THREES - GRATITUDE
THE THREES IN THE DECK OF CARE ENCOURAGE YOU TO SAVOR THE POSITIVE THINGS IN YOUR LIFE.
The Threes encourage you to savor the positive things in your life, building new neural pathways for positive thinking and confronting your natural negativity bias. As part of being humans, we all have a natural biological tendency to see and focus on the negative in our life. Research has shown that our brains are adaptive, though, and we can literally rewire our neurons by regularly and purposefully engaging in a new type of thought. When used to help ourselves see and savor the good more, this is called positive neuroplasticity.
To accomplish this re-wiring of our brain, we need to establish a regular practice of focusing on the good in which we savor present-moment, positive experiences. Best practice is to be specific (celebrating actions or occurrences as opposed to broad themes), and to reflect on the good for at least 15 seconds (allowing it to soak in). Positive neuroplasticity takes time but if you keep up a regular practice you will see a difference.
If you like more formal program learning, The Path to Resilience with Jamie Lynn Tatera is an 8-week program designed to help you fully savor the side-by-side experience that is life by learning to relate skillfully to difficult experiences and also intentionally create positive strategies for long-term resilience and well-being. She also occasionally offers a free journaling program with the same goal which can be found on this page, or you can sign up for her mailing list to learn when a new one is being offered.
Three of Spades - Gratitude
The three of spades encourages you to build a gratitude practice in which you reflect on things that you feel fortunate to have experienced or to have in your life. One classic (and well-researched) version of this practice is gratitude journaling - in which you write down three things for which you are grateful, usually in the morning or at night. Journaling isn’t for everyone, though, and you may prefer to exercise gratitude in your head or aloud. Nighttime prayer is another common gratitude practice.
Three of Diamonds - Savoring the Positive
The three of diamonds encourages you to take time to soak in the positive experiences in your life such as delicious food, time with friends, a beautiful view, or anything else that brings you joy. The world is full of beauty and good - but most of it will go unnoticed without intentional attention. To really soak in a positive experience, you need to sit with it for at least 15 seconds with some mindful attention.
Three of Hearts - Developing a Positive Personal Image
Our culture floods us with unattainable goals and peer benchmarks, setting us up to always feel like we’re failing compared to this fictional benchmark. It’s natural to struggle with the parts of ourselves that we don’t like and we all get stuck in rumination patterns second-guessing things that we’ve done. It’s important to build out a more full, more compassionate self-image - one that understands our flaws and celebrates our strengths. If we have a more complete, kind picture of ourselves, we’ll be more resilient when challenges arise.
The Three of Hearts encourages you to celebrate the parts of yourself that you like. Try to be specific, like “I like the curve or my earlobe” or “I’m good at actively listening without interrupting.” The Three of Hearts isn’t encouraging broad, generalized affirmations (I am strong. I am beautiful . . .). Broad affirmations tend to only work for people who already have high self-esteem, and can be counterproductive for those struggling with their personal image. In addition, the goal isn’t to develop irrational confidence which can lead to narcissism, so don’t approach the exercise with the intention of telling yourself everything about yourself is good, correct, or right. The goal is to pair your self-criticism with self-love and acceptance, and to develop a more balanced self-image.
As for the parts of yourself you struggle with, you’ll work with those in the Nines when you develop self-kindness. When applied to challenging situations, such as negative body image, those skills will help you develop a compassionate but fair understanding of your weaknesses, or traits that you would prefer to not have. The two paired together (celebrating what you love about yourself and bringing compassion to the rest) will help you have a kind and balanced self-image.
Three of Clubs - Creating a Sense of Safety and Stability
Part of our negativity bias is grounded in the evolutionary background of needing to be more regularly on guard for natural world threats (think dangerous animals). We’re naturally set up to overweigh the risks of the world, and to perceive our overall situation in life as irrationally unstable. This can be good for us - helping us to focus on stability and to engage in low-risk behaviors. Unfortunately, it can also hold us back.
Research has shown that a sense of safety and stability is necessary for creativity and innovation. To more fully express yourself and your passion more fully, you’ll need to take risks and challenge yourself. This is a lot easier if you have an appreciation for how much of your life is stable, and a clear-eyed perspective on what you will still have if everything else in your life crumbles apart.
The Three of Clubs encourages you to find time to appreciate the sources of stability in your life - the things that keep you grounded and will still be there if you fall. By taking time to notice these stabilizing forces in your life, you can help to emotionally meet your core needs for safety and security - creating more bandwidth for you to explore, take risks, and to explore your passions.
A Final Thought
One other classic positive neuroplasticity trick is to pair negative thoughts and speech with a broad positive or neutral statement such as “and my life is truly blessed” or “and the sky is blue.” The goal is to catch yourself when you’re exercising your negativity bias, and negating it in the moment with a positive thought or a grounding/neutral thought. This can take the sting out of your negative mindset, and help to sustain a fuller picture of your life.