Establishing a Gratitude Practice

In partnership with

Hi there,

Happy Thanksgiving to those readers based in the USA. For everyone else: happy Thursday. This is issue #48 of the Network Wrangler.

Almost thirty years ago, I worked as the Program Manager for the Network Specials team at America Online. This was in the early days of being online. And this unique role meant I got to create customized content, primarily tied to the holidays, that lived for a week to ten days before disappearing again into the ether.

My primary task was to get people who signed on to AOL to do something more than just check their emails or drop into a chat room (morf, anyone?). After all, AOL had big-dollar partnerships with the likes of CBS Sportsline and Hachette and Motley Fool to send online eyeballs to their content, yet the majority of time online was in the mailbox or chat.

Enter the Network Specials (my group) and our quest to feature the best of the content procured from our partners around themes. If Hallmark had a card for it, my Network Specials team created a site for it: Valentines@AOL, Mother’s Day@AOL, Back to School@AOL, Thanksgiving@AOL, etc.

I wasn’t trying to create a new online-only event, I was simply trying to create a destination that had holiday event-themed content for people to find when they searched the keyword (remember, this was before Google was a thing).

So, this being the beginning of all things online in the mid-1990s, I created and matured a programming model that featured customized content sponsored by the first ad banners and embedded with nascent online commerce links.

We went from proof-of-concept to millions of impressions and sold-out ad packages in just a few short years.

Along the way, I created the world’s biggest online Easter Egg hunt (over 1 million eggs found), I crashed countless servers in the AOL server farms from attracting too much traffic, and I got to write the first scripts to publish as-they-finished football scores over the holiday weekend on a special Thanksgiving@AOL page (I was busy that weekend).

But one of the programming ideas I am most proud of is the Resolution Reminder I created for the New Year’s@AOL site in 1997.

This particular program leveraged the existing habit of setting resolutions for the new year and added a new online-only twist: if you submitted your resolution into our New Years@AOL form, we sent you a reminder three weeks later asking how your progress was going. Think of it as the first online nudge to try and get our users to keep their resolutions.

Of course, in the thirty years since this first launched, billion-dollar businesses have been built via much more sophisticated nudges (Amazon, Facebook, Google, Apple, etc).

But back then, including this simple feedback/follow-up feature in an online site was groundbreaking. And what struck me most about it then, and what sticks with me still to this day, was the gratitude that users shared in response to being asked how their resolutions were coming along.

We only had several tens of thousands of members actually sign up to be reminded (small potatoes for me back then), but they were effusive in their reactions to the reminders we sent.

This gratitude came in the form of direct emails, posts in message boards, and comments in chats. Wasn’t it cool that someone had followed up to check on whether the New Year’s resolutions were kept (or not)?

If I’d been a smarter business person, I’d have jumped all over this user behavior and figured out how to monetize it better. But as it was, I was already on to the next holiday (Valentine’s Day@AOL) where we were trying to create a CupidBot to spew out candy heart-like messages at the click of a button.

I’m still so grateful for having that role on the Network Specials team, where I could experiment and try new things. It was a springboard for many other new products I created at AOL: Hometown@AOL (our Geocities killer), Easy Designer and 1-2-3-Publish (home page publishing tools), and Digital Heroes (the first-ever online mentoring program).

I’m grateful to all the folks I worked with at AOL who made creating things in those early years of the internet possible. I wouldn’t be the person I am today without them.

Which brings us to today’s topic of gratitude and cultivating a gratitude practice.

Just in time for Thanksgiving.

Stay up-to-date with AI

The Rundown is the most trusted AI newsletter in the world, with 800,000+ readers and exclusive interviews with AI leaders like Mark Zuckerberg.

Their expert research team spends all day learning what’s new in AI and talking with industry experts, then distills the most important developments into one free email every morning.

Plus, complete the quiz after signing up and they’ll recommend the best AI tools, guides, and courses – tailored to your needs.

Sign up to start learning.

Leveraging Thanksgiving to Cultivate a Year-Round Gratitude Practice

In the same spirit that New Year’s is the perfect time to make resolutions, Thanksgiving, a holiday deeply rooted in the tradition of expressing gratitude, offers a perfect opportunity to not only celebrate our blessings but also to begin a practice that can enhance our well-being throughout the year.

Thanksgiving is uniquely positioned as a day dedicated to reflecting on and giving thanks for the blessings in our lives. Whether you’re asked to share as part of grace at the dinner table, or you simply count your blessings as a way to relieve the tension of being with so many people in the same room at once, this focus on gratitude provides a natural setting to initiate a more consistent practice.

The holiday's emphasis on appreciation and reflection helps highlight the positive aspects of our lives, setting a foundation for a gratitude practice that can extend beyond the holiday season.

During Thanksgiving, we come together to share food, stories, and time, creating the ideal environment for reflecting on the past year's blessings.

Because we typically come together in close-knit groups (yes, even “Friendsgivings” count), this collective celebration can amplify feelings of gratitude and demonstrate the joy that comes from acknowledging and sharing our blessings with others.

And because of the ever-increasing body of evidence showing the positive effects of gratitude on our well-being, it’s high time we freed gratitude from a once-a-year holiday event and create a gratitude practice that becomes part of our everyday lives.

How to Establish a Gratitude Practice on Thanksgiving

Establishing a gratitude practice on Thanksgiving can be both meaningful and simple. Here are some practical ways to integrate gratitude into the holiday and beyond:

Gratitude Sharing at Meal Time

One of the most direct ways to cultivate gratitude during Thanksgiving is by setting aside time during the holiday meal for each person to share something they are grateful for. This can range from significant life events to small, everyday joys. Sharing these reflections can deepen personal feelings of gratitude and enhance the sense of connection among those gathered to hear them.

Break free of the Thanksgiving Day bounds by selecting one day a week where you share gratitudes prior to mealtime. After you’ve successfully done this one day a week for at least two months, add another.

The Gratitude Jar

Another engaging activity is to create a gratitude jar where family members and guests can deposit notes of gratitude throughout the day. These notes can be read during the meal or saved and read as a family tradition on New Year’s Eve, thus extending the spirit of Thanksgiving.

Break free of the Thanksgiving Day bounds by keeping a gratitude jar on the counter in the kitchen, and dedicate the last Sunday meal of the month to reading the accumulated notes together.

Daily Gratitude Journal

Starting a gratitude journal on Thanksgiving offers a personal and introspective way to extend the practice. Encourage family members and guests to jot down three things they are grateful for each day and share these entries from time to time to reinforce the habit and the benefits associated with it.

Break free of the Thanksgiving Day bounds by creating small gratitude journals by folding several sheets of printer paper in half and then in half again to create a small booklet. Write THANKS on the cover and set a booklet at each place setting for the new owner to write in and take home to continue to write what they’re grateful for each day.

Stuck Searching for Something to Be Grateful For?

Not everyone is quick to come up with something to share for which they’re grateful.

If you’ve ever had small kids around the Thanksgiving table with you, you’ll either get delightful moments of marvel, or you’ll get a recitation of favorite foods sitting on the table in front of them.

You have the power to find things to be grateful for, and I share these six questions as a good place to start:

1. What good thing happened today?

2. Am I taking anything for granted that I should instead be thankful for?

3. Which people in my life am I grateful for?

4. What was the last article, show, social media post that I saw that I really appreciated, and why?

5. What am I most looking forward to this coming week or month and why?

6. What is the kindest thing someone has said or done lately?

And if you’re really feeling inspired, pen a good old-fashioned thank-you note to someone and send it via the post office.

Your Gratitude Practice: A Follow-Up Offer

Lastly, I’d be remiss if I didn’t say thank you to each of you for reading my newsletter week-in and week-out. I appreciate you opening your inbox to me and spending a few minutes each Thursday (or so) reading what I write.

In the spirit of my New Years@AOL resolution reminder, I’d be happy to send you a gratitude practice reminder in three weeks to see how you’re doing incorporating this new practice into your life so you can reap the benefits that come with it.

Simply reply to this week’s issue with the simple request “Remind Me,” and I’ll send you a special note three weeks from now to check in on your gratitude practice.

Thank you for subscribing 😄 

Thanks for reading the Network Wrangler! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.

P.S. Want to comment/reply/say hello? Just hit reply — your email goes straight to my inbox. 🤗