Episode 157: Thanksgiving Wishes to You

Welcome to another edition of "Around with Randall" your weekly podcast on making your nonprofit more effective for your community. And here is your host, the CEO and founder of Hallett Philanthropy, Randall Hallett.

I'm thankful for your time today on this edition of "Around with Randall". A shorter version maybe with a little less tactical and maybe a little bit more distant than what we normally are to the concept or knowledge of philanthropy. Today I want to talk about what we celebrate in the United States in the fourth week of November, and that's Thanksgiving. I spent a lot of time talking about the idea of gratitude and that's really what Thanksgiving is really all about. If you look back in history going all the way back to the Mayflower and those first years, it was the end of the harvest season and a moment where pilgrims as they were called generically but Puritans, those who came in the middle or early part of the 1600s, 17th century, came to America and gave thanks. They gave thanks for the opportunity for some to practice their own religion the way they wanted to, some from freedom from a professional perspective meaning business they could not be under so much the thumb of the crown or feudalism as it was living in England. For others it was just a chance to start over. From that moment to today, Thanksgiving in its official and unofficial because it didn't become a holiday until here in the last 100 years formally, but unofficially as well has always been a moment for those of us who live and work in this world, in particular the United States, but I would tell you other parts of the world probably pull up or pick up the thought of being appreciative in different ways and forms and holidays, a moment to be appreciative for what we have. And I want to be someone who exemplifies that even though I have as many faults as anybody I've ever met, and I make more mistakes every day than most people do in a month.

I try to live my life based on gratitude because I am grateful. I'm grateful for so much of my life life, personally. It starts with the way I was raised. And while I was sad this year to lose dad, coached every team I had and played on, he was there for every High School sporting event, was there for me in college and standing right next to him, and still standing there today is my mother who I'm unbelievably grateful for, and now spending an immense more amount of time just with her. I'm grateful for that even though I'm sad. I'm grateful for my wife who, for 26 plus years and next year will be 24 years of marriage of that 26 almost 27 years, has put up with me. I found someone that's a thousand times better than I am. I'm not sure how she ended up in my life. I'm appreciative for children. I'm appreciative for my kids. Was not easy for us to have kids. It was not what they teach us in biology. We took a little longer to get there but that makes me even more grateful.

Professionally, I'm grateful for the opportunity to teach and do what I do every day. I'm thankful for my clients, collectively and individually. The individuals inside those organizations and the organizations themselves because I get to be one tenth of 1% of their success in what they want to do to make a difference in their community. All of this is something that I sometimes forget because life moves too quickly.

I did a podcast a few episodes ago on being in the moment. Sometimes we're not grateful because we're not in the moment. It's not that we don't have kind of an innate sense of appreciation, but life's moving so fast so we lose sight of the things going on in our lives. I'm at the top of that list of someone who does that. How do we get to that? Sometimes it's just as simple as turning off the world. In my case I have one less thing to turn off and that's social media. I ain't got it. I don't have Twitter, and Facebook, and Instagram, and Snapchat, and all those other things. But that up for me turning off things like business. I work six, six-and-a-half days a week because I enjoy it, and turning off all the other things that I'm involved with so that I can think about the things that I'm appreciative for. How?

When was the last time you turned off the world, turned off the radio in the car, or your podcast? Don't turn this one off quite yet! Turned off the noise? Closed your eyes and just said what do I have to be appreciative of? I'm not here to say that everybody has the same things to be appreciative for in their life, or that we all have equal amounts of appreciation, but even people who are in really difficult circumstances have things to be appreciative of.

For me, losing dad this summer was a moment of that challenge and I had a choice to make. Still due to this day am I going to be sad that I lost maybe my best friend, the person I most wanted to be in this world. And I was going to let that overcome me and miss other parts of the world that I'm just lucky to have, or am I going to embrace the fact that I got the best deal in the world by having him as my dad. Now that's a different kind of challenge than someone who maybe doesn't have enough to eat or is struggling with homelessness, or drug addiction, or alcohol addiction. Much different, but theme's the same. How do we find moments of a peace to find gratitude? When we do, when we actually have those opportunities to be appreciative of all the things in our world it actually is beneficial to our health.

The last 20 years of research on how we connect gratitude to health are spectacular. If you follow all of this from having better romantic and friend relationships, when we're grateful for them, deeper more meaningful relationships to the fact that we're just happier by as much as 10%, if we just take moments to realize how grateful we are for the things we have it actually affects like what I think of vital signs from blood pressure to improving sleep, to things like cholesterol levels are better when we have a sense of gratitude and appreciation. Depression is reduced when we have a sense of gratitude. Our pain tolerance improves when we're grateful, and actually according to a couple studies here in the last decade, little more those with immense amount of gratitude actually live longer.

On this Thanksgiving I'm going to spend a few extra moments thinking about all the things I am grateful for. Most of them are going to be personal, from my children to my sisters to my mom to how much I appreciate Dad, and most importantly to my wife and for my wife. But I'm also going to think about the people that I work with in Wisconsin and in Missouri and in California, in Washington, and in Oregon, in Iowa, in Indiana, in Florida in Texas, and in Australia, how much I love being a part of their professional life. How much I appreciate their trust in me, that I'm grateful for it. And over the next month as we get close for me Christmas, spending a month realizing that I got the best end of the deal.

And the Tactical for you, no matter what's going on in your life, no matter how challenging it is, no matter if you're driving home or driving to work, if you're looking for a small piece of advice from Randall you might be desperate. But I'm going to give it to you anyway. Take a moment and find gratitude. Find Thanksgiving, for your blessings is as simple as that you were born in a free country or that you live in a free country, that you have freedoms that other people in the world don't have, all the way to what moves you most about the people you love, for your health for whatever comes your direction that you feel good about. That's my Thanksgiving wish for you that you can find that. Enjoy a peaceful moment and realize not only the health benefits that come with gratitude but the strong, innate sense of well being to you and yours. I wish you the best of the Thanksgiving holiday season. It's my favorite from Thanksgiving to Christmas because it's all about back to my all-time favorite saying, some people make things happen, some people watch things happen, then there are those who wondered what happened. This time of the year is about people who have immense amount of gratitude, who realize they can share a little bit, give a little away, and make the world a better place, particularly for those who are wondering what happened. Happy Thanksgiving! Thank you for always tuning in to "Around with Randall" and for this holiday season. Thank you for allowing me to be a part of your world. I'm grateful! We'll see you next time right back here on another edition of "Around with Randall". Don't forget, make it a great day.