Greetings all, 

The end of the year is upon us and collectively it seems like a good time to take a deep breath. For us at Bona Fide Finance and for many of our clients, it has been a very busy year with unprecedented challenges and adjustments to what our conception of ‘normal’ means. Lately, we’ve found ourselves drawn to focusing on all the things we have to be grateful for. In this last newsletter of the year, we would like to share some thoughts about gratitude with you. 

Read – 
It’s often said that “You’re the average of the five people spend the most time with,” (Jim Rohn), and we feel the same extends to creating a sense of gratitude in our daily life. Filling your mind and interactions with a sense of gratitude creates a tangible feeling that permeates into all of your interactions. And yes, it’s easy to be grateful in good times, but what about now, when things are less than perfect? This article addresses just that and points to the difference between feeling grateful and being grateful. If you are looking for some guidance on how to bring gratitude into your daily life, this article from Mindful.org has some great suggestions to increase your quotient of gratitude.

Watch – 
For this segment, we return to our friends at The Money Guy Show for their episode about ‘Keeping Up With the Joneses’. This show has a financial focus but the takeaways are relevant regardless of your financial situation. It’s so easy to focus on what the people around us ‘have’ that we get jealous or envious and then forget how lucky we are in our own lives. The major takeaway is that your mindset depends greatly on who you compare yourself to. Oprah Winfrey is credited with saying, “If you look at what you have in life, you’ll always have more. If you look at what you don’t have in life, you’ll never have enough.” Focus on the good in your life and that’s what you’ll see. If you focus on what everyone else has, you’ll never feel like you have enough. And remember, you never know what the Jones’ balance sheet looks like. 😉

Listen – 
Apparently, we’re not the only ones who feel like focusing on gratitude is worthwhile, because if you search for gratitude podcasts you are spoiled for choice. We’ve picked a couple that look promising. The first is The Gratitude Podcast. With a name like that, good audio quality, a host with a soothing voice, and quotes like, “It isn’t happiness that makes you grateful, it’s gratitude that makes you happy” we think this is a pretty good bet for some gracious listening. Our last link is to the Tom Ferry experience. His podcast focuses on mindset, business pursuits, and taking action to improve different parts of your life. We really enjoy his down-to-earth, no fluff approach and think there are a lot of great episodes here for you to enjoy on a number of topics. 

As we close out this last newsletter of the year, we would like to extend a warm and sincere thank you to all of you for your continued support and encouragement. We are grateful for the relationships you have built with you over the years and look forward to continuing to grow and thrive together. 

All the best in the New Year, 

The Bona Fide Family