Today, US Americans think about giving thanks with varying degrees of sincerity and cynicism. Over the past few years, gratefulness, including the idea of gratefulness journals, have burgeoned as mental health/pop psych topics.

Two people I care about are grieving the loss of loved ones this week. I won’t go into detail on who they are, but they both seem to feel put upon in life in general, and to have lo have lost their insistence on joy that I knew in them earlier. Being told you should be grateful (or that you should feel anything, really) is awful. I don’t want to do that to them. But I do think that being grateful for the person they’ve now lost, as well as for specific events in their past year, could be healing.

I need to think this through more deeply, and carefully. My son is here, and has been talking about how my discipline, by being non-didactic, not telling him what he should feel, not focusing on my emotions, was effective at teaching him to think through situations and develop his own thoughts and feelings, the one’s parents often try to force on their kids. .That’s what I’d like to do for these two people—not tell them what to feel, but give them the idea that they want to open up to gratitude and let it help them heal.

From all the copious writings, podcasts and videos, do you have favorites that might help me help my friends?