Accepting a Lack of Appreciation Empowers You to Be of Higher Value
“You are just so ungrateful.”
“Don’t you know what I have done for you?”
How many times have we heard or even spoken these words?
These statements often reveal that we feel entitled to another person’s gratitude. Entitlement is a result of a feeling of powerlessness.
When we are asking for (or demanding) gratitude, we are wanting someone to acknowledge our value. We want someone else to VALUE what we have offered. In the light of another’s appreciation, we tend to feel like our efforts were worthwhile and contributed to the relationship – and we like that feeling.
We often want “who we are” and “what we have to give” to be valued by the other person. Yet, this may or may not be the case. If its not the case, we get stuck trying to change the other person.
In reality, we are very limited in changing what another person values. When we try to force gratitude, we will continue to circle around the same frustrations and disappointments in the relationship and reinforce feelings of powerlessness in ourselves when we do this. Yet, when we are powerful enough to get honest about our own values and to redirect our efforts where we are appreciated, our souls and relationships thrive.
GRATITUDE IS RELATIONAL
Gratitude happens in relationship. Gratitude is a response to receiving something that you wanted, requested, or value. Gratitude is a desirable state to which we are naturally all attracted, similar to joy or peace. We all want to be grateful. We want to be grateful because gratitude indicates that we are receiving what we desire, value, and have requested. It is a good feeling.
FORCED GRATITUDE SMOTHERS IMPORTANT SIGNALS AND DEGRADES THE RELATIONSHIP
The problem with forcing gratitude is that we lose sight of what we or the other person genuinely desires. We lose self awareness. We lose awareness of others. We lose authenticity – and it can be a lot of work to get it back.
A lack of appreciation can so quickly be condemned that we miss the signals that it is offering us. A lack of responsive gratitude can indicate a number of important insights.
Recognizing ungratefulness can be one of your hidden power tools to receiving experiences of high value for yourself and offering experiences of high value to others.
GLEANING THE INSIGHTS OF NOT BEING THANKFUL
Here are a few of the possible insights of a lack of appreciation can offer you:
- You are not getting what you really want in life. This is can led to a meh feeling with life. Its not that your life is bad but it isn’t what you genuinely want. This often leads you to question, “Why can’t I just be thankful?’ You find yourself at war with your desires whether consciously or subconsciously. You could have ended up in this place because
- You have lost clarity or confidence in getting what you truly want out of life. You became so accustom to doing what you should do, what other people “value” that you are not even aware of what you want.
- You are (were) in relationships with people who invalidate, reject, or refuse to respond with what you want in life. They give you what they want not what you want and expect you to be grateful.
- You have created ideals that are unachievable by you or others and constantly confront the lack of fulfillment of these ideals. You only value that which is perfect, complete, and top notch. Anything less than these ideals does not hold value for you. Remember, I said that we all WANT TO BE GRATEFUL, so why would you create ideals that make gratitude elusive? Here are 2 possible reasons.
- You don’t expect to get what you sincerely want in life until you achieve these ideas. You do not see yourself as valuable until you achieve perfection. You don’t expect care, respect, attention, unless you or the people around you are a certain way. Therefore, you postpone gratitude for yourself or others as a reward of achieving this personal state of “worth”.
- People in your life have used gratitude or a lack thereof to manipulate you. Thankfulness may have been demanded, given insincerely, or withheld as a punishment for not performing. You developed distrust in sincere gratitude. Therefore, it becomes easy to resort to using or withholding gratitude to manipulate yourself or others to achieve ideals.
- You are not familiar with the investment that a certain experience of life takes. Therefore, you immaturely expect versus appreciate the experience. Others have enabled this benefit in your life and have deprived you of the privilege of familiarizing yourself of the true cost. Only when you are familiar with the true cost can you accurately assess the value you place on it.
- You haven’t had to personally choose this experience at its true cost. When you do not have to choose, you miss the powerful chance at recognizing the various degrees of what you are willing to have it cost you. This is essential in determining priorities.
THE CHALLENGE OF AUTHENTICITY IN RELATIONSHIPS
Refusal to look at or accept a lack of appreciation is why relationships get more messy. In relationships, people often do not distinguish the various degrees by which they value someone’s presence, communication, gifts, etc. This leaves large gaps of inauthenticity for unthankfulness to fester.
In relationships, alot of one’s true values and desires get smothered by shoulds, expectations, being nice, and accommodating. Unfortunately, this can leave two people frustrated by each other’s lack of appreciation and deteriorate one’s sense of worth.
Relationships can be so incredibly rewarding, yet we have to be honest about what kinds of rewards we VALUE and do not value in the relationship.
PUTTING IT INTO PRACTICE
It can be challenging to recognize a lack of appreciation in ourselves. Usually because it just is a meh feeling. We are much more likely to recognize a lack of appreciation in others. We sure do feel those emotions!
If you are brave, ask others in your life about what you seem to not appreciate. Run those experiences through the signals listed above and gain some powerful self awareness. Then practice the steps below to make solid shifts in how you receive and offer value.
Harnessing the power of ungratefulness to access high value in relationships includes:
- Be willing to notice apathy in yourself and others.
- Accept the lack of VALUE that you or someone else has.
- Grieve the time, energy, and resources you/others have directed in ways that are not valued.
- Work with internal and external signals to realign with what is of high value (great appreciation) in yourself or others.