Gratefulnesssaved my life
A memoir in daily gratitude

Gratefulness saved my life

by Anonymous

Four years. Three things a day. A marriage begins, breaks, mends and ends, and the list keeps going.

Human-written Handwritten in daily journals, 2015–2018

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Cover of Gratefulness Saved My Life, a memoir by Anonymous
About the book

Every morning for nearly four years, one man wrote down three things he was grateful for. Then the days kept happening anyway.

Gratefulness Saved My Life is a true story told one journal page at a time: the place, a line about the day, three small gratitudes, and a reflection, often written weeks later while rereading those lines.

Moving from Zagreb and Prague to the San Francisco Bay and Barcelona, the entries follow a marriage through separation, reunion, a wedding, sudden grief, and the slow work of letting go. Some days are funny, some are plain, and some are almost too hard to write down.

Together they make an honest record of what it means to keep choosing gratitude on the days it is hardest to find, and of how small daily attention can carry a person through the largest changes of a life.

“Waves of extreme sadness along with relief and feeling right. So hard!”
— Day 526, Sausalito

A note on authorship. This book was handwritten by its author in daily gratitude journals kept from 2015 to 2018 and transcribed by the author. It was written in real time, not reconstructed afterward, and the entries were not written by AI. Names and identifying details have been changed for privacy.

  • 585daily entries
  • 2015–2018kept by hand, in real time
  • 3gratitudes, every day
  • 8parts, from Zagreb to Signing the Papers
How the journal works

The same five parts, every single day

The form never changes, and that is what drives the book. The same three lines hold a wedding countdown and a funeral.

1Day 165

2San Rafael · Fall 2015

3At work with people. Nice to be ’round friends.

4Three gratitudes:

  1. Work space.
  2. Getting through things.
  3. Making dreams happen.

5Time truly is such a healer. It is the space and perspective that it brings. The time to talk to others about the issue at hand, or the time just to think (or write) about it all. Just the time to make time for something. When there is “no time”, things just get put on pause. All of a sudden, when there is “time again”, things start to flow, and grow. … Without time, we have nothing, and without our health, we have no time.

I’m so grateful for the time I have to “make time” for people and things in life that I love.

  1. Day numberEntries are numbered in order through the journals, Day 1 to Day 585.
  2. Place & seasonWhere the page was written: a café in Zagreb, a tent set up indoors in Sausalito, a riverbank in New England.
  3. One line about the dayWritten that morning, before anything was known about how it would turn out.
  4. Three gratitudesNumbered, every day, no matter what. Sometimes small (“Work space.”), sometimes enormous.
  5. ReflectionOften written days or weeks later, on rereading the top of the page, sometimes ending in an italic “I am grateful for…” line.
From the journal

A few pages

Five entries from four years, lightly trimmed. Names have been changed.

Day 37

Zagreb · Spring 2015

Lazy sunday. Distant from Maren. We are on off pages of life.

  1. Morning walks.
  2. Trying again.
  3. Acceptance of what is.

I love how emotions and feelings change, and how people change. … That transition period, between the hard and the good, can be truly challenging. … The patience to let things change before giving up is key. I’m grateful for my patience in life, and in others. Things are almost always not what they seem, and it’s always better to be kind.

Day 129

Alder Hill · Summer 2015

Sitting down by the river. Berry picking. Peaceful place… Dad’s ashes here…

  1. My dad, and who he was
  2. Alder Hill, and quiet country
  3. Chess and the peace it brings me

… The heartbreak, the drama, the hard choices — the big choices. All the things that mattered, deeply, to them. Full, powerful lives, now over and here I am, alive and working on my life. I am just like they were. I’m grateful for the people before me who got me here. … Life is a beautiful and amazing challenge.

Day 169

Sausalito · Fall 2015

First day after moving out of Apt… Maren and I split for now.

  1. Courageous conversations.
  2. Friends and family support.
  3. The ocean.

The idea of courageous conversations came from the poet David Whyte. The idea is to allow yourself to face those difficult topics and embrace them with courage. … I think it’s one of those things I have almost no idea how special it truly is.

So, I am grateful for my web of support, and for my courage — that is so much greater now & forever, thanks to it.

Day 366

Alder Hill · Summer 2016

Day after our wedding party. Great happiness. News about Declan — sad contrast.

  1. Thankful family time.
  2. My new work.
  3. Chapters starting/ending.

No reflection was written on this page.

Day 575

Alder Hill · Fall 2018

Morning alone in house. Apple pie & eggs, chess, peaceful. Sad about signing papers with Maren last night.

  1. Taking on scary challenges in life.
  2. The happiness that comes with freedom.
  3. The many beautiful memories and loves Maren and I share.

… It is not a bad thing, it is just life — it is just nature. The more I can accept this in my life the more peaceful I can be in my day to day life. A small ant just walked across this paper and seemed to stop to meditate. … Alas, even for the ant, life is uncertain. Beautiful uncertainty.

Start your own gratitude practice

The practice behind the pages

The book opens with the author’s own instructions. “For me, this is not a private diary, but for you, it can be. Please feel free to read my entries as examples of how this can be done.”

  1. Week one: write the top of the page

    Start each page with the date, the day number and where you are. Write three things you are grateful for, and a few notes about the details of your life at that moment.

  2. Week two: go back and reflect

    Return to the page you wrote on day one. Read where you were and what you were grateful for. Write a short thought piece in the body of the page, inspired by those items, and end with an “I am grateful for…” line. Tomorrow, do the same for day two.

  3. Week three and beyond: reread and mark

    Read day one again. Underline the thought that jumps out at you, your “power statement.” Mark the page with an (R) once you’ve reviewed it, and a star if it’s a favorite. Then keep going, one page a day.

  4. Just continue forever

    At minimum, record three things, the date, and where you are and who you’re with, every day. Try to stay about a week ahead, so you are always rereading what you were grateful for in the past.

A tip from the book: use a journal with two bookmarks, one for today’s page and one for the page you’re rereading. If you want to go further, copy your power statements into a separate book, a “boiled down” list of what mattered most.

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