When Gratitude Feels Forced: A Thanksgiving Reflection Copy

Written by Evan Vukets, RCC, Registered Clinical Counsellor in Abbotsford, BC. I specialize in men's mental health and offer counselling in Abbotsford, the Fraser Valley, and online across British Columbia. Learn more about me.

Thanksgiving is a time of year when we are encouraged to slow down, spend time with people we care about, and reflect on the things we are grateful for. For many people it is just that. A day that naturally comes where they look forward to gathering with family and friends around food, and sharing in practices of gratitude for their year.

But in my work as a counsellor, I have supported many people who have a complicated relationship with thanksgiving. Rather than being a day that helps them to slow down and practice thankfullness for their year, gratitude has become another way of criticizing themselves.

I should be grateful for what I have.

I should be happier.

Other people have it so much worse than me.

What do I have to complain about?

The problem is not necessarily that these people have nothing to appreciate. Often, they can recognize that there are good things in their lives. They might have a family they love, a job that provides for them, or a home they're proud of. But recognizing those things doesn't mean that life isn't also difficult, and it doesn't make the things they're struggling with any less real.

Gratitude becomes unhelpful when we use what we have to dismiss what we are struggling with, rather than appreciating what is genuinely meaningful to us.

When gratitude becomes another expectation we place on ourselves, we can lose sight of what makes it valuable in the first place.

When Gratitude Becomes Another Voice of Criticism

I recently wrote about something I call the Drill Sergeant, that internal voice that pushes us through criticism, shame, and an endless list of things we ought to be doing better.

One of the challenges with this voice is that it doesn't always sound unreasonable. Sometimes it sounds like responsibility, discipline, or an attempt to keep things in perspective.

Gratitude can become part of that same pattern.

Someone may be struggling with the demands of work, parenting, or his relationship, but instead of acknowledging that he's having a difficult time, he reminds himself of everything he has to be grateful for. He has a good job, healthy children, and a partner who cares about him. From there, it can become easy to conclude that he has no good reason to feel the way he does.

But gratitude and difficulty aren't mutually exclusive. We can appreciate the things we have while also recognizing the things that need attention in our lives.

I think this is also where some of the more popular approaches to positive thinking can be unhelpful. We see messages encouraging people to look in the mirror and tell themselves that they're beautiful, successful, or a wonderful parent. The intention of these exercises is to be generally positive, but for someone who is already struggling with how they see themselves, those statements can become another opportunity for self-criticism.

Someone who doesn't believe they're a good father might immediately start thinking about the times they lost their patience, were distracted, or were not as present as they wanted to be. Instead of feeling encouraged, they now have another reminder of the distance between who they are and who they want to become.

Positive affirmations and gratitude are not the same thing, but I think they can run into a similar problem when we're asking someone to believe something positive that doesn't line up with their experience.

A 2009 study by Wood, Perunovic, and Lee found that repeating positive self-statements could actually leave people with lower self-esteem feeling worse rather than better. That doesn't mean all affirmations are harmful, or that gratitude practices work the same way, but it does illustrate why simply asking someone to think more positively isn't always helpful.

I think there's a meaningful difference between trying to convince ourselves that something is true and learning to recognize what is already true.

Thanksgiving Is not the Same Experience for Everyone

Thanksgiving can bring all of this into focus because it is one of the few times of year when gratitude becomes not just something we're invited to experience, but something we're expected to feel.

This year, I am particularly looking forward to Thanksgiving as it is my first with my youngest son and as a family of five. With three children, life certainly is not getting any quieter, but there is something meaningful about having another little person joining our family traditions.

One of the things I appreciate about Thanksgiving is the opportunity it gives us to gather with people who matter to us. That might be a large family dinner, a quieter meal at home, or a Friendsgiving with people who have become an important part of our lives.

But I also recognize that holidays can be complicated.

For some people, Thanksgiving is a reminder of someone who is no longer sitting at the table. For others, it brings attention to difficult family relationships, a recent separation, or the family they hoped they would have but never quite did.

There can be grief in those experiences, even when there are also things worth appreciating.

Someone can be grateful for the family they've built while still grieving the relationship they never had with a parent. They can enjoy a holiday with friends while wishing things were different with their family. They can appreciate the people around them and still miss someone who isn't there.

I wrote about some of these complicated experiences in my Father's Day reflection on fatherhood, presence, and the things dads carry quietly. Holidays have a way of bringing our relationships, both the ones we have and the ones we wish were different, into focus.

I don't think gratitude becomes more meaningful when we use it to dismiss those experiences. If anything, allowing ourselves to recognize the full picture gives us a more honest understanding of our lives.

We don't need to turn every difficult experience into a lesson or find something positive in every loss. Sometimes things are simply difficult, and acknowledging that doesn't take away from the things we genuinely appreciate.

Making Room to Be Present

Another thing I've been thinking about this Thanksgiving is how easily we can become so focused on making life work that we forget to experience parts of it.

I see this often in men who take a lot of pride in being responsible, dependable, and providing for the people they love. Those can be meaningful qualities, and I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with wanting to work hard or take good care of our families.

But when we're constantly focused on what comes next, it can become difficult to recognize what's happening right in front of us.

Even Thanksgiving can turn into another set of responsibilities. There are groceries to buy, meals to prepare, a house to clean, and people to accommodate. Sometimes the effort that goes into making a holiday special can leave us with very little time to enjoy it ourselves.

I think there's a distinction worth making between creating a meaningful experience for the people we care about and actually being present to share that experience with them.

That might mean taking a little longer over a morning coffee before opening the work emails, sitting down to dinner with our phones put away, or making room for a conversation without immediately thinking about the next thing on our list.

None of those moments needs to be particularly remarkable. Often, they're ordinary parts of our lives that are easy to overlook when we're constantly measuring ourselves against what still needs to get done.

For someone who spends much of their time looking for the next thing to improve, sometimes the difficult part isn't working harder. It's slowing down long enough to recognize something that's already going well.

Finding One Thing Worth Appreciating

One exercise I often work on with clients is taking a moment at the end of the day to identify one thing they're grateful for. Not ten things, not a long list of everything that went well, just one thing that is grounded in what actually happened. It might be:

Enjoying a quiet cup of coffee before the workday began.

Sharing a meal with family.

Having a good conversation with a friend.

Appreciating something kind that another person did.

Sometimes, it might be recognizing something constructive we did ourselves.

Perhaps we made time for a relationship that's important to us.

Followed through on something we'd been putting off.

Made a choice that reflected the kind of person we're trying to become.

It is important to hilight that we are not inventing something positive or trying to convince ourselves that the day was better than it was. We are looking for something real that we can acknowledge and appreciate.

I also like keeping this exercise to one thing because gratitude can quickly become another task to perform. When we start trying to come up with a long list every evening, it's easy to begin measuring ourselves against how many things we found yesterday, or wondering why we can't think of more today.

This can also connect with our core values. When we have a clearer understanding of what matters to us, we can become better at recognizing the moments when our actions line up with those values. I've written more about living by your core values, including an exercise to help identify them.

For someone working toward becoming a more present father, for example, recognizing that they put their phone away during dinner can be meaningful. It doesn't mean they've become a perfect parent or that there aren't other things they want to work on. It means they made a choice that was consistent with something important to them.

That's a grounded observation, rather than a sweeping judgment about who they are. We can take responsibility for the things we want to change while also acknowledging the things we're already doing well. We don't have to choose between the Drill Sergeant, who dismisses every effort as insufficient, and the Placator, who finds ways to avoid difficult responsibilities.

There's room for a more grounded approach that recognizes our efforts, our limitations, and the work we still want to do.

A Thanksgiving Reflection

As Thanksgiving approaches, I have been thinking about the opportunity to slow down and appreciate something meaningful, even when life is busy and there are plenty of things still demanding our attention.

For some of us, this Thanksgiving will be a happy occasion, surrounded by people we love. For others, it may be a difficult weekend, with some grief or disappointment sitting alongside whatever we're grateful for.

And for many, it will probably be a little of both.

I think that's worth remembering when we talk about gratitude. It doesn't have to mean everything is going well, that we've accomplished everything we wanted to, or that we no longer have things to work on.

There can be plenty to appreciate while there are still things that are difficult, uncertain, or missing. We can recognize the work we still have to do while appreciating the things that are already meaningful in our lives.

Common Questions About Gratitude and Mental Health

Can gratitude make you feel worse?

Gratitude can become unhelpful when we use it to dismiss things we're struggling with. Telling ourselves that other people have it worse, or that we have no reason to be unhappy, can reinforce shame rather than help us appreciate our lives. The distinction is between recognizing something we're genuinely grateful for and using gratitude as another measure of how well we're doing.

What if I have a hard time feeling grateful?

Sometimes life is difficult, and finding something to appreciate doesn't come easily. I don't think forcing ourselves to feel grateful is particularly helpful. Instead, we can look at what actually happened during our day. Perhaps there was a quiet moment before work, a meaningful conversation, or something constructive we did that reflected our values. Recognizing one real experience doesn't require us to pretend the rest of the day went well.

What is a simple gratitude exercise I can try?

One exercise I use with clients is to take a moment at the end of the day and ask:

What is one thing I'm grateful for today?

It might be something another person did, a moment you enjoyed, or something constructive you did yourself. The important part is that it's grounded in reality. There's no need to come up with a long list or turn the exercise into another task to perform. One genuine observation is enough.