Appreciation and Compliments go together

Tell Card: What would be the best compliment anyone could give you?

Maybe you have to stop and think about it for a minute. Wouldn’t it be nice to hear that compliment? Who would you like to say it? Who do you think would never say it? Do you think you could accept it? Can you imagine how hearing it would raise your energy level, lift your spirit and put a lighter feeling in your heart?

Compliments are an outgrowth of appreciation, and they can become a powerful tool for building connections to people around us. They not only put a smile on our face, but also help mend relationships.

Those people who learn to appreciate the world around them can be powerful change-makers through their kind words in compliments. If you question this energy, just think back in your own life to the moments when someone gave you a genuine compliment. Chances are at least a few of them stick out. Maybe they are moments that helped define you. Maybe that compliment stayed in your mind through moments of uncertainty. Spoken words are very powerful.

In their book, “Find Something Nice to Say,” Kathy Chamberlin and Debby Hoffman suggest we practice a “5-a-Day” rule. Try to give 5 compliments a day away to people around you. It can be your spouse or child, or the person helping you check-out at the grocery store. It doesn’t really matter who, just learn to appreciate little things about people and you will find yourself looking at the world differently. That may make you even look at yourself differently too.

At Do Tell: The Relationship Game, we’re all about building better connections between people. Relationships can be sticky at times and there are many reasons they sour, but small moments CAN change them. We really believe in moments of play, like when you sit down with a few people to play a game. Yes, a game.

You see, many of us are in such bad practice of not appreciating the world around us, we forget to do little things like look for the positive, or remember moments that made us laugh. People who’ve picked up our game at Amazon.com or a retail store and made time to play, have found a starting point.

Appreciation changes us, and that changes the way we see other people. It is a mindful choice about how to interact with the world. And you’ll find that you literally uplift the energy that belongs to a relationship or situation in your life, when you think about and speak appreciation. Your new reactions may change others. Your compliments certainly will begin to build a bridge.

We’ll start with a compliment for you:

If you are still reading this post, it PROVES you are the type of person who cares about the world around you and WANTS to live a better life. You’re way ahead in the game already. Good job.

Be deliberate about it. Start using the powerful appreciation tool and try out the 5-compliments-a-day rule today. Have fun.