Gratitude is a quality similar to electricity: it must be produced and discharged and used up in order to exist at all.

Faulkner’s comparison treats gratitude not as a static feeling one “has,” but as an active force that only exists when generated and expressed. Like electricity, it is invisible until it is put into motion—created by an encounter (help received, love given) and made real through “discharge”: acknowledgment, reciprocation, or concrete action. The image also implies that hoarded gratitude is self-canceling; unspoken thanks becomes inert, while gratitude practiced becomes sustaining energy in relationships and communities. The metaphor carries a moral edge: gratitude is an obligation of use, not a private sentiment, and it must circulate to remain alive.