The 35 Most Inspiring Quotes on Gratitude

The list of things to be grateful for is infinite. A vibrant sunset on the beach, a fragrant cup of coffee to start the day, laughing until your side’s ache, a warm embrace, a roof over your head and a soft pillow beneath it, awaking each day to new possibilities.
Reflect on the blessings in your life, be inspired, be grateful.

Bookmark this post or print it out and re-read these quotes any time you need a reminder of the amazing power of gratitude and the abundance it brings.

Top Gratitude Quotations and Sayings:

1. Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.

~Melody Beattie

2. Gratitude is the fairest blossom which springs from the soul.

~Henry Ward Beecher

3. There is a calmness to a life lived in Gratitude, a quiet joy.

~Ralph H. Blum

4. Whatever we are waiting for — peace of mind, contentment, grace, the inner awareness of simple abundance — it will surely come to us, but only when we are ready to receive it with an open and grateful heart.

~ Sarah Ban Breathnach

5. Gratitude helps you to grow and expands; gratitude brings you and laughter into your life and into the lives of all those around you.

~ Eileen Caddy

6. Each of us is unique. We each possess a special recipe of natural strengths, talents and qualities.  When we recognize and acknowledge our gifts in gratitude, we stand in our truth, strong and confident, and then have the ability to give generously.

~ Carol J. Adamski, founder of Gratitude Habitat

7. Gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder.

~ G. K. Chesterton

8. Reflect on your present blessings, of which every man has many; not on your past misfortunes of which all men have some.

~ Charles Dickens

9. To speak gratitude is courteous and pleasant, to enact gratitude is generous and noble, but to live gratitude is to touch Heaven.

~ Johannes A. Gaertner

10. For today and its blessings, I owe the world an attitude of gratitude.

~ Clarence E. Hodges

11. As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them.

~ John F. Kennedy

12. Gratitude is a twofold love — love coming to visit us, and love running out to greet a welcome guest.

~ Henry Van Dyke

13. Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it.

~ William Arthur Ward

14. No longer forward nor behind
I look in hope or fear;
 but, grateful, take the good I find,
the best of now and here.

~ John Greenleaf Whittier

15. As each day comes to us refreshed and anew, so does my gratitude renew itself daily. The breaking of the sun over the horizon is my grateful heart dawning upon a blessed world.

~ Adabella Radici

16. Courtesies of a small and trivial character are the ones which strike deepest in the grateful and appreciating heart.

~ Henry Clay

17. Appreciation can make a day, even change a life. Your willingness to put it into words is all that is necessary.

~ Margaret Cousins

18. The hardest arithmetic to master is that which enables us to count our blessings.

~ Eric Hoffer

19. If you count all your assets, you always show a profit.

~ Robert Quillen

20. Gratitude is riches. Complaint is poverty.

~ Doris Day

21. We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures.

~ Thornton Wilder

22. From gratitude grows aliveness. With a grateful heart, we are energized to move toward our desires, live creatively and give generously.  In gratitude song and dance burst spontaneously.

~ Carol J. Adamski, founder of Gratitude Habitat

23. When you are grateful, fear disappears and abundance appears.

~ Anthony Robbins

24. Whatever we think about and thank about we bring about.

~ Dr. John F. Demartini

25. Gratitude is the heart’s memory.

~ Jean Baptiste Massieu

26. We should all be thankful for those people who rekindle the inner spirit.

~ Albert Schweitzer

27. Thanksgiving comes to us out of the prehistoric dimness,
universal to all ages and all faiths.
At whatever straws we must grasp,
there is always a time for gratitude and new beginnings.

~ J. Robert Moskin

28. When I started counting my blessings, my whole life turned around.

~ Willie Nelson

29. People who live the most fulfilling lives are the ones who are always rejoicing at what they have.

~ Richard Carlson, PhD

And More Great Quotes:

30. The best and most beautiful things in this world cannot be seen or even heard, but must be felt with the heart.

~ Helen Keller

31. No one who achieves success does so without the help of others.  The wise and confident acknowledge this help with gratitude.

~ Alfred North Whitehead

32. It is impossible to feel grateful and depressed in the same moment.

~ Naomi Williams

33. The deepest craving of human nature is the need to be appreciated.

~ William James

34. Gratefulness is the key to a happy life that we hold in our hands, because if we are not grateful, then no matter how much we have we will not be happy — because we will always want to have something else or something more.

~ Brother David Steindl Rast

35. Happiness cannot be traveled to, owned, earned, worn or consumed. Happiness is the spiritual experience of living every minute with love, grace and gratitude.

~ Denis Waitley

Which quotation is your favorite? Are there any sayings I missed that belong on this list?Leave your brilliant comment below.

Photography by Dennis Hayes, 2011