It was one year ago today. I remember distinctly driving down the road and feeling something in my chest, a dull ache on the left side. I don’t have to tell you what went through my mind. I also don’t have to tell you how anxious it made me. A cold shiver went down my spine. My hands got sweaty, and I gripped the wheel just a bit tighter. I tried to think of something else, anything else.

I had experienced chest pains before. When I first had chest pains in my 20s, I had them checked out and was told it was nothing serious, just some inflammation in my ribcage. Later, in my 30s, I would attribute any chest pains to stress. A couple of ibuprofen, and I would be right as rain again.

But this time was different. A decade older, in my 40s, and having just seen my father go through quadruple bypass surgery, there was an urgency to these symptoms. And that urgency was repeated when I told a doctor friend of mine at church that night about them. The first question she asked was about my family history.

“Well, my dad’s always had high cholesterol,” I said. “And he just had open heart surgery.”

Without asking any other questions, she told me to go see a doctor — tomorrow, if I could. That wasn’t the answer I wanted. I wanted her to say, “No big deal. Probably just pulled something. Don’t worry about it.”

But worry I did. It seems everyone wanted to share a worst-case-scenario. They told about a very healthy 28-year-old who worked out every day and ate only vegetables falling dead from a heart attack. Those stories were not good for my mental well-being. Thankfully, I did find something that was good for my mind, body and spirit.

Journaling the Journey

Around that same time, I was doing research for Thanksgiving sermons. I came upon Robert Emmons’ excellent book, Thanks: How Practicing Gratitude Can Make You Happy. As a researcher, he linked happiness with thankfulness.

Emmons discovered that gratitude can make you more pleasant to be around, give you better sleep at night, lower your blood pressure, and even decrease your risk of injury and disease. Thankful people live longer. That’s what I wanted!

It was how Emmons performed his research that was eye-opening. He had one group of people keep a gratitude journal. Each week, they would jot down a few things they were thankful for. The control group either wrote down random things that happened to them or gripes they had.

At the end of the research term, Emmons discovered dramatically improved health in those who kept gratitude journals and decreased health in the control group. And the positive results for the gratitude journal group only increased when they went from journaling their gratitude weekly to daily.

When you are thankful for the things in life you have no control over, every gift comes into clear focus.

So why not try this out? I got a notebook and wrote the word “Thanks” on the front cover. Before bed each night, I wrote down three things I was thankful for that day. Sometimes it was difficult to find even one thing. It’s hard to come up with something new every day. How many times in a row can I be thankful for my family?

But I kept at it, and I started noticing a change. I was certainly happier. The chest pains were still there, but I felt a calming presence of God.

Gratitude Is a Gift

Another point that Emmons makes is that gratitude is all about what others do for you, not what you can do for yourself. Thanksgiving is always a result of a gift. You say “thanks” upon receiving something or when someone does something for you. It means that you had nothing to do with it. You’re relying completely on that other person.

When you’re thankful for life, you’re thanking the giver of life. When you acknowledge that you’ve done nothing to deserve anything you have, you’re directing your thought life toward God. We have a word for that type of gift. It’s called grace. Ultimately, all gratitude is about grace.

When you are thankful for the things in life you have no control over, every gift comes into clear focus. It compounds itself. You start to find grace in everyday things because you’re forced to. And the gift of gratitude produces new ways to see grace and receive grace and even give grace. And that’s the whole point of a gift. It’s better to give than to receive after all.

“ … With Thanksgiving”

My medical visits did little to steady my nerves or calm my anxiety. The findings of each blood test, EKG and stress test were normal. But whenever I brought up my family history, they wanted to probe deeper, since this is a major risk factor for heart disease.

After several appointments, a round of expensive tests, and months of waiting and wondering and worrying, I finally had an answer. I found a letter in my mailbox one afternoon. It was thin. When you get a letter from a doctor, you want it to be thin. That means the answer is nice and short with no follow-up needed. And that’s exactly what I got: a clean bill of health. Whatever was going on with my chest pains, it was unrelated to my heart. I was in the clear.

I was as healthy as a 41-year-old could be. Life was good. But I already knew that because of my gratitude journaling. I had experienced the benefits of thankfulness the apostle Paul writes about in a well-known passage of Scripture:

 “Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:6-7).

The key to unlocking the power of prayer, ending your anxious thoughts and finding grace in every situation is the phrase “with thanksgiving.” Each day that I wrote down what I was grateful for, I was living, praying and praising God with thanksgiving. And that made all the difference.

Whenever life feels out of control, be thankful for the things you have no control over. When you find yourself short of breath or short of faith, seek God’s grace in your struggle. When you think everything is out of whack, find the peace that comes from gratitude. And let Jesus guard your mind — and your heart.