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As we approach St. Patrick’s Day on March 17, the unofficial symbol of the holiday is a three-leaf shamrock, or a three-leaf clover. Legend has it that St. Patrick used this common plant to help teach about the holy trinity.

The four-leaf clover, which is a rare variation of the three-leaf clover, was regarded by ancient Celts as a charm against evil spirits. Some folk traditions assign a different attribute to each leaf of a clover. The first leaf represents hope, the second stands for faith, the third is for love and the fourth leaf brings luck to the finder.

This brings us to the question of whether we’re lucky or grateful in our lives.

At certain times in life, we’ve all used the terms “lucky” and “grateful.” For example, we consider ourselves lucky when we go to a party and meet someone special or we are grateful that a bad storm didn’t hit our house. Are luck and gratitude the same?

Luck, according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, is “a force that brings good fortune or adversity; the events or circumstances that operate for or against an individual.”

Being grateful in the same dictionary is defined as “an appreciation of benefits received.”

A wealth of opinions, information and tips

As you can imagine there is a lot of debate, conversation and philosophizing about luck and gratefulness. And, in the past few years, experts have talked about how gratitude has been a way to help cope with all the stresses the world has experienced since the COVID-19 pandemic started.

Just search the Internet and you’ll find page after page written about luck and gratitude. There are websites about gratitude, books about luck and loads of advice and opinions on both subjects. You can even find specific quotes from people who have shared their uplifting thoughts about how to cultivate luck and gratitude in your everyday life.

Oprah said, “I believe luck is preparation meeting opportunity. If you hadn’t been prepared when the opportunity came along, you wouldn’t have been lucky.”

And Karl Barth, a Swiss theologian, said, “Joy is the simplest form of gratitude.”

So, what can you do to bring more luck and gratefulness into your life? It may be easier than you think.

Increase your luck

Luck is being open to opportunities and that often comes down to your attitude and how you approach situations.

According to Richard Wiseman, author of The Luck Factor, there are four principles of luck. They include:

• Maximizing your chance opportunities. This means you create, notice and act upon experiences that come your way.
• Listening to lucky hunches. People who practice this go with their “gut” feelings and take active steps to boost their intuitive abilities such as meditation.
• Expect good fortune. This involves believing that the future is going to be full of good luck and then using those expectations as a self-fulfilling prophecy.
• Turn bad luck to good. Lucky people develop techniques to cope with bad fortune that may come their way. This can include taking control of a bad situation or imagining how things could have been worse.

Build gratitude habits

There are various ways to add gratitude to your life. On the website Mindful, there are several lists of simple ways you can become more grateful in your everyday life. Some of these include:

• Keep a gratitude journal
• Remember the hard times to appreciate the good
• Share your gratitude with others
• Use visual reminders such as photos of loved ones or fun times
• Go through the motions of smiling and saying “thank you”
• Use positive language
• Be creative about finding gratitude in everyday moments
• Spread gratefulness by sharing it with others

Whether you consider yourself lucky, grateful or a combination of both, learning how to appreciate life in the moment will certainly make your journey a more meaningful and pleasant one.

Want to learn about our complete move solutions? Visit the WayForth website. Or give us a call at 1-844-WAYFORTH today.

SOURCES:

rd.com/article/four-leaf-clover/

RichardWiseman.wordpress.com

Mindful.org