"Why do these kind of things always happen to me?"

I stared at the hole in the front grill of my new car. Someone backed into it with their trailer hitch, cracked the grill all the way down the middle and drove away. No note and no apologies.

There are a few things wrong with the "woe is me" attitude into which I eagerly slipped. To begin with, it was based in pure fantasy. "These things" never happened to me. In the course of my 12 years of driving experience, this was only the second time that my car had been damaged. Aside from the delusion, this negative attitude also made things worse. Instead of getting over the incident and moving on, I agonized over it, surveilled the neighborhood for suspects, and lost sleep worrying about a repeat offense. My interpretation of this tiny little incident cost a week or two of mental capital and anguish, anguish which turned out to be much worse than the event itself.

What would have happened if I approached the event with gratitude? It sounds anti-intuitive and a bit insane, but let's take a closer look. Although a hit-and-run is less than ideal, someone with a gracious mindset might focus on the fact that they have insurance, while the offender may not have been able to afford it or the bump in rates that come along with causing damage. If I had a gracious mindset , I would have been thankful that it only cost a tiny fraction of the actual damage amount to repair. I paid $250 to repair $1,000 worth of damage. Aside from repairing the damage, the body shop also detailed my dreadfully filthy car. The $250 was worth it just for the cleaning.

The human mind is much better at noticing the negative events over the positive ones. Remember all of those times that someone didn't cut you off on the road? What about all of those times when your flight left on time? We notice the missed deadlines, perceived slights, and unfair treatment, but we easily forget the 99% of the times when things go as planned. We forget how lucky we are to have flights to take and cars to drive. Reveling in the negatives is a hard habit to overcome, but overcoming this bad habit can dramatically increase happiness. Had I focused on the positives in my situation, I would have saved a week of agonizing over my first world problem, and I would have been happier as a result.

This is all great, but how can someone develop a mindset of gratitude? Journaling is one way. I've tried various forms of journaling and often turn to journals when the times get tough. Despite knowing the benefits of journaling, I've never been able to make it stick, meaning the relief is only temporary.