Years ago, I read Tiny Habits by Dr. BJ Fogg.
One of the ideas I took away from the book was that if you want to establish a new habit, it helps to connect it to something you already do. An existing behavior becomes an anchor—or trigger—for the new behavior.
I had already been practicing gratitude for years. But somehow, it never occurred to me to connect gratitude to something my body was already going to make me do multiple times every day.
Like going to the bathroom.
Seriously. Think about it. You can forget to journal, skip a workout, and forget to meditate. You might even get so busy that you forget to eat.
But eventually…
You’re going to have to pee. Or poop. Your body is going to remind you.
And once the bumper sticker I told you about in the introduction got me thinking about being grateful for something as ridiculous as pooping, I realized bathroom breaks might be one of the best gratitude triggers I could possibly use.
Maybe even a genius trigger.
I know calling going to the bathroom “genius” might be pushing it. But stay with me.
Your Body Already Remembers for You
One of the problems I’ve seen with a lot of gratitude practices (and habits in general) is remembering, or finding the time, to actually DO them.
“I’m going to write three things I’m grateful for every morning.”
Great. Until you wake up late.
“I’m going to practice gratitude every night.”
Great. Until you fall asleep.
“I’m going to pause three times throughout the day.”
Okay.
When?
That’s what I like about the bathroom.
For most of us, you don’t have to create the trigger. You don’t have to put “pee” on your calendar.
Your biology handles the reminder.
And bathroom breaks have some other advantages.
They happen multiple times a day. They’re possible pretty much anywhere you are.
And unless your kids are banging on the door—which, if you’re a parent, is VERY possible—you usually get at least a few seconds to yourself.
You’re already stopping whatever else you were doing.
So why not use a few of those seconds to practice being grateful?
Brace Yourself…
Here’s the super-duper complex SWYP (sounds like swipe) practice.
Ready?
- Go to the bathroom. I’m pretty confident you can handle this step without my help.
- Pick ONE thing to be grateful for. One. It can be related to the bathroom: “Thank You for toilet paper.”
“Thank You that the plumbing works.”
“Thank You for the lock on this door.”
“Thank You that I made it here in time.” Or it can have absolutely nothing to do with the bathroom. Your spouse.
Your kids.
Lunch.
A comfortable pair of shoes.
That you can breathe through your nose right now.
Whatever. You’re not trying to come up with the most profound thing you’ve ever been grateful for. Just something you can honestly appreciate. - Say thank you. And smile. You can say thank you silently or out loud. And smile. Yes. While you’re on the toilet. That’s kind of the point of the title. The smile might feel natural. Or it might feel completely ridiculous. Either works for me.
- Marinate in it for about 10 seconds. Don’t immediately jump to the next thought. Give yourself a few seconds to actually appreciate what you just noticed. I like taking one slow breath—about four seconds in and six seconds out—and staying with the gratitude while I breathe.
That’s it.
Go to the bathroom. Notice one thing. Say thank you. Smile. Marinate for 10 seconds.
You just SWYPed.
Ten Seconds!?
Yes. Ten seconds.
Could you spend longer? Absolutely.
Will you eventually spend longer without even trying?
Probably.
But I don’t want the starting point to feel like work. If I tell you to spend 20 minutes practicing gratitude every day, there’s a decent chance you’ll think:
“That sounds great.”
And never do it.
But ten seconds while you’re already in the bathroom?
You can probably do that today. Actually, you can probably do it within the next few hours. Maybe sooner depending on when you last went.
And you’ll get another opportunity later. And another one after that. That’s just one of the things that makes this work so well.
You’re not trying to remember ONE big gratitude practice every day.
You’re attaching a ridiculously small practice to something that already happens repeatedly.
The Bathroom Is Just the Training Ground
The goal is NOT for you to become great at being grateful in bathrooms.
That would be a weird life goal.
The bathroom is practice.
The goal is for gratitude to become part of how you naturally experience your whole life.
You practice noticing something while everything is normal, so eventually you start noticing things without trying so hard.
You practice appreciating the plumbing while it works.
You practice appreciating your body while it works.
You practice appreciating ridiculously ordinary things that you normally overlook.
And over time, maybe you start noticing more reasons to be grateful outside the bathroom too.
Standing in line. Driving. Walking through your house. Dealing with something annoying.
Eventually, maybe even when life gets hard.
We’ll talk a lot more about that. For now, I just want you to get some reps.
“This Is Weird.”
Correct. 😂
It IS weird.
You are intentionally smiling and practicing gratitude while using the bathroom.
I’m not going to try to convince you that’s normal. But normal isn’t necessarily the goal.
Memorable is the goal.
You might forget some random gratitude exercise you read about in a book.
You probably won’t forget the phrase: Smile When You Poop.
And once you remember the phrase, hopefully you remember the practice.
“Will 10 Seconds Really Make a Difference?”
Once? Probably not much.
Do it one time, and I doubt you’ll walk out of the bathroom as a completely transformed human being.
But that’s not the idea.
You’re practicing. Ten seconds.
Then another ten seconds. Then another. And another.
Instead of asking me whether ten seconds will change your life, try it.
Test it for yourself.
See what happens when you intentionally practice noticing and appreciating something multiple times throughout your day.
You don’t have much to lose.
You were going to use the bathroom anyway.
“What If Bathroom Breaks Don’t Work for Me?”
Then don’t use bathroom breaks.
The bathroom isn’t sacred to the practice.
If health conditions, work situations, schedules, or any other reason make bathroom breaks not the best trigger for you…
Use something else you already do repeatedly.
Wash your hands. Open a door. Take a drink of water. Sit down. Stand up. Start your car. Or if it makes sense for you, you can even use blinking as a trigger.
Smile When You Blink doesn’t make nearly as good of a book title, but you’ve got plenty of opportunities.
The point is to connect a small gratitude practice to something your life already reminds you to do.
For most people, I think bathroom breaks work REALLY well.
But the best trigger is the one you’ll actually use.
Your Next Bathroom Break
I don’t want you to finish this chapter and think:
“That was interesting.”
I want you to try it.
So sometime between now and the end of today, go to the bathroom. Hopefully because you actually need to.
Pick ONE thing you can honestly appreciate.
Say thank you. Smile. Spend about 10 seconds actually feeling grateful for it.
Done.
Don’t worry about doing it perfectly. Don’t worry about building some giant streak. Don’t worry about becoming a “grateful person” today.
Just get your first rep.
And if you forget during the next bathroom break? You’ll probably get another chance today. And if you already know you’re going to forget…
Set an alarm on your phone that says:
DON’T FORGET TO SWYP.
I know…
Ridiculous.
That’s kind of the point, though.
Once you’ve tried the practice, we need to talk about something more important than bathrooms.
Because it’s relatively easy to be grateful when life is going well.
What about when it isn’t?
What about when the bill is five times higher than normal?
What about when something genuinely sucks and you don’t feel thankful for it AT ALL?
That’s where we lean into All Progress Starts With The Truth.
And that’s where we’re going next.