Thanksgiving Every Week

As I mentioned in my last post, the book The How of Happiness: A Scientific Approach to Getting the Life You Want describes an experiment involving expressing gratitude in writing.  Some of the subjects in the experiment wrote down, once per week, five things they were grateful for.  They did this for 10 weeks.  The people in the control group wrote also once per week, but on any topic they wanted.  Those who listed what they were grateful for were measurably happier than the control group, and even had some physical health benefits.  This almost seems to me to be too good to be true.  But there is another way to think about it.

Thanksgiving happens just once per year.  Traditionally, people will talk about what they are grateful for.  It is a deeply cherished holiday, suggesting it has a real impact on people.  So is it really that hard to believe that a weekly gratitude journal would have a big impact on a person?  Isn't that like having Thanksgiving every week?