John Kralik
This is a true story.
Depth of despair
It was December 22, 2007 and 52-year-old John Kralik felt it was the lowest day of his life. His law firm was going bankrupt, he was going through a difficult divorce, he had no money, and even his sons had grown distant from him. His current girlfriend Grace seemed to break up with him. John had always been an ethical lawyer charging very reasonable fees for his services. Yet his major clients did not pay him that year. It was a bleak Christmas season for him.
In that complete breakdown and desperation, John decided to walk on the Echo Mountain trail leading to the Angeles National Forest, California. John walked alone along meandering back paths until he was completely lost. Soon he was not even sure of getting back before dark. Then he heard a voice: “Until you learn to be grateful for the things you have, you will not receive the things you want.” Tired and frustrated, John sat down. He could not guess whose voice it was, nor could he get an explanation for the words. He felt that it was an important message. Some energy returned to him and he found his way back.
Thanking one person each day
John then had an idea. He would find one person to thank each day and send the person a thank-you note. He would do so for one full year. Then the question came to him: “Do I have anything to be grateful for?” Until the end of the next day nothing happened that merited a thank-you note. That evening, however, there was a note for him in his mailbox. Grace had thanked him for the Christmas present he had given her. That encouraged him to thank those that had given him presents.
John sent a thank-you note to his older son who had sent him a coffee machine. The next day, the son came to meet him after a long time. They had a meal together and then the son gave him $4000 he had once borrowed from his dad. Actually John had forgotten the loan altogether. When John sent a thank-you note to his younger son, he too returned a loan he had taken from John. John then began sending thank-you notes to every person who had sent him a present – and then to all clients, opposing lawyers, court clerks, witnesses, brokers, and so on, expressing gratitude for any positive thing, big or small, the person had done for him.
Things begin to change
Things were still bad in John’s life, but just the process of writing the notes every night calmed him down. His self-pity went away. He began thinking more about others and how he had neglected to be grateful to many people and many things in his life. Now, when someone asked him, “How are you?”, he found something positive to say about himself. John’s life continued to be difficult the rest of that year, but he never again questioned whether it was worth living.
John’s thank-you notes to his coworkers set off a chain reaction – they started thanking one another and the atmosphere improved. Once John had found the rhythm of feeling grateful to others, he found innumerable occasions and reasons to thank others. He realized that there were so many who did so many good things to him in the past. He wrote notes to all of them. Expressing gratitude to others brought him joy and often the other person did something nice to John.
By the end of June 2007, John had written nearly 170 thank-you notes. In return he was receiving many thank-you notes, calls, hugs and so on from them. Many had also begun expressing their gratitude to others and found good things happening to them.
Examining oneself
Writing the thank-you notes made John examine his life and he realized that his life was a lot better than he had been willing to acknowledge. Things got even better during the year of gratitude: John was in fact appointed a judge by the Governor of California. And Grace came back to him.
This is what John Kralik says about his experience: “Although it took more than a year to complete the writing of 365 thank-you notes, I continued writing them until 365 were completed. And then kept on. I learned to be grateful for the life I had, recognizing that the love I had for my children made my life already richer than the many people I envied. I learned to be grateful for my law firm, my practice, and for the love of friends and family that surrounded me. I became thankful for the many people around me who dealt with challenges far greater than the ones facing me, with courage and style. I learned to recognize the many people in my life who had protected and cared for me.”
Background: This is a short summary of the book A Simple Act of Gratitude: How Learning to Say Thank you Changed My Life written by John Kralik.
John ends his book with these words: “At the risk of making an unscientific and directly moral statement, I will say that writing thank-you notes is a good thing to do and makes the world a better place. It also made me a better man. More than success or material achievement, this is what I sought.”
Success and material achievements are only a short term solace. But to enrich on relationships and building on human bonds, is life itself. It is compassion that adds value and character to our lives providing the right energy in our every day lives. It appears that John Kralik discovered it and made the world a better place not only for himself but also for all others, to whom he sent his thank you note. At the bottom of every heart there is a longing and a need to be belonging to someone or somewhere. That is the whole purpose of life, to make life meaningful and simple. A concern for others that makes us humane and humble.