Interdisciplinary Psychology:

Gratitude letter

After much consideration, I decided to write my gratitude letter to my boyfriend of two years, John. At first I wasn’t sure if I was going to write to him, because we live together and I assumed that he knew how much I appreciated him and why but it turns out I was mistaken. Writing the letter was difficult and I procrastinated because I knew that it would make me emotional to compose my thoughts and then to read them out loud (and i thought this exercise wasn’t due until the next time that the class met!). I did get a bit teary when I realized how much I’ve depended on John and how he’s been my number one supporter since I decided to return to school full time.

I chose to write my gratitude letter to my little brother, Daniel. Before reading it to him I was really nervous. When expressing any kind of sappy emotion to a fourteen year old boy, there is always the danger that they will laugh in your face and tell you that you are “gay.” Granted, Daniel has a lot more sensitivity and heart than most teenage boys I’ve met, but he still has his stereotypical “dude” moments. So I was unsure of the reaction that I would get.
Dear Daniel,
 Thank you for being an amazing little brother. Thank you so much for making me laugh all the time and for giving me an excuse to go see cheesy superhero movies. I am so proud of you for growing up to be such a smart, kind, funny, thoughtful, loveable guy. I really enjoyed talking to you when I came home for Christmas break and it made me so happy to see what a good head you have on your shoulders. Despite peer pressure, you unapologetically remain your own person, which is more than can be said for most people twice your age. I hope you know how grateful I am that you are my brother. Thanks for thinking I’m cool even when I‘m a huge nerd. And THANK YOU for taking such good care of our mom.  I know I don’t have to worry too much because you’re there to make sure she’s okay.  No matter how many times you hit me with a shoe, I will always be glad that you are my little brother!

The book answered many of the why questions I have asked myself over the past decade. I am so tired of my friends telling me I am the strongest person they know. They tell me they wish they could be more like me. Well, I always tell them the only way to do that would be to go through what I have in last few years. I wouldn’t wish that on ANYONE.  I never viewed my ability to continue to constantly seek the positive and beauty in life as a strength, I’m more content to view it as being resilient.

 Normally I despise the phrase/paradigm “Self-Help Book” however, I was surprised to discover Karen Reivich and Andrew Shatte’s The Resilience Factor is one of the few books I have read of its genre that has left a considerable and profound imprint on my consciousness.One of the thing that was rare about this book for me was that I found the book’s initial resilience intakes to have been very skillfully constructed.  The questions were presented in a highly specialized framework that forced me to take a hard, closer look at the core beliefs that shape my worldview, how my unique worldview gets translated into my relationships and how my current coping strategies have both served and limited my overall resilience.               In taking the tests I was shocked to find that I was slightly below average in some of the resilience skills—namely impulse control and emotional regulation.  Having respect for the manner in which the questions were presented, the results came as a rude wake-up call (for emotional regulation I projected that I would be in at least 70-80 percentile), but it succeeded in hooking me into the material and got me emotionally and intellectually invested in the learning the techniques.            Having been in Mark’s Theories of Counseling class last quarter—which focused heavily on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy—I found myself appreciating the authors for being able to concisely articulate the nuances of CBT which forms the backbone of their  approach to resilience (i.e.

 Normally I despise the phrase/paradigm “Self-Help Book” however, I was surprised to discover Karen Reivich and Andrew Shatte’s The Resilience Factor is one of the few books I have read of its genre that has left a considerable and profound imprint on my consciousness.One of the thing that was rare about this book for me was that I found the book’s initial resilience intakes to have been very skillfully constructed.  The questions were presented in a highly specialized framework that forced me to take a hard, closer look at the core beliefs that shape my worldview, how my unique worldview gets translated into my relationships and how my current coping strategies have both served and limited my overall resilience.               In taking the tests I was shocked to find that I was slightly below average in some of the resilience skills—namely impulse control and emotional regulation.  Having respect for the manner in which the questions were presented, the results came as a rude wake-up call (for emotional regulation I projected that I would be in at least 70-80 percentile), but it succeeded in hooking me into the material and got me emotionally and intellectually invested in the learning the techniques.            Having been in Mark’s Theories of Counseling class last quarter—which focused heavily on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy—I found myself appreciating the authors for being able to concisely articulate the nuances of CBT which forms the backbone of their  approach to resilience (i.e.