feeling the guilt of being ungrateful to something abstract and unknowable a lot of the time growing up and unpredictable because it was based on the moods of the adults around me has been crippling.
I now can let go of that and choose to allow life’s flow and embrace the abundance guilt free (well, the possibility is there for me to choose) with a deep appreciation of all that is me and comes my way. We do not have to live believing in scarcity as is the norm (just see the panic buying on fuel or bread when rumours circulate about limited amounts of such items).
Gabriele, thank you for another thought provoking article. Funnily enough I was pondering recently about the feeling of saying Grace, the words that people say either before or after eating. The version that I know is “For what we are about to receive, may the Lord make us truly thankful/grateful. Amen”, it conjures up images of rather dishevelled people, smiling thinly as they tuck into gristle and greens! There’s also a kind of subservience to it, an enforced acceptance that ‘this is your lot, so just accept it and be grateful for it’. It sucks the power out of life and encourages us to stay as we are and be ‘grateful’. There’s a palpable stagnation about being grateful, whereas appreciation is embedded with forward movement and a certain spring.
I used to work for someone who’s motto in life was ‘gratitude is the best attitude’, and as a result would literally shower you with thank you’s and daily token ‘appreciations’ of the weather. This ‘attitude’, never sat right with me. It felt forced, like it was something that was necessary in order to be a good person in the world. It felt icky and heavy. And so yes, I see a clear distinction between appreciation and gratitude.
To be honest I have never looked at these two words together and yes how they are used and what they mean have an importance in how they feel. I remember ‘grateful’ being used when I grew up and how it was something I should do. At that point I tried my best but never seemed to be grateful enough. Yet at times I can feel that is how I can also use the word appreciation. I support at their core they are two very distinctly different words and when it comes to feeling the words carries an imprint of a meaning and also the deliverer adds their own energy to this meaning as well. Appreciation used truly is a building block and a key to expanding your awareness of the world where grateful seems to stop short and not hold the same level of expansion.
I can definitely feel the loadedness of grateful. Such a clear difference between this a appreciation. I do however feel that gratitude is also different from gratefulness, and that it’s true meaning has been misused to the point where we believe that grateful and gratitude are the same.
Appreciation is nothing to do with what you do. Appreciation is an inner understanding and allowing of the being that you are and all that it brings in daily life.
I never thought of it that way Ariana but it makes sense, both from what I experienced and then loaded onto my children. Bringing awareness to something simple like a word and the loading that comes with that word can have such a massive impact on our mental as well as physical health.
Thank you for illustrating the difference between the two words so well, I have to say I was probably hooked by the ‘grateful’ one for a very long time. Yet I could really feel how much being appreciative is more all encompassing and leaves room to grow. We can offer that difference to our children and stop the curse of that guilt.
When I remember the times that people have said I was ungrateful, I can now feel how much those statements were coming from them as a neediness for me to be a certain way based on their own lack of acceptance of others and inability to take responsibility for their own life situations.
I have a distinct memory of feeling very guilty because I was not showing how grateful I was to my parents for a birthday gift. Now I can see that having to show how grateful we are is loaded with expectations.
Love it Gabriele. Makes me wonder if those that ask us to be grateful would do so if they truly were appreciating themselves and what they bring and are to.
When you asked if we could feel into the quality of the two paragraphs I could without a doubt. Yet I didn’t consciously register that I had felt the difference. Makes me wonder how much this occurs in life…
What is makes me realise Leigh is that everything is either encouraging us to be the truth of who we truly are, or the lie of who we are not and this is going on constantly, it is actually what is behind the whole of life. Everything boils down to these two energetic sources that set everything in motion. One energetic source that ensures that we keep on repeating the same choices that keep us in the dark and then the other source of energy that offers us the opportunity of choosing something different that gives us access to the light of awareness and therefore a way out of the illusion. It is for us to discern what the energetic source is of every single thing.
Gabriele, spot on! The word gratitude comes so loaded, and yes it comes with the imposed belief that we are small and have no part to play in anything that comes to us – that we are simply victims of what life metes out. What if however, there was such a thing as reincarnation and that when we are born and where is a direct result of the past choices we have made? If we can ‘appreciate’ this then everything starts to open up!
Appreciation comes from allowing ourselves to feel deeper and deeper layers and hence having an understanding of ourselves and of others which then translates into a joy that cannot but be shared around.
Being grateful is certainly a way to give your power away – on the other hand being appreciative is a way to hold each as an equal and yet have so much joy in what comes your way and all that you can feel. Thank you Gabriele for this awesome insight!
In gratitude there feels a bondage and there is nothing you can change about that only being grateful to be in the position you are in. Appreciation feels completely different and leaves us free, it is coming from our inside and can never be imposed upon us. Thank you Gabrielle for writing this piece about two words from ‘two worlds’.
I’m glad you took this blog where you did. Appreciation is not based on comparison one iota. Appreciation is based on the quality we feel in relation to people, places and objects.
This is very exposing of how gratitude is imposed upon us, a mental construct of how we should be… whereas appreciation comes from our own heartfelt experiences.
Jealousy and comparison are so insidious… like being hurt by experiences in WWII, and then to compare those experiences with you growing up ‘with it so good,” one can celebrate the new and good life, or dwell on the old hurts and experiences.
Gratitude comes with a belittling feeling, demeaning and being less… whereas appreciation presents a fullness, a joy and a quality that includes everyone.
Oh, Gabriele, you have reminded me of the guilt I felt when I was younger for not being grateful. I was constantly told how much I took for granted as a child, and all the hardships others went through. And I thought the same as you..“ it’s not my fault, I didn’t ask you to do that”. I absolutely now do appreciate all that others did, not just for me but for everyone, and we can contribute in service for others without needing any ounce of gratitude back from anyone.
Appreciation has a depth and quality that can be felt in the very particles of our body. I feel it is spherical in nature, and is as you say Gabriele, expansive. When we truly appreciate, we expand the energy of this thing, or being in our lives. It is a very powerful act.
I love this blog, as I never really considered the difference between appreciation and gratitude. I too was brought up to be grateful but not to appreciate and it is only now, thanks to the teachings of Serge Benhayon that I am learning what true appreciation is and how important it is.
‘And finally, would it be fair to say that we can easily be led astray if we don’t feel, discern and stay with what feels true – regardless of the prevailing winds?’ Yes it would be fair to say. I find gratitude is what people seek when they are acting ‘good’. They think by being good they should get a reward of some sort, in this case a person gives their power away to them so they feel ‘good’ this is being grateful, giving one’s power away.
Reading your blog brings a clarity to how different gratitude and appreciation feel, thank you.
Thank you for bringing light to this. How often were we asked as children or do we ask our children today to say thank you? It seems we have made appreciation into a mannerism that needs to be upheld but that does not give room for truly feeling what is going on and what we are blessed with (or not).
The word gratitude has never sat well with me either. The other word that comes up when I hear someone say they are grateful, is subservience. When I think I need to be grateful I can almost feel myself going down on my knees and giving my power to the one or the thing I am supposed to be grateful for. In stark and wonderful contrast, when I use the word appreciation I can feel an expansion throughout every particle of my being, the joy starts to bubble up from deep inside and a smile is not far behind.
It just goes to show that the words we use are thought of as harmless and yet they actually are loaded and laced with having us be less, and accept that less. It reminded me of the many conversations I had with my mother who would look at how bad others had it and would say something like ‘When you look at how others are suffering, I’ve got nothing to complain about’.
We are grateful when we are in comparison to others – we can be appreciative when we see everyone as equal and unique thus having appreciation for our own inner expression and essence.
This feels like stepping over egg shells; be grateful ‘or else’ everything could be taken away from you.. Although it is so important to appreciate what we have, this way of living keeps us on our toes and on the verge of guilt for being so ‘lucky’, when could it be that our choices have much to do with how our lives panned out?
Appreciation from the heart, feels expansive, no lessening on one or another, no ties, collusion or owing someone, but pure joy and registering a divine spark within another being.
Fantastic work Gabriele debasing these words that are imposed on us from an early age. A child is naturally appreciative, they move in self appreciation and a joyful connection to themselves.
What a beautiful and revealing sharing on the real difference between appreciation and gratitude and how much they effect us. The absolute expansion naturalness and joy of true appreciation and the allowing of this with ourselves coming from within our body as apposed to the subservience contraction and guilt of gratitude that does not serve us in any way and allows a feeling of being lesser putting down and imposition .To truly appreciate ourselves allows true appreciation for everything and everyone joyfully and us to open up to the world the universe and the all and is an every expanding process.
“….. what do we know innately as children that we then discard to fit in?” Fitting in – that starts when young in order not to feel left out and then continues into adulthood. Hardly surprising when one puts ones head above the parapet you get shot down. All part of keeping the status quo. Yet when a few get together to question the status quo things can change and a true momentum can build. A true reflection can then inspire other people. Serge Benhayon is one such individual.
Gratitude so often comes with an imposition from another that that is how they expect us to feel about something which gives us no space to feel what is true for us. Appreciation offers an allowingness of what is there to be acknowledged and confirmed and in this we have the opportunity to grow. Thank you for exposing how uninterchangeable they are and how damaging it can be for children to be told what they should be grateful for rather than being supported to be their own person and express from there.
What an interesting expose of these two words that we generally just take for granted. How being grateful is something that is almost expected of us, whereas appreciation of oursleves is something that we can find so hard to accept.
From my understanding of what you are presenting here “gratitude” is something you should have, or are expected to have and “appreciation” is where you are naturally thankful and your whole body is filled with joy from it, it’s authentic and raw, whereas gratitude is something that can be demanded.
Reading the second paragraph I could feel the appreciation, the joy and the sense of harmony that came with this which reminds me when I am in appreciation of another then this is what is being emanated.
Superb blog, Gabriele. Until reading this I had not appreciated or discerned the implication of gratitude – that it is to be beholden to something or someone else and hence lesser. I was brought up to have ‘gratitude’ and now appreciating its implied submission feels very liberating. Thank you.
Upon contemplating the words gratitude and appreciation in my body, I feel they are miles apart! When we are in the movement of appreciation it is an expansion of what is already there and what is coming to us when in connection to our truth. Whereas, gratitude comes from a lack of embracing what is our natural right.
Gabriele, this article is really interesting, the other day I was talking to my son about appreciating his party and all the work that had gone into it, I bought in the word ‘ungrateful’ and saying it felt awful, I can feel how it is like a putting down and it felt like I was saying he was wrong, reading this article I can now understand why, thank you.
Gabriele I really appreciate you raising this as I’d not really considered ‘being grateful’ vs ‘appreciation’ before. You are spot on though, the stickiness of ‘being grateful’ and how that has been ‘used against me’ in my life when I was doing things that were not true has haunted me, yet appreciation is free from that stickiness and very powerful.
If we took reincarnation into consideration there have probably been many many times you have lived or fought in wars! And yes I agree being asked to be grateful is asking to be what someone else wants and feels and not truly coming from within you .. so very insidious. A great blog to debase and expose what gratitude really is and instead asking the reader to ponder on appreciation as well as the words love and adore .. yes definitely expanding in feeling with these words.
This has given me a lot to ponder on. I often feel my child doesn’t appreciate how good she has it! You took the words out of my mouth, I am not feeling very good about that right now! As a parent I guess what you get caught in is this sense that the child is oblivious to what is so amazing about their chosen life, its hard to know if you are raising them to feel that they are getting much more and then again less than previous generations. So I very much love what you have presented and as always it comes back to knowing that love and your connection to love is what is needed and the appreciation of that.
This is a really great point Gabriele. When people ask, or actually demand, us to be grateful it says so much more than just that. The feel is very much about us having to suffer and shut down our lightness and joy of having a great life just because another has not. It feels a bit like jealousy and the cutting down of the other person just because they shine too bright, to then not to feel our own choices of not moving on and shining our own brightness.
So well said, Gabriele. I can’t think of an example right now, but I am sure there are many words of which meanings we became a bit stroppy with and ended up allowing untruth in their expression – add to it the translation factor, I am not sure how much of truth we are actually communicating when we choose our words with little to no discernment.
When we don’t discern feel and stay with what we feel is true, we are very easily led astray – by what we think we should do (instead of feeling and knowing), or aligning to what others think we should do. When we stay with what we know, and feel is true, we may find ourselves in uncomfortable situations that don’t fit the pictures of how we might like/want/need things to be, but there’s almost always an opportunity to evolve and grow, when we stay true to ourselves.
Gabriele great blog that asks us to sit with the words and feel the vast difference between them, and there is a huge difference.
‘being grateful for small mercies’ was something that was said all the time within our family and it used to annoy me no end as a child, I hated the connotation of those words. But shock horror they we so ingrained in me I used the phrase myself towards my family and friends as an adult. I can now see that as children we assimilate other peoples ideals and beliefs and then live them as though they are who we are, and I have spent years discarding all these false ideals and beliefs from my body and am at last getting to the real me.
“And to top it all, there was the guilt of being ungrateful,” The imposition of having to be grateful feels very heavy and an obligation whereas appreciation is a natural feeling of expansion and enjoyment of someone or something and it comes from within.
Thank you Gabriele for bringing the quality of these two words to our attention. Gratitude to me always carries a ‘like it or lump it’ energy, to be grateful that things are not worse, a constricted narrative of life. Appreciation inspires, it opens our hearts, broadens our horizons and cannot be demanded of us, but ignited by our own and other people’s divine qualities. Appreciation is a celebration of our love, wisdom and grandness, a gift for us all to openly share.
The distinction between being grateful and appreciation is really clear in your two examples, Gabriele. I hadn’t given much thought between the two, but yes, being grateful comes loaded with not being worthy, beholden to someone else or something else; whereas appreciation is rich, expanding, inspiring and fulfilling.
Thank you Gabriele, you clearly show that there is a difference between the meaning or the intent of these two words, and I wonder if gratitude actually has a true meaning for itself, a meaning which over time has become changed. And even though it will always be different to appreciation, it still at its core has a valuable contribution to make to how we communicate with eachother.
I often hear people say this to their children, ‘you should be grateful you have good food, shelter and clothes, etc.’, I have said this myself to my children in the past but now, every time I hear these words spoken, I can feel the guilt, the shame and game we play when we use this form of comparison to discipline our children. Does this method work? I say ‘definitely no’ because it shuts down communication, love and understanding. Using guilt to convince people to do what we want mostly likely ends up with unloving results and behaviours that does not support anyone.
A brilliant blog on our misuse of words Gabrielle. This clearly exposes the difference between gratitude and appreciation. To me, the word gratitude feels so demanding, demeaning, sticky and filled with a false servility and humility, designed to bind and perpetuate living in a lesser way. Appreciation opens and expands in my body and feels warm, vast and offering a re-connection to something far greater and already known.
I too remember being told to be grateful for all manner of things when I was a child. There is definitely a difference between being grateful and being appreciative, and you have explained it so well.
Some things I never really pay much attention or think much about to unless spelt out in black and white so thank you Gabriele for pointing this one out. I couldn’t count the times I was told I should be grateful as a child and how bad or awkward it made me feel and you have made me realise I lay the same word on my daughter, maybe not as frequently but I still do. No longer though as you are so right, appreciation has a totally different feel, it is a beautiful word and not at all loaded.
Awesome to go to this detail in the meaning of word and what they bring to us. I have never looked to appreciation and grateful in this way but can feel that in their expression they are mile away from one another. And as you say Gabrielle, being grateful is demanding something of us, something we are not while appreciation is just a natural emanation from deep within.
Appreciation is in the flow of a movement, that is it can be felt as part of the entire experience. Gratitude singles out an event and occasion that is to be acknowledged and accredited as an entity of it’s own. So there is either appreciation as part of the whole or separatism if we are only grateful for a particular part.
Appreciation is not a common word, we tend to use the term being grateful, however the energy of appreciation is so different. I always feel that appreciation is something we have for our and another’s inner qualities. Being grateful is more for outer experiences, like having a job and I feel it’s often used in comparison to what another does or doesn’t have.
Be grateful for small mercies – yes that was bandied about a lot in my life – it is probably similar to ‘Things aren’t so bad after all’ being used when we try to make the best of a situation knowing that others are worse off than us. I like the subtleties of the words – they do certainly feel different – gratitude and appreciation.
Appreciation is allowing the energy of Love into our bodies and seeing how boundless it is as well as moving in its movement.
What an apt point Gabriele. We can learn what it may be like for those in previous generations who went through hardships, but should we need to apologise or extend gratefulness out of ourselves to comfort the situation? Appreciation is a moment that is completely free of these barriers.
Gosh, two words ‘grateful’ and ‘appreciate’ that conjure up polar opposite qualities – reveals just how important it is to choose the correct word when wanting to describe a particular meaning.
Brilliant Gabriele – what a timely reminder that appreciation isn’t so much something you do like a vegetable you must get on your weekend shopping list, but an energy you can live and let flow in you. It’s an energy source we tap into by accepting and allowing life to be as it is. Gratitude as you rightfully say is an obligation to cognitively recognise that we ought to be pleased. Appreciation has no need of that as the flow and the feeling speaks for itself. If you don’t feel it just check the connection and the way that you move.
I found this to be the most beautiful blog overflowing with true love and appreciation for the knowingness of being a Son of God. I too remember those phrases of ‘being an ungrateful wretch’ etc., and when as a child not feeling to eat the mashed swede and turnip while being told to ‘”think of the starving children of India'”- this was always coupled with “you don’t know how lucky you are!” Indeed, I so appreciate this blog as the reminder of the vast chasm between the two words ‘grateful’ and ‘appreciate’. Thank you Gabriele.
I really appreciate what you write hear Gabrielle, but with no gratitude. It is remarkable the strength of difference we can feel between these two supposedly similar words. I feel it is a truly awful thing to impose on a child our own need for them to be grateful, which of course is entirely different from building appreciation into life.
“And finally, would it be fair to say that we can easily be led astray if we don’t feel, discern and stay with what feels true – regardless of the prevailing winds?” – Gabriele what a beautiful piece of writing your post is, like a bedtime story I found myself lost in enjoyment and in time by its truth. Thank you for expression.
This is a genius blog – so potent to really feel the difference. I have often used the word grateful and I’m now wriggling with discomfort to feel the manipulation and abuse in the word; an utterly selfish expression which hooks the ‘receiver’ under some kind of servitude. Ultra imposing that neither serves, supports nor inspires the other – give them nothing back and keep them looking outside of themselves for more “gratitude” rather than “appreciation” which invites them to accept and embrace their own glory.
Grateful is a contract. Appreciation has no small print.
Appreciation is a simple statement, no return or consideration required. Its a beautiful gift and I’ve witnessed it used widely and beautifully as a real blessing (big or small).
We all make our own choices during life, where we are is a result of all of these choices, made by us, no one else. To step into comparison is a very slippery slope, we can’t possibly know everything there is to know about another person, all the previous lives they have lived, the sacrifices they have made to be where they are today. To go into comparison, we have to step away from our gorgeous selves and we are then inviting in an energy that is the complete opposite of the love that we are.
Wow – I love the way you make the distinction that gratitude is something others expect us to have based on their experience whereas appreciation is based on our own experience.
What a beautiful blog, Gabriele, you offer so much for us to ponder on …..
I love the contrast you highlight between gratitude and appreciation. It feels like the comments for you to be grateful came laced with hurt, comparison and jealousy, demanding you to get into a figurative box.
Yes, there is a beautiful flow and spaciousness with appreciation, which treasures all that is and openly shares this with everyone.
I remember being told to be ‘grateful’ many times in my young life Gabriele, and then feeling so guilty as I was led to believe I was a really ‘ungrateful’ person. Whereas the word appreciation didn’t feature very much at all. And Im sure many people can relate to this too. Its no wonder so many of us dont appreciate ourselves when we are laced at such a young age with feelings form others of resentment and jealousy for not having had to endure what they did.
Gabriele, amazing blog and perfect to read today. I had quite a reaction reading it as I realised recently how much I had been complying and yes I can feel the demand for gratefulness in that and appreciation feels so different – I can feel it’s expansiveness, it’s allowing and it’s joy in all within and around, there is no less there and no room for it. Gratefulness suggests favour and servitude, very different. I felt a huge joy in my body reading and considering appreciation today, thank you for sharing.
Equally beautifully shared Monica – it is true that Gabriele’s blog asks us to look at things outside the box. Most of us would have grown up with the words grateful in some form or another, but not many of us would have had the word appreciation as part of our viocabulary. But more so it is about the way the words has been used and how they have come loaded with the guilt, disempowement and oppression. And even the word appreciation can be bastardised in a similar way if we are not careful. And yet the way Gabriele uses the word ‘appreciation’, we can feel how light and expansive it is, just as you have so beautifully said Monica!
I love the power of words and feel that when we say appreciation it offers us a world of expansion and opportunities to connect more deeply where as grateful feels curt and a little sneaky to me. Sharing in one another’s appreciation I find it to be a great confirmation of who we are and it not only appreciates one it welcomes all at the same time.
“Stay in your place and don’t you dare step out of line!”, this line sticks out for me Gabrielle, because I was told at a young age not to speak of what I felt… and I can see how that shut me down for so long. It is only in the last 8 years that I have learnt to express what I feel again, and I so appreciate that I have support to do this and how it has opened me up and how it not only effects me but others too.
Hello Gabriele – I know exactly what you mean! I recently had the same realisation about these two words and the associated ‘feelings’ that they stirred within myself. Here is my take on the difference between Gratitude and Appreciation. http://www.gaylecue.com/blog/whats-the-difference-between-appreciation-and-gratitude
It’s interesting, that dynamic that is so often visited upon us – the need to be ‘grateful’ that one wasn’t born at a certain, more dreadful time, or in a difficult set of circumstances. If we were all aware of choices, karma, reincarnation and responsibility we’d never be able to foist our jealousies on to others ‘more fortunate than ourselves’.
A great breakdown and exposure of 2 words seemingly similar and often used interchangeably but with vastly different meanings. The beauty of appreciation alone is undeniable but very clearly worlds apart when compared.
You’re right Samantha. It just goes to show the power of words and language and how we choose to yield this power. The message that is being imparted on so many levels is vastly different when we refer to gratitude as opposed to appreciating all that there is to appreciate.
‘Grateful’ and ‘gratitude’ surely have the same origins as the awful ‘ingratiating’ – all ugly words. I’d much rather be appreciative and great-full : ))
To want children – or any one- to be ‘grateful’ for their situation is a complete imposition, much like being told about starving children in other countries, it completely debases any feelings that are arising to be exposed.
Gratitude diaries have been quite a thing for many over the years, however I never felt the pull to start completing one. What you have written, Gabriele, so clearly explains why. I’m naturally feeling appreciation from inside me – true and heartfelt.
I did not know there was such a thing as a gratitude diary – each entry an expression and acknowledgement of being beholden to someone or something, each word written cementing a lesser state, an inequality which is not part of who we truly are.
Very true Gabrielle – we are being asked to feel, discern and stand for what we know that is true.. But we have let ourselves go astray from those feelings, nevertheless – we can claim that voice in us back again.
Thank you for highlighting the difference between gratitude and being grateful. It’s one I hadn’t spotted before.
Excellent points Gabrielle, as always I love reading your sharings. I had not consider the word grateful as you have presented – great insights.
There is a sense of obligation and a certain way that you need to be when it comes to being told to ‘be grateful’ however appreciation is entirely different, it is a feeling that comes from within and there is a want to express it outwardly as you know it does not belong to you- it is a very natural feeling and comes with no impositions.
This is so telling of what comes with words. To be grateful feels like we are being told off – it is very cold and comes with a picture of how we should be. But to appreciate – well this is so much bigger, and as is shared here- to appreciate it very expansive.
Grateful is the minds version of appreciation, full of expectation and control. Appreciation is a natural expression from the inner heart; energetically completely different in their flow.
You raise a valid point Gabriele and it is interesting that we use the words appreciation and gratitude simultaneously as if they mean one and the same thing, but when given the chance to sit with them we can all feel how vastly different they feel. In order for us to be grateful we first have to make ourselves lesser than another and from this separation are made to feel like we owe them something. It places an expectation and thus a great weight upon us that feels very imposing. Appreciation on the other hand comes from deep within us and sort of just bubbles up and out of us. It is a full-bodied feeling that carries not an ounce of the heaviness of ‘gratitude’ but is far more expansive and allows us to feel not only the wonderment of the situation/person we are expressing appreciation for, it also allows us to feel the ‘what next’ in the equation.
“Can you feel that appreciation does not play power games?” Absolutely, I have felt the difference between the two but not really pondered it much more than that. I have felt the ‘heaviness’ ‘sense of duty’ of gratitude whereas appreciation does feel much lighter. Great article, thank you.
Gratitude is quite a loaded word as you say, whereas appreciation feels and is nourishing and expansive. I often use to express how ‘lucky’ I felt that my life was as it was, and yet this also is one of those words that assumes it has nothing to do with us, that we end up where we are by luck of the draw or by chance. It is our footsteps walked past and present that lead to our current experiences in life. There is much to appreciate that naturally leads to our next expansion.
Great post Gabriele. I too remember as a young girl being told to be “grateful for small mercies” – not a phrase I’ve heard for years! There is a vast difference between the expectation to be grateful for something, a duty, as opposed to the expansion and beauty of appreciation, which is impulsed and heart-felt.
Indeed sue, when asked or told to be grateful feels as an imposition because we have done wrong by just being who we are.
What I can feel from the comments of those asking you to be grateful is resentment and comparison that they didn’t ‘have it so good’. I could also feel as you say, the judgment and guilt being laid on. No wonder you didn’t like feeling this as a child!
When we are more aware of the energy of judgement and guilt, we can mostly like see it play out in all areas of life. How damaging is it when we impose this on children? What does that reinforce?
Yes, I get that sense too. We can lace anything we do with resentment, it can look good on the surface, helping out another, cooking and caring for our family but if it comes with resentment then this is what is felt beyond the picture that is being presented.
As a child I have also had the word ‘appreciation’ used in an untoward way, with a disdain and have to do feeling with it. How we use words is so important and often they are bastardised.
I was just reflecting a few days ago on the vast difference between these two words and what they mean and bring. Gratitude was a big thing for me many years ago – I would pray at the end of the day with my hands up to the roof and sky (while I was in bed in the dark) and call out how grateful I was for this, that and the other. It was akin to begging… it was a ‘please please, give me more’. Yep – there were demands and conditions aplenty.
Appreciation is an inward movement that asks for nothing from outside of us. We appreciate from the innate knowing we have – that’s the starting point. It comes from a fullness meeting the same fullness back – in appreciation of it.
The difference is worlds apart.
The scenario you describe makes it quite clear how demanding gratitude is, both as an imposition on the grateful one and equally on the recipient as an underhanded ruse to beg for more of the same.
Love this Katerina, the two in quality and meaning are worlds apart. Calling out what we feel grateful for is like having our hands behind our back with fingers crossed, believing we are not deserving and that we need fixing. Unlike appreciation that goes of course that is me and that is you. I can feel though how important it is to be honest with when we are using appreciation that there is not the energy of gratefulness tainting it.