Should we take things for granted?

"The more often we see the things around us... the more they become invisible to us. That is why we often take for granted the beauty of this world: the flowers, the trees, the birds, the clouds – even those we love. Because we see things so often, we see them less and less." – Joseph Wirthlin

I must admit, that is one of the most beautifully-worded quotes I’ve come across. And yes, I do agree with the concept that gratitude is something we must practice every day, like building a habit, in order to be thankful and fulfilled in our lives.

BUT

I wanted to toy with the idea of gratitude in a negative light. Or, put reversely, how taking something for granted could be good. I know, I know, you probably think I’m crazy, but hear me out on this.

When we break it down, gratitude is the simply but significant idea of showing appreciation for the people, things, accomplishments, etc. in our lives, and the awareness of being thankful for its own sake.

Let’s take an example. When I received my college decisions, I couldn’t believe my eyes were reading an acceptance letter from UC Berkeley, now my alma mater. Every day until my first day of college, I looked up through the Berkeley course catalogs, planned my semesters, perused club websites, and basically read and re-read Berkeley’s Wikipedia page. Frankly put, I was so obsessed about getting into my dream school and I was beyond, you guessed it, grateful.

Well fast forward through each year of my college experience and over time, I grew less and less grateful about being at Cal. Instead of seeing all the wonderful classes I could take, I only saw the competition and late nights that each class would bring. Instead of seeing the amazing college town that I got to live in and beautiful San Francisco just across the bay, I only saw the safety issues of the city of Berkeley, and the difficulties of securing housing every year. And this was a pattern I saw with all my friends and peers.

Don’t get me wrong, I was thrilled to be at Cal, and looking back now, college was truly some of the best years of my life, but we’re humans after all. And humans love to drown in their own self-pity and wallow in sympathy. And we do that because we take things for granted. Before I started college, I could never imagine a day when I wouldn’t be thrilled with my life.

But as creatures of habit, one of our fatal flaws is we become accustomed to things. As Wirthlin put it,

"...we see things so often, we see them less and less."

So that brings me to using the idea of gratitude to ignite powerful change. Let’s continue the example. If I took an amazing class and instead of complaining about the readings or the professor, I chose to look at all the things I could be thankful for – the opportunity to learn from one of the best in the field at a world-class university – then sure, I would probably be a lot more fulfilled with my life at that point, and I wouldn’t be so quick to brush away all the small but wonderful things that make life, life.

But couldn’t that make me complacent? Well, it could, and that’s why I wanted to go down this path of exploring 'taking something for granted' in a positive way.

When you’re constantly grateful for something, then you will constantly see the happiness and value it’s bringing into your life. And while this seems like a wholly good thing, it may backfire. Because, if you see the happiness and value something is bringing into your life, then why would you ever change it? Why would you try and risk losing that happiness for something that may be better – though not guaranteed.

If you started a business from scratch, and you’re simply grateful for how far you’ve come and how well you’ve done, then you’re going to become complacent. An invisible pat-on-the-back, so to say. And you will keep doing what you’re doing, keep being grateful, and keep giving yourself infinite pats-on-the-back. But where will that get you? Will you improve your business? Will you take it to the next step?

Maybe. Though maybe not.

Of course, I’m not saying that you need to be completely and utterly ungrateful about everything for the rest of your life. But I wanted to play with the idea of how we can use the idea of taking something for granted in order to push ourselves to do better, to be better.

What do you think?!