Back in October, I wrote about having swapped my daily gratitude daily journalling into a gratitude jug. This jug still sits on my shelf. I still write notes and add them to the jug. But I’ve noticed that the kind of things that I write on the pieces of paper have broadened somewhat. As well as recording moments of gratitude, I’ve recorded things that made me smile, things that people have said or done, or even things that I want to claim as small victories. In fact, anything that I thought would be of benefit for the future me to read when she felt a bit flat, or under the weather, or was struggling.

My gratitude jug on the shelf

Towards the end of last year, I read The Self-Care Project: How to let go of frazzle and make time for you and there, amongst a section on things to do to help yourself, was a paragraph entitled “Start a positivity jar”. It describes having a positivity jar as being evidence against negative thoughts. And suggests that I could “Read them over when a dose of sunshine is needed.” It suggests that it could include “the kind things that people have done, the kind things we have done, the glimmers of hope in an otherwise dark time, our wins.”

Looking into the jug

And, somewhat inadvertently, that’s exactly what I’ve done. As ever, it’s a work in progress and is just one of many tools in my tool kit. But while it helps, and is a thing that even brings pleasure in its own right, it gets to stay, even if it has had a slight name change.