Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Unflip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

Mumsnet classics

Relive the funniest, most unforgettable threads. For a daily dose of Mumsnet’s best bits, sign up for Mumsnet's daily newsletter.

See all MNHQ comments on this thread

Unflip

1 2 ··· 5 6 7 ··· 14 15

Original poster

To not keep a flipping ‘gratitude journal’

353 replies

Eastie77Returns · 21/02/2022 21:02

New manager at work, from the US if that’s relevant, declared a few weeks back that she thought it would a great idea for the team to start keeping a gratitude journal. Not my cup of tea at all but I was wasn’t bothered as it was optional. Then journals arrived at our home addresses in the post, she’d ordered them for everyone

On our weekly team meetings she started asking volunteers to read journal entries aloud. When no-one volunteered, she picked people. A few colleagues ‘read’ clearly made up on the spot entries. When it was my turn I just said I’m not keeping the journal. I’m grateful for many things but I don’t write them down. She didn’t look happy and I’ve heard I’m now on her shit list for not being a team player or something. WIBU??!

OP posts:

MrsToothyBitch · 22/02/2022 08:52

No way would I fill that in... but I'd also refuse to share my "private" writing. I think you need to explain that in order to fill it in properly and sincerely and get the benefit as she no doubt intended, you've now written things you don't want to share with work. Her insistence that you share is intrusive and also unfair if it wasn't initially implied to be compulsory- she's punishing/shit listing people who aren't fitting her personal vision. Also, unless she's directly specified they're to be filled in during work hours, she ought to be paying you at whatever rate you get over time to compensate the incursion into your free time. Might only be minutes but for the whole team it'll soon add up.

In the interest of the team and their welfare, as a team player you feel it prudent to run all of this past HR as you have concerns and also ask how she got your address that you definitely didn't give her nor would you have consented to her being given- in order for her to pressure you and commander your time. Take the article a pp mentioned about misapplied mindfulness and work place break downs, too.

Then buy her a "rude word" adult colouring book for secret santa & invite her to unwind the British way- in gratitude for her journal, obvs.

I loathe stuff like this. It's a chore and filling in similar semi- forced diaries caused me more anxiety about my anxiety than they ever cured.

RedToothBrush · 22/02/2022 08:46

I am grateful that i am aware of the warning signs of cults.

I am grateful for George Orwell and his book 1984.

RedToothBrush · 22/02/2022 08:44

I am grateful for the right to free speech so I can tell you this is a complete load of bullshit that i refuse to engage with.
Im grateful you said it wasn't compulsory.

RedToothBrush · 22/02/2022 08:40

I am grateful for my privacy, keeping my work and home life separate and not having to explain my feelings to my employer which represents a gross conflict of interests. I am grateful we have an HR department we can go to if our manager over steps the mark. I am grateful for being British so we aren't into psychobabble at work.

And boom.

MNHQ

HopeMumsnet · 22/02/2022 08:35

Hi all,
We are grateful to those MNers who nommed this for Classics...

cansu · 22/02/2022 08:34

MissM2912
It is not for a manager to impose things they themselves like the idea of unless these are actual work tasks. The fact that you think it is lovely is beside the point. Many people have difficult lives outside of work and really don't want to make up random things to make their managers feel better. It won't help them at all.

luckylavender · 22/02/2022 08:25

I think you should have told her before the meeting.

Migrainesbythedozen · 22/02/2022 08:25

@Eastie77Returns

Thank you all…these replies have made me

I work for a huge tech company. There has been a big focus on mental health and managers have apparently been told to prioritise anything that helps their teams well-being. This is her idea. Each weeks she reads her journal (it is always something cringe) and asks if anyone wants to share. Most people have their cameras off and no-one ever volunteers so she has now just started picking people. I will be on her shit list forever if I don’t have something this week so I’m printing this thread for inspiration

Why don't you refuse to do it? Just say you find it silly and insulting, and it's not part of your job.

She will soon get bored and give up if no one volunteers and others follow your lead refuse to be part of it. She will have no choice but to drop it.

DogsAndGin · 22/02/2022 08:11

@Brefugee

In Germany she'd be in the poop for sending it to your home address without asking if she could have your home address for a one off thing.

You could do like Harry and Ron in the divination classes and make up increasingly batshit entries? That's what I'd do

She’s in the shit for this by UK law too! Why would she need to know your address? She doesn’t have a copy of it. She sourced it from your files - which should be confidential. You haven’t supplied your address for any other reason than receiving your pay slip/official communication. She can naff off! Bloody gratitude journey. I’d write in there, ‘I’m grateful for my privacy!’

sillysmiles · 22/02/2022 08:04

@dementedmummy

Ok so this is a mind set thing (although i think she has gone about it all wrong and had the opposite effect!) you are supposed to write down 3 things you are grateful for every evening. It can be anything at all like "i was grateful i had the opportunity to wake up this morning" or "i was grateful the professionals are back in charge of my children's education now that lockdown has ended" or "i was grateful i got to go on y course because i really enjoyed it" or "i was grateful Katie brought in cream buns today as i was feeling hungry" Really anything at all big or small that you can be grateful for. The effect is supposed to be that you retrain your mind to focus on the positives rather than negatives in your life. This should in turn create a happier and more resilient you because although rubbish things may happen you are still finding the positives so it means you shouldn't sink into a funk if that makes sense. However, and its a big however, what you choose to be grateful for is entirely up to you and you should not be forced to share what you are grateful for. Its your life. Its your journey. If you want to share great but absolutely should not be force otherwise you have the situation you have here whereby you now resent your manager and she is turn seems to have a misplaced sense of where your team spirit is. Perhaps just thank her for the journal and for thinking of you but let her know you are not comfortable sharing what you are grateful for with the team as you are a private person. Good luck x Ps if you can treat her exercises as a bit of fun or an excuse to be a little bit silly for a while, you might find you enjoy some of it. Wait until you have to write a letter to your future self!! Believe me, come back gratitude journal, all is forgiven! 😂

I think everyone understands what a gratitude journal is and it's purpose.

However, it's inappropriate for work to send you one without you requesting to opt in and it's really inappropriate for the manager to feel like she has any rights to discuss it at team meetings.

GeorgiaMcGraw · 22/02/2022 07:56

I'd go with one of two options. Either, "I am grateful for the word 'no'." Or, "I am grateful for the excellent hospital staff in this country. I am grateful for Marie's speedy recovery. I am grateful for that broken cctv. I am grateful for the lack of hard evidence. I am grateful that she knows what I'm capable of now." Something like that, nice and deadpan.

User237845 · 22/02/2022 07:51

@Bullandbush

I’m grateful for root beer and sasparilla, grits and yams and the good old jumbo jet that brought our new manager safely across the Atlantic. Amen. Alleluia

Properly laughed out loud.

grapewine · 22/02/2022 07:50

@Gynaesaur

I'm grateful that somebody has unilaterally decided that showing the slightest amount of backbone to pointless workplace wankery precludes you from living in the real world.

Me too. It totally would be a hill to die on for me. Utterly pointless and invasive.

RhiWrites · 22/02/2022 07:49

@NeverDropYourMooncup I remember all of those but imaging OP saying (or singing!) she’s grateful for those in peril on the sea made me genuinely lol.

declutteringmymind · 22/02/2022 07:46

Tell her that your therapist said that this is the wrong time in your return to wellness and spiritual enlightenment journey.

UserBotLurking9to5 · 22/02/2022 07:36

Being told to be grateful by a company that is underpaying you (eg) would be really annoying.

ClariceQuiff · 22/02/2022 07:34

I would be tempted to say that I unfortunately found nothing to be grateful for over the preceding week, because my life is really shit.

Smallkeys · 22/02/2022 07:32

That’s so American DH got one ahead of a zoom meeting from the American bosses it went in the bin but at least he wasn’t asked to read entries out loud. Read the room woman!!

Franklyfrost · 22/02/2022 07:31

I’d do pets. Never too outrageous but each time a new animal.

I’m grateful my pet iguana is feeling better now he has a new sunlight.
I’m grateful my tortoise has come out of hibernation safely.
I’m grateful my dog was returned safety after he ran off.
I’m grateful my parrot didn’t scratch me when I trimmed his claws
I’m grateful my fish keep me company at night
Etc

HettySunshine · 22/02/2022 07:24

@NeverDropYourMooncup

Best post ever!

StrangerYears · 22/02/2022 07:23

You could say

it gives me a sense of enormous wellbeing when I feed the pigeons, and I sometimes feed the sparrows too

(sorry Blur)

babyjellyfish · 22/02/2022 07:20

@Eastie77Returns

Thank you all…these replies have made me

I think I would say that being expected to keep a gratitude journal is a source of stress for you because (a) it's an extra thing to do at the end of a long day which isn't in your job description, and (b) most of the things you are grateful for are in your personal life and you prefer to keep your personal life and your work separate, and so the whole gratitude journal thing is actually having a negative impact on your mental wellbeing.

diamondpony80 · 22/02/2022 07:09

Gratitude journals are supposed to be a personal thing. I like the idea of journaling as it helps me to get things out of my head and down on paper. Sometimes I write down the things I'm grateful for.

Not in a million years though would I do it because I was instructed to by a manager. And I certainly wouldn't be sharing my journal entries out loud with my colleagues. That's just taking the piss and has zero value.

Knittingchamp · 22/02/2022 07:02

She's literally the manager from the Office. Making you write in a gratitude journal then forcing you to read it out publicly is the stuff of dark comedy. Sorry OP she's a loon. I'd complain to HR if it were me, that's such a weird and intrusive management style that she has. Well done for telling her no!

Oblomov22 · 22/02/2022 06:31

This would piss me off. American nonsense. Although I did like the link earlier of 48 unusual things to be grateful for.

Unflip

1 2 ··· 5 6 7 ··· 14 15