Wake Up Grateful: The Transformative Practice of Taking Nothing for Granted

by Kristi Nelson

With a growing body of researching demonstrating the tremendous social, physical, and mental health benefits of gratitude, Kristi Nelson challenges readers to join her on the quest to feel grateful no matter what circumstances life presents. Using her own heartfelt story as a 25-year survivor of Stage IV cancer as a jumping-off point, Nelson recounts how she opened the door to living with great fullness of heart in every moment. Building on the groundbreaking, universal teachings of Brother David Steindl-Rast, called "the Grandfather of Gratitude" by Oprah Winfrey, Nelson helps readers learn how to cultivate gratefulness and wholehearted living, moment by moment, through a series of practices, meditations, and journaling reflections. She explores the opportunities for approaching all aspects of life with gratefulness, including our bodies, no matter what the challenges, our emotions, our relationships, and finally, the natural world and the greater world community. "Ultimately,"  says Nelson, "we recognize that each moment and each interaction, every step on the path and every way that we walk the path of our lives, can be infused with a sense of the poignancy and preciousness of the moment. As we are able to more fully embody joy for the gift of being alive, our own lives are transformed, along with the lives of the people around us." Reconnecting with the joy of being alive is the gift Nelson shares with readers. 

Genres: Nonfiction, Self Help, Spirituality, Audiobook, Psychology, Personal Development, Memoir

240 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 27, 2020

Reviews

[Jenny (Reading Envy) · Rating 3 out of 5]

The author reflects on gratitude as a practice, discusses it in the context of her own life (dealing with and getting through stage iv cancer) and quotes from others who are reflecting on gratitude in their own practice. Her thinking/practice is heavily influenced by Brother David Steindl-Rast, and they both seem to be affiliated with the Network for Grateful Living which has helpful tools such as daily gratitude journaling prompts.

These kind of books... I usually end up feeling they are repetitive and circle through a lot of the same content to emphasize their point. I also had an eARC from the publisher that was full of almost full-page watermarks and out of context incomplete paragraphs that made it a struggle to read. I suspect if I'd had a final copy without all the mess this might be a four star read. (I suspect publishers do this because they are worried about theft but it makes it very difficult to have a genuine reading experience.)

But if you are struggling to keep perspective right now, like I definitely am, reading a chapter of this book every day and trying out some of the practices certainly can't hurt, and it helped me reframe some things I was struggling with. Since both my parents dealth with cancer in the last five years, and only one survived, it was useful to read about how life feels after cancer when you thought you might die, which I might find helpful in talking to my Mom, who has survived cancer, lost a spouse, and had to move from the home she lived in for 40 years. It would be easy to lose perspective.

This book is coming out November 24 so I kind of jumped the gun a bit... I had an early copy from the publisher through Edelweiss.

[Literary Redhead · Rating 5 out of 5]

During the COVID pandemic, I’ve tried to count my blessings more. So when I found Kristi Nelson’s book on NetGalley, I snatched it up. Executive director of A Network for Grateful Living, she turned to thankfulness to survive stage four cancer at 33. In WAKE UP GRATEFUL, she shares transformative techniques to go from “woe is me” to “thank you.” It’s a big spiritual shift that impacts mind, body and soul. I’m starting right now to follow Kristi’s example. Read this book and I bet you will too!

5 of 5 Stars

Pub Date 24 Nov 2020

Thanks to the author, Storey Publishing and NetGalley for the review copy. Opinions are mine.

#WakeUpGrateful #NetGalley

[Kirsty ❤️ · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a really well rounded look at gratitude and how to educate your brain to see the joy in life every day. I really enjoyed doing the exercises. I liked that it can be picked up at any point in life and there's something for every scenario. Really enjoyed it.

[Jennifer · Rating 3 out of 5]

“You are the sky. Everything else is just the weather.” – Pema Chodron

Wake up grateful was a practical guide to understanding how to be grateful.
The author explains through her own journey and other helpful examples how to do that. The grateful perspective is a practiced thing. It has to be worked at every day. It helps to focus on a person on life. And....
*Integrity
*Values
*Feelings
*Perspective
The book gives a step by step suggestions “to do” list to awaken your beliefs in gratefulness. There are
questions for reflection are at the end of each chapter. Things to make you more aware of what you should be grateful for.

I thought this was ok. It felt like something was missing. IDK, lots of helpful advice if you’re open to it.

Thanks to the publisher via Netgalley for this audiobook, in exchange for my honest review.

[Betsy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a book worth owning and revisiting slowly. Also it is particularly well timed for the COVID challenges we have been living through in 2020. Kristi Nelson, Executive Director of a Network for Grateful Living, has taken the foundational teachings of Brother David Steindl-Rast and developed insights and practices which are easily applied to our every day lives. Interwoven throughout, she shares her personal story of encountering and surviving Stage Four cancer as a young woman. (I love the personal stories and would love to see even more of them in the book.)

For me personally, there is much that resonates, having been through cancer as well as other traumatic life experiences such as domestic violence and the sudden traumatic death of my young brother and his wife in a tragic accident. Grateful Living has always been an important part of my life, both as a function of how I was raised, and as a result of the challenges (and blessings) I have encountered in my life. I have always said that I am grateful not in spite of my hardships, but because of them. So I guess I am probably predisposed to love this book, but I think there is also much here for people who are new to the idea of Grateful Living and are curious to learn more. (Ie what exactly is it, and why and how is it transformative for ourselves and the world?)

Although some could say at times it is a bit repetitive, I myself find that helpful and think of it as “spiraling” material...things get revisited in the text and build on what comes before, so I don’t necessarily have to go back and keep re-reading...the important things are offered up again and again in different ways and in different contexts, and may “click” at different times.

It is clear that Kristi’s heart and soul went into the writing of this book and the careful, thoughtful development of these materials. One of my grad school professors in linguistics was famous among the students for saying “if you want to know about water, don’t ask a fish.” Meaning just because you know something inside and out has nothing to do with whether you can teach it. In Kristi’s case, she not only knows and lives according to the principles of Grateful Living, but she has developed ways to make it accessible to the rest of us making our way through our crazy, wondrous, messy lives. She shows us the importance of living into the paradox and poignancy of the good, the bad, and the ugly...the knowing that grief and gratitude are inextricably intertwined, and it is that very fact that wakes us up to appreciate the opportunities that are within every moment.

One additional note: the audio book is read by Kristi herself, and her passion really comes through. I feel like she’s sitting in my living room sharing her story - definitely worth the purchase price!

Thank you Kristi Nelson for sharing your wisdom and gifts with the world - I am grateful for this book.

[Flaka]

As I am currently researching about gratitude and grateful living, this book came at the perfect time. I got the chance of reading a detailed book about grateful living with tips and prompts at the end of each chapter.

However, I couldn't connect with the book as much as I wished. All the helpful and reasonable topics discussed in the book seemed to fly past me. This is at my fault because the book is very well crafted and composed.

I cannot rate it, but I would still recommend to anyone interested in the subject.

[Bojan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Inspiring book

[Deb · Rating 2 out of 5]

2 unsatisfying stars

Waking Up Grateful is well organized. Part I covers Five Guiding Principles: Life is a Gift, Everything is Surprise, The Ordinary is Extraordinary, Appreciation is Generative, and Love is Transformative. Part II focuses on bringing the grateful practice into areas we need support, such as emotions, relationships, loss, and our world, and ‘legacy.’

Nelson’s book Wake Up Grateful states that it is offered as a guidebook – plus much more. A book you can pick up any time, open, and find a nugget of wisdom, a quote, a poem, a practice or a question to reflect on. And it shares a personal story of hope. What more could one want, I ask, starting to read with an open mind.

As a practicing Christian, I am already grateful Every day. For some reason, I expected the book to mention God, giver of life, Creator of all I am grateful for. What I got was a repetitious new age ‘mumbo-jumbo’ of affirmations, sprinkled with poems and questions. She speaks of reframing thoughts from I must to I get to. This is not a new or profound insight.

I’m not supposed to quote from the unpublished version, but here is a typical sample of the writing. “It is our full aliveness that wakes up the presence of joy. It is in learning to embrace and appreciate the fullness of your life as it is that joy emerges.” Living gratefully makes our hearts overflow into generosity and kindness. My opinion – this is wishful thinking, not grateful thinking, but God is with us in the hard times as well as the joyful ones. Nelson writes that Nature, Love, Light, and Poetry (her caps) are sacred to her. I ask, what about God?! God (by whatever name you use) is so much more than this vague, floating around spirit within us that new agers allude to.

Nelson writes that life has been given to you. I would add, by our abiding, loving God. She writes that we all want to feel wanted, to belong. I argue, that as Believers, we Do belong. If we read scriptures, we learn that we Belong. Anyone wanting to develop a practice of gratitude in a lasting way would be wise to read the Psalms, especially in the modern vernacular by Eugene Peterson. The practice of gratitude has been around for thousands of years. Study the Source.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for providing an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

[Jamie Bee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Embrace the More Inclusive Idea of Gratefulness

Audiobook and eBook Review:
As one who enjoys reading self-help books, I couldn't pass this one up when I saw it at one of my favorite book review sites. I am so glad I chose it as both an audiobook and an eBook. While I certainly enjoyed listening to the author narrate the book—and I do think when authors narrate their own books, the audiobook is so much better because you can feel the author's passion for their writing and subject—I'm so glad I chose the eBook as well. Audiobooks pass through the mind so quickly, but this is a book to be savored and thought about. The author has dealt with medical issues and is also a spiritual seeker—in fact, her spiritual mentor wrote both the foreword and has quotes sprinkled liberally throughout. Both these aspects of her life inform this book. At the very beginning of the book, she distinguishes between the concepts of “gratitude” and “grateful.” While this might appear to be quibbling over details, the author explains herself well and shows how the concept of “grateful” is far more broad and inclusive than simple gratitude. Each chapter has insightful quotes that in themselves give you much to think of. She also has questions about each chapter's topic for you to consider, usually in several places, as well as how to practice what she is talking about in your own life. Occasionally, she offers affirmations as well. The book is so rich, and I know I will be returning to it to dive deeper into each chapter. I particularly liked the second part of the book, after the introduction to gratefulness, its five principles, and general practice, where she looks more deeply at gratefulness in the real world, at different aspects of our lives, like being grateful for our bodies, our emotions, nature, and even uncertain, grief, and loss. If you like pondering these kinds of topics as I do, you may enjoy this book or audiobook as much as I did.

I received a free copy of this book, but that did not affect my review.

[Akcherrybomb · Rating 2 out of 5]

The main positive I got from this book is 'life is a gift'. As much as we all know this, we can forget and a reality check is needed sometimes for us to be grateful.

I did struggle with this book, I'm trying to be more open minded and some of the sections I couldn't get to grips with.

Does encourage you to wake up and take stock of all the things you are grateful for.

Books like this as always quite personal i feel so depends what headspace you are in when reading them.

Wouldn't read again, or reccomend if honest

[readswithcoffee · Rating 5 out of 5]

The focus of Wake Up Grateful is on taking a proactive approach to gratitude and mindfulness. I like the way that Nelson phrased it:

“Gratefulness is a way of being that helps us focus our attention and navigate our lives with gratitude as our compass.”

Nelson's book is divided into two sections. The first discusses five guiding principles and then five perspectives for cultivating a gratitude mindset. One of the five principles, for example, was about finding ways to value and appreciate the ordinary. The second part of the book focuses on the practice as applied to specific commonalities such as loss and relationships and legacies.

This is a book that would be helpful to anyone interested in mindfulness and practicing gratitude. Questions such as:

“In what areas of life do you find that expectations or assumptions diminish your capacity to appreciate what actually unfolds in your life?”

Similar questions are scattered throughout the book and make great gratitude journal prompts.

[Connie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a book to read and re-read throughout the year to remind yourself how to move through the world. It
speaks to me.

[Carissa · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm conflicted on my rating because Wake Up Grateful was dry. I listened to the audiobook and the author narrated it. She wasn't horrible but I would have preferred a professional.

I'm also sure my style of listening to an hour of the book at a time made the book less enjoyable. The author broke the material into tiny segments with questions at the end. This would be a great book to own and read slowly. I was on a library deadline. I know I would have enjoyed this better if I would have slowed down my pace.

All that being said, this book made such a difference in my week! I've read a few books on gratitude and while I've enjoyed them all (I LOVE the topic of gratitude), this one impacted me in a way that the other books didn't.

I always thought of gratitude as "counting blessings." Sort of something that happened at the end of a long day. The "take nothing for granted" theme of this book really struck a chord for me. I found myself pausing in my day and finding things to be grateful for and really trying to cherish the now. I loved how the author incorporated mindfulness into gratitude.

Another take-away for me was to appreciate the gift of life. I loved the idea of not worrying if the glass was half empty or full but to just be grateful for the glass. The author went through cancer and effectively convinced me that life is a gift. Period.

The actual "entertainment" value for this book would be closer to 2.5 stars. However, the impact of the book was closer to a five. I'm going to compromise and rate four stars.

[Karen Wood · Rating 5 out of 5]

Highly recommend everyone read this. Changed my perspective of my life.

[Nancy Juliano · Rating 3 out of 5]

I felt like this was a good book, well written but somehow it was hard for me to read an entire book on this topic. I got her point but did so in the beginning. I ended up skimming through the last half.

[Erin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Author Kristi Nelson discusses grateful living and the difference between this and mere gratitude, which she describes as a more fleeting experience. I'm certainly behind the whole gratitude thing, but this book didn't "spark" for me. It felt repetitive at times, with the author emphasizing the same points - be grateful, appreciate what's right in front of you. Got it ;)

Thank you to NetGalley for the opportunity to preview this book.

[Covenant Way · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wake up Grateful by Kirsten Nelson is a work that seeks to expand on the idea of gratefulness into a lifestyle. Sometimes a little highbrow and metaphorical, the author tries to prevent this with practical application based on principles that run throughout the book.

This is a book to read slowly with a journal by your side in order to get the full effect. That was the mistake that I made; I read this book to finish it, rather than reading to let the message sink in. While the life-guiding ideas outlined are easy to understand, you still need to slow down and savor each sentence. In fact, I would recommend reading a chapter and then stopping. Over the course of the following week, take the time to go back over the applications at the end of the chapter. Find the ones that are the most relevant to you and implement them.

While the book tends to be susceptible to overly mystical statements about gratefulness, especially in the personal testimonies, the personal story of the author’s battle with cancer, and the way that the author incorporated personal reflections, ground the book. In this way, the book tries to appeal to those who are coming to it from a more pragmatic and self-help perspective and also to those who approach from a spiritual and mystical perspective. However, because it is trying to appeal to both, if you find yourself more on the pragmatic side, you might find yourself skimming certain sections.

Personally, gratefulness has been such an important part of my own well-being and spirituality that I found a lot of value in this book and would recommend it to those who want to live and breathe gratefulness more. However, I found myself bored when the ruminations about gratefulness were attempting to place me into a mindset of all-consuming reverence towards the topic.

Rating: 3 ½ out of 5 stars.

Wake Up Grateful comes out on November 24, 2020. You can pre-order the book here.

I received this book courtesy of NetGalley in exchange for a fair and honest review.

[Amanda · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 stars, rounded down, because unfortunately I just didn't really like this. I wanted to like it a whole lot, I thought a book about how to practice daily gratitude would be right up my alley. And heck, it was also highly recommended by self-love, self-care, and mindfulness queen, Alex Elle.

But, this book was a slog. It was rambly, repetitive, boring, and honestly could have been a much more enjoyable read at about a hundred fewer pages. I enjoyed the first part but found myself turning to several other books instead of reading the second part, and then once I committed to finally finishing this I had to skim through most of the second half and fully skip over the action steps part. Look, I am a hippy who loves "hippy dippy mumbo jumbo" as much as the next hippy and can usually take it pretty seriously, but this book was too much for me. It made a lot of the actionable steps feel un-actionable and overly complicated.

At the end of the day, I loved the general message of this book... Live every day like it's a gift and start paying attention to the little things throughout your day you can be grateful for, and suddenly more stuff will start to show up. Or, as the author says, Stop. Look around you for something you can be grateful for. Go on with your day keeping that grateful energy and thanks present in your heart. Stop. Look. Go.

[Kimberly Barnes · Rating 5 out of 5]

The book, “Wake Up Grateful” is a guidebook and framework to transform your life. It allows you to see your life as a source of hope. Due to the current national pandemic, this book is especially helpful and can be a transforming process of your everyday life. You can use what that author has set forth in this book and personalize it to what works for you. Part 1 of this book focuses on the 5 guiding principles for grateful living. These 5 guiding principles include: life is a gift, everything is a surprise, the ordinary is the extraordinary, appreciation is generative, and love is transformative. One of the most transformational aspects that I took from this book included the practice of changing your everyday tasks from ‘obligations’ to ‘opportunities’. This is something that really made me stop and think. While I get so bogged down in everyday life with what I ‘have’ to do, I should merely be glad that I am ‘able’ to do so. I also liked the focus that expectations and assumptions lead to anger, regret, and disappointments. Not only does this author point out the guiding principles, but she also provides specific practices of how to put these principles into your daily life. I highly recommend this book to anyone wanting to change their thoughts about being more grateful. I am appreciative of the author, Kristi Nelson, Storey Publishing, and NetGalley for providing me the opportunity to review this book and provide feedback.

[Stephanie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Audiobook Review of Wake Up Grateful by Kristi Nelson.
"Open your heart to the things that now enrich your life but came from loving something or someone you had to let go. Be grateful to your heart for its beautiful courage." ~Kristi Nelson, Wake Up Grateful.

Kristi Nelson is a cancer survivor who fought for her recovery and wrote this book as a lesson for the power of gratefulness. She does a beautiful job narrating her book and sharing her vulnerabilities as personal examples. She provides numerous perspectives and practical ways to shift the brain to look for gratitude every day.

Nelson says, "I carry grief as an evident blessing of having loved and been loved." I have six dear guardian angels (Paternal and Maternal Grandparents, Godmother/Aunt, and my Dad). Losing my Dad so unexpectedly from a brain injury after slipping on the icy driveway made me conquer my deepest fears. Grief has become my close friend because it reminds me I've given and known the greatest unconditional love. This exceptional loss gave birth to my daily practice of vulnerability and gratitude. Nelson discusses her thoughts of facing death and how it strengthened her appreciation for the little pieces of life. I see them too. This book is so powerful and meaningful, now especially, as we are all living in this pandemic. 2020 has become the "year of gratitude" because all of the daily distractions disappeared, allowing us to pause and count our blessings. I highly recommend this book to everyone. I will be making this book an annual tradition to listen, practice, and strengthen my gratefulness.

Thank you, #NetGalley and #WorkmanAudio, for this ARC/ALC in exchange for my honest review.

[Katherine Dixon · Rating 3 out of 5]

Kristi Nelson's premise for her text is powerful and persuasive. Her initial commitment to grateful living was catalysed by a cancer diagnosis, however she explains that as her life returned to "normal" she found herself falling back into old habits. This makes her story extremely emotive, but also highly relatable. The distinction she makes early in the text between "gratitude", which is definitely a well-being buzzword at the moment, and "grateful living", which the book advocates, is instructive. The spiritual tone of the text will be a draw to some and will likely deter others, in particular perhaps those who are seeking pragmatic/science-driven tools to integrate into their life. Certainly, some of its advice feels very meditative, even ruminative, in contrast to other sections which offer very practical guidance about how to move towards "grateful living". For example, the step-by-step guide to having a grateful day really helps to ground the advice of the early sections of the text and feels very achievable. One of the real strengths of Nelson's book is the fact that she designs it to be useful even if read in a non-linear fashion. It is intentionally "bitty" and easy to dip in and out of - this I feel complements her intention for the practice of "grateful living" to be a lifelong commitment and something that her guidance can support for the long term. The only thing I would say about this, however, is that the many different sections available in the text make it hard to create an aesthetic mise-en-page. The publisher has done a good job at being consistent in the design, but I would personally prefer an additional level of simplicity.

[Brigitte Ayerves Valderas · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wake up Grateful by Kristi Nelson talks about cheating life and cheating death to get to a point of gratefulness. She went from always wanting more to focusing on what works and what's enough in each moment. Nelson wrote a book articulating a framework of teachings so gratefulness becomes actionable. I found that the book was a guide to make people more reflective about gratitude.
I reviewed the audiobook via NetGalley and I will say that the pace of the narration and tone weren't too helpful. I believe the intent was for the narrator was attempting to be poignant and reflective. However, considering the nature of Nelson's health challenges, the monotone nature of the narrator's voice with limited inflection made the Nelson's story more sobering and slowed it down.
The content of the book was highly useful and significant and very reflective the nature of life, love, happiness. Nelson highlights the importance of not taking moments in our day for granted. She offers actionable steps from to do lists to breathing exercises that can be easily incorporated into a daily routine. Nelson also talks about struggling with a deadly disease and what it means to confront death.
I would definitely recommend her book. I think it can benefit people who either learned or struggle with a life-threatening disease. I think she presents many relatable moments to help people feel that they are not alone in their journey but it also offer a gentle nudge and awareness of the end of life and the beauty of living and doing so with a great appreciation for each moment that's given to you.

[Nikki · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wake Up Grateful: The Transformative Practice of Taking Nothing for Granted by Kristi Nelson
Narrated by Kristi Nelson
Publisher: Workman Audio
Genre: Health, Mind & Body | Nonfiction (Adult)
Release Date: November 24, 2020

Wake Up Grateful by Kristi Nelson is a book about changing your perspective and focusing on "Grateful Living". I really wanted to love this book!

I found the book to be interesting, but there were a lot of things that didn't work for me (& those stood out more). I found the book to be repetitive and it was expected that I would know & appreciate who Brother David is (I finally had to look up the website so I could see why he was such an expert and why I should care about what he had to say on the subject). I also found the author's criticism of gratitude and gratitude practices to be insulting. In her mind, gratitude and gratefulness are two dissimilar things and gratitude is lesser (though the differences were skimmed over).

In the end, I felt like Brother David should have authored the book himself, instead of his teachings & methods being taught by someone else.

The narration by the author was good. She spoke at a good pace with proper intonation and inflection.

I would recommend checking out the website www.gratefullness.org prior to listening to or reading this book. I think it will help give more context to the book.

I'm so grateful to Kristi Nelson, Workman Audio, and NetGalley for providing me with a free copy of this ARC ebook in exchange for my honest review.

[Ashton · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is beautiful. If I'm honest I've been reading it at a very angry and depressed time in my life. half the time I would read it, I would be angry because I would know that she was right but I'm too tired to keep fighting. And then I'd keep listening and I would know that she was right to the point where it would push me to fight again. And that's really saying something. I was lucky enough to receive this book from #Netgalley to review for free. I read it because I knew I needed help and I can't find anybody to help me. And now I know I will be rereading it and marking the crap out of it because there were a lot of great pieces of advice and beautiful sentiments and painful sentiments that just needed to be known. I have been sick for 14 years and I was not expecting they're to be anything about how to be grateful when your life has essentially left you. When you've lost almost everything. But it does. It's somehow helps with the unhelpable. Helped me feel us alone. I would highly recommend this book and already have actually. I hopefully will be able to physically work again one of these days, which point I will buy this book and reread it constantly. Trying to put into action some very good advice.

[Misa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I have already gave my review about the audiobook version of this same book that I have liked and I got to learn some of things about gratefulness in an everyday life as a practice. Being grateful is not an easy task and mainly when times are difficult and to know how to be and stay grateful in each moment and for everything even for the tiniest little things in our lives. Gratefulness is really bigger than what we may think .

Through this book, the author speaks about so many things and each point is detailed in many other points, it's really rich . There are some spirituality of course for it is influenced by Brother David Steindl-Rast. I'm not a big fan of books about spirituality and so on but this apart, the book has some good advice that can help after the last year and in order to start a better year with a new view about your life.

What I can say is that reading this book can not hurt for sure, so why not give it a try and that was actually what I was thinking when I decided to start it. At the end, it didn't hurt and it reminded me about some important things that I should be grateful for.

[Kelsey Mahoney (The Reading Nook) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Happy pub day to Wake up Grateful!

This year it has been a bit more difficult for me to find gratitude in every day life. As an effort to be more grateful, I started writing gratitude lists when I journal. When I came across Kristi Nelson's "Wake up Grateful" on NetGalley, I knew I had to pick it up! Now, my ARC is in the form of an audiobook; I listened to this while mindlessly cleaning, winding down for the night or while going on walks. Listening to personal stories as well as tips & tricks on how to retrain your mind to go from "pity part" to "thank you" was beneficial as I did these tasks, reminding me to ever be grateful for not just the bigger things, but the little things in life as well. I loved that Nelson targeted every last bit of being in this book - she even touched on the body and gratitude as a component to better health and overall sense of well-being. I do wish I picked up the eARC copy as well, as this to me is a book I would have taken notes in. Overall, this one gets 4/5 stars from me!

Thank you to the author, Storey Publishing and NetGalley for the ARC. All opinions are my own.

#NetGalley #WakeUpGrateful

[Carolynn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kristi Nelson came incredibly close to losing her life to cancer. She recovered and wrote this book to remind us all that life is worth living and that we should be grateful for every day. Living with gratitude is not a new theme in the self-help advice genre, but Kristi's personal experiences bring something original to this genre. With the beginning of the book, I was afraid that this was another book that was just going to repeat "live with gratitude" over and over again in different ways. However, when Kristi brings her own story into it, it gives the book greater meaning. She can take the worst day and find the tiniest sliver for which to be be grateful If she can do it, surely I can do it, too. Kristi writes about separating your emotions from your day and that it is okay to live without a plan. As someone currently living through grief, I found these two items extremely helpful. I recommend this book to anyone who needs a reminder that life never goes as planned, and that is okay. There will always be something to be grateful for, even if it just that you woke up today. Life is tough for all of us right now and it is important to live with gratitude in our lives.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the arc of this book in exchange for an honest review.

[Brian C · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is so great. I can't say enough about it. Here are a few of my notes

Inhibitors of gratitude
Comparison- “They have it so much better”
Assumptions/expectations - “This experience should go this way”
Scarcity - “I don’t have enough of X”
Entitlement - I deserve this much and I’m not getting it

Learning that co-existing with our emotions is a precondition for self awareness, insight and empathy

Feelings offer guidance for our lives

Having a regular gratitude journal

Having gratitude for each opportunity in life. Life is a gift rather than a struggle. “If you are breathing, then there is more going right with your body than wrong” Jon Kabot Zinn

Recognizing and affirming the positive aspects of another person is important “I am so grateful for how kindly you treat strangers, the integrity of your choices, the joy that you bring to life.”

Embrace mystery and uncertainty. These allow for the beauty of possibility and curiosity. When we live with feelings of fear and a need to control life, we miss out on the beauty of what life can bring us.

[Meghan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was received as an ARC from Storey Publishing in exchange for an honest review. Opinions and thoughts expressed in this review are completely my own.

I needed a book like this in our collection at our library. During this difficult time, we lose sight on the blessings and gifts that we have already been given and instead of using them to our benefit, we wish for more. Wake Up Grateful was a great tool in reminding us that we should acknowledge the blessings we already have to help us look on the bright side more often than dwell on the negative side. The exercises and passages written in this book were easy to follow, easy to understand and easy to complete. Everyone deserves to feel their best and little do they know they have just what they need right in front of them.

We will consider adding this title to our Self-Help collection at our library. That is why we give this book 5 stars.

[Connie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really appreciated the author's statement that having cancer makes you feel appreciative for the life you are living in new ways. While I haven't had cancer, I did fracture my foot years ago and after sliding down steps on my bottom and hobbling around on crutches, it occurred to me that I never truly appreciated my feet before, but I certainly did after that!

Kristi Nelson acknowledges that some of what she has learned along the way is from the teachings of Brother David Steindl-Rast. (You can find his website online.) There is a good bit of useful information in this book, and I felt as if I was getting a nudge to appreciate life more. I'm writing this while going through the COVID 19 pandemic along with the added stress it has added to my life and the lives of many of the people I know. It often feels like a very difficult time to be grateful, so this is needed more than ever.