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+---- Thread: *Letter of Gratitude (/showthread.php?tid=27499)
*Letter of Gratitude - gbfn - 11-18-2020
In these hard times of experiencing a second lockdown in my home country it is hard for many people to keep maintaining a positive mood. There are enough studies on how the personal mood generally speaking impacts your life and the life of the people around you. To be clear i am not speaking about feeling depressed or sad here and there, i am referring to the mood you find yourself in every day.
It doesn't matter if you have felt depressed, angry, moody, or jealous recently or are feeling any negativity right now, as long as you can overcome it i an adequate amount of time. At some point you just have to move on and let it behind you or it will poison your mental and physical wellbeing. I personally find myself thinking about problems too long and too hard, not actually trying to find a solution for the issue. It's dragging you down to a point where you just don't want to find a solution and you are finding yourself sitting in a puddle wallowing in self-pity. One method to overcome this is reminding yourself about all the good things in life, in your job, in your relationships, or even in the challenges you are about to face and trying to be grateful for it.
It's not that hard to put a statement like that out there, what really is hard is to try and actually do it. Hell, it is even hard to just start trying to do it.
But remember: You can stop at any time and take two minutes trying to block all the stuff that is going through your head out, and just be thankful for all the positive things that exist in your life, but also the difficult circumstances too, for they make you grow and become the full person you are.
I know it is not easy to see through bad times. However, you can look back at all the difficult moments of your life and appreciate what you got out of it: a lesson, a "tougher skin", even simply the experience that will make you make better choices in the future.
There are so many benefits of being grateful for - well for everything really!
It helps you to be in the present by noticing what you do have. It helps you to not take everything for granted, your health, your family, your friends, your job and appreciate those things.
Being grateful has the power to change your mood almost instantly from negative to positive. Good feelings and positive energy arise when you start acknowledging what you are grateful for.
Feeling grateful automatically puts you in a good state which generates good vibes. People are very social and can detect immediately how everyone is feeling. Often they don't really recognize it and think "Damn, that guy is putting out bad vibes!" But they get the message. Their subconsciousness is working permamently affecting their feelings and actions towards others.
It is said that the first seventeen seconds of any thought are the most powerful, and they create enough energy to start attracting what you are thinking of into your life.
You can see the importance of being grateful when you realize that you can use thankful feelings to achieve what you desire.
Sometimes we allow our negative emotions to rule us and affect our mood. At these times it may appear difficult to actually feel thankful for anything.
If that happens to you, think about this: things could always be much worse (I'm not just saying: do hold the thought, really try to visionize it).
Whatever your circumstances, they can always be even more difficult. Think about the fact that they are not so, and look at the positive side of your reality.
We create a shift in our thoughts and moods when we reflect on what we are thankful for.
Here are a few things you might want to try:
- Even if you are feeling negative when you start looking at what you are grateful for, you won't be able to hold the negative emotion for very long. I admit that this is maybe one of the hardest things for me as i often enjoy to self-pity.
- You can make being grateful one of your positive habits as you understand the importance of being grateful.
- You can also choose to write a list of at least ten things you are grateful for at the end of your day. I know it means work and is probably dreary. But honestly, it is not that easy to find 10 things you actually are grateful for.
Having said all this i will give a try myself and write about what i am grateful for. I concentrate this solely to ISFL matters as i don't want to lay out too personal things in the internet. Here is my list of ten things i really am grateful for and appreciate.
- First and foremost i am grateful for being a member of this great league. I had a blast over the last months since i joined. There have been a few hick ups here and there where i thought why i am doing this to myself, but fortunately i can count those times with one hand. The positive things outweigh the negatives by a lot.
- I want to give out my gratitude to the the GMs @ADwyer87 and @Raven who took the risk and drafted a guy who despite earning really well, contributed zero to the locker room at 3OA. At least by the time i had no interest in being an acitve member on discord. I got the chance to be called up immediately after the draft and leave my mark on a young team, which was trying to build a championship contender. Given the short history of the Honolulu Hahalua and my intentions to stay with the team throughout Heinrich's whole career i am in the best position to set a few marks on the teams record board. They will eventually be broken, but to hell with records. I will be grateful even for someone snatching records, since it can only mean that Honolulu is having great players on their rosters by then.
- My thanks go out to the current GM duo @gucci and @siddhus. I have the feeling that i can trust you guys. That you always put the team and the team's success first. Yes, there were moments, especially at the end of season 24 where i had my doubts. I wasn't feeling confident, that the Honolulu is trending in the right direction. This was the time, when we started negotiating my contract extension. I am happy and thankful to have decided the way i did.
- I feel grateful for my fellow comrades in the war room. It was the first time i got to experience the work and effort you all put in for a draft. I got really enlightened by the constructive discussions in the war room during the draft and I think we did not too bad. I now understand a bit more the amount of free time the users who really want to contribute to the team and the league as a whole put in voluntarily. I don't want to call anyone out by name, so nobody feels left out. But take my sincere thanks for everything you do.
- Thank you so much to the sim-testers. During the season you guys work your ass off to maximize our whole teams success. I have sat down for an hour or two and tried a few things to get familiar with the process of sim testing. And i do have to say one thing: It sucks! It really does! For me at least. I feel the utmost respect for anyone who is doing this to himself. You guys rock!
- I want to thank all the people who are currently are holding league jobs and have held in the past. By design the whole concept of a simulation league won't work if the tasks and assignments to run this whole construct are not completed. This refers to everybody who is doing his little share of the huge pile of work to keep everything up and running. From top to bottom. League owner, comissioner, HO, appeals team, updaters, auditors, simmers, streamers, event team, dotts team, casino, dev team, GMs, bankers, media and grafics graders, and everybody else i have now forgotten to mention. It amazes me that people from around the world form a community with it's own economy and rules where everybody has to bring in his fair share to make it work.
- I feel grateful for my buddy @sakrosankt who brought me into the league. Who just wasn't stopping lamenting about it. Who showed me around the site. Taught me how to set everything up, how to update, what to do and when. You have come a long way in this league - and fast as well now being co gm at sarasota. You and frost are doing a great job there. I have to aknowledge that since Honolulu and Sarasota are direct expansion rivals. I am already looking forward to the next "fishbowl". I'm telling you, the Hahalua will pull ahead! It is difficult sometimes talking about the league since we have to commit to certain rules and not giving out discrete information while chatting over a few beers.
- My gratitude goes out my IRL friends and girlfriend who have to endure and accept the time and work i put in something "weird, nerdy and totally unnecessary" thing like sim-football. God knows the sheer amount of time it can take when i find myself in a discussion and everybody around us is rolling their eyes stating "oh no, not that s**t again!".
- Thanks to the Head Office! I want to be very clear about this. Yes, there are times where i am against some decisions. There have been times where somebody, as an idividual, may have f***ed up. There are some questions and will also be in the future about the process of getting into HO. But to be fair that's the way in every "governing" instance in the world. Wanting to please everybody almost always means harm for yourself and the goals of an individual the goals of a whole community. Everywhere where people come together there have to be certain rules in place. In society, in countries, in every single instance where people are getting together, communicating, working, every part of social life, beeing in real life or virtually there has to be a set of common guidelines. And with that rules there has to be someone who defines those rules and someone who enforces them, and yes also someone who hands out punishment for breaking that set of rules. I don't want to discuss if the way it is working in the ISFL is the right or wrong, but this is how things are done here. Everybody has the choice and the power to lead a constructive discussion on how to improve the experience of each and everyone. That said i want to thank HO for their work in running the league and providing a healthy environment where we as a community can thrive and grow and let's not forget: HAVE FUN!
- Last but not least i want to express my gratitude to all the people who joined here. I am definitely not the most well known around here, i am most definitely not the most popular person here and most of you just don't know me. But I want to thank everybody in here, just for being part of it. I hope you are able to enjoy the experience as i do and while it means work and dedication it - for me - it really is worth it. Don't get down to much when something doesn't go your way or how you pictured it for yourself. Do as much or little as you are comfortable with. Don't let anyone push you in a direction you don't see yourself. Don't take everything too personal and try to have fun. And if you are having bad times, try to remind yourself of the positive things and weigh your options, and try to be grateful for whatever little things that come your way.
When i saw the post for 1.5x Media i at first thought about writing yet another piece about the draft. I don't know maybe a little prospect analysis since i don't want to be in danger of leaking anything about the ongoing draft since i am a war room member. Just when i wanted to start get writing, i was getting hesitant thinking about going over all the prospects, doing research and so on and i was thinking to myself why i shouldn't try to get my honest feelings out and just say thank you for once.
At first i didn't really know how to start the whole thing, so i went and yes, did my research. It might seem strange to do research about gratitude, but i found it really interesting personally. And i am a bit of a nerd myself and wanted to know a bit more, like in everything i am (temporarily) interested in. Anyway as i started to get writing, i got enjoyed it more and more and i have found out many things for myself and how i took for granted the way the ISFL is constructed and works. And it changed my personal view of it to a certain degree up to the point where i felt genuine gratitude for the people who commit their free time to it.
Interestingly when i got to the point of laying out my list of ten things i was feeling grateful for i found it pretty hard to get together 10 things. I didn't want to write about generic things and kiss asses out here in public. It took me quite a while to put together those points.
I can only suggest to everybody who is sometimes having a hard time to just try it. You don't have to write it out but just remind yourself why you do it, the positive aspects of it and try to find things you like and enjoy and aprecciate them. We often get caught up in the moment were everything seems tedious and we just don't are against something just for the sake of being against something instead of comtemplating and trying to offer solutions or just getting to work to be over with it.
I would recommend everybody who plans on writing some media to get his sweet money to afford the equipment (just as i am doing in putting this out) to reflect on their career, their experience their situation in the ISFL and maybe if you are in a state of thinking about quitting the whole damn thing try to reflect as honest as you can. I don't want to force anybody to stay at all costs, but don't let a bad moment decide your future.
Edit: it has been brought to my attention that i forgot to thank ppt as well. So here i it is: THANK YOU!
@Baron1898
RE: Letter of Gratitude - gucci - 11-18-2020
Awesome article. This is like taking the offseason PT to another level!