I thank God I'm alive.

I just like waking up.

And I'd never say, speak negative.

May I hope I, hope it's a good day today?

No! I say today is going to be a great day.

I claim it.

- [Audience Member] Amen! - I lay claim to it.

That's the first thing. (audience applauding)

The second thing, at least 20 minutes,

sometimes it lasts an hour, it depends.

I have a journal.

I have a daily devotional called "Jesus Calling,"

and I have a New Living Testament Bible.

I sit down.

I just ask God to show me what I should learn today.

And he flips to open the book

to whatever he wants me to read.

And I read it, I highlight it,

I take notes about what I learned.

I study it and I try to put it into action.

And that's every day.

Now, a lot of people say,

"Steve, I don't have time to do that."

But you do have time.

If you don't have time, you should make time.

Because gratitude is the number-one way

to become successful.

Because the more grateful you become,

the more things God will give you

to be grateful for. (audience applauding)

That's a very important question.

So if you start your day with gratitude,

it's like this, check this out.

If somebody come to your house every day

and ask you for a cup of sugar,

and you give him a cup of sugar

and they take the sugar and they just walk off.

And then the next day they come in

and ask for another cup of sugar,

and you're nice person so you give him

another cup of sugar, and they just walk off.

How many days can this person come to your house

and get this cup of sugar and never say thank you?

I mean, how many times you

going to let that go down? - [Audience Member] Survey said?

- Seriously？

- [Audience Member] Survey said!

- Survey said!

You know, how many days?

Not many, cause you're human.

Cause at one point you're gonna say,

"Hey, wait a minute, hold on, man.

"You done came by here six times.

"I done gave you this cup of sugar,

"and you ain't say thank you one time?

"Don't come by here no more."

So now, let's think for a second.

If this God wakes you up every day, allows you to breathe.

See, it's not your alarm clock that wakes you up.

Your alarm clock goes off, God shakes you,

then you hear the alarm clock.

It's not you just waking up.

It's God allowing you to wake up.

So if you ever stopped to just thank him

for everything he's done for you,

whatever clothes you got,

whatever kind of coffee,

you just got taxi fare,

and you thank him every day for a list of things,

guess what he'll do tomorrow?

He will add to

that list of stuff that you can thank him for.

And if you keep thanking him,

you'll find out that in one week,

you have a lot more stuff to be grateful for.

Gratitude is the number one principle of success.

That's what the average person doesn't understand.

You can do that today.

You don't need no more money.

You can start that today.

That will change your life, I kid you not.

You ain't got to... just try.

You ain't got to believe me.

Try, I dare you.

Try.

(audience applauding)