Daily Do's: Starting Your Day Your Way

Let's start off by saying there is no right or wrong way to start your day, but there may be routines and practices you can incorporate to support you to have better or more manageable mornings.

It's also important to acknowledge that some people especially those who are suffering with depression can find mornings even harder. So be kind to yourself, nothing changes over night but taking that first step to change is a huge achievement. However big or small that change is.

The right morning routine can make your day, every day. Tayloring your morning routine to suit you is the trick. If only it were that easy, the idea here then, is to give suggestions to make your morning and hopefully the day easier and more manageable. More importantly, its remembering to be kind to yourself when things don't always go to plan, or your best laid ideas just don't work out. Sometimes we just have to accept that today was not our day, but we can try again tomorrow.

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If we have started with our mindful sleep routine, then hopefully we have had a restful and full nights sleep.

Let's talk about our mornings:

1. Wake up mindfully

Every morning can be looked at as a new opportunity to start fresh, waking up mindfully can be our way of connecting with ourselves in a moment of calm and attunement before starting the day. In this we can acknowledge the difficulties of the past and choose to move forward with the present moment in mind. The idea of a mindful morning can be much easier said than done when we lead such busy lives and have so many responsibilities.

First thing in the morning is our first moment of the day to be alone with our thoughts is a special time for us to be just with ourselves, reflect on ourselves, on what we want to achieve and simply be in the present moment. Setting a time to wake can be helpful but be cautious of setting alarms on a mobile phone, it can become all too easy to start scrolling or reading the news and setting you straight into a negative mind set before you even get out of bed.

2. Set an intention

Setting an intention is stating out loud what you intend to achieve though your day by actively engaging with yourself to achieve your goals. It could be your intention for the day, week, month or even the year. The idea is that your intention is a commitment to what you want to manifest for yourself. When we are intentional we are focused in the moment, focused on what we want to achieve.

Setting out intention can be as simple as

Today, I -----------

This week, I -----------

This month, I -----------

This year, I -----------

Our intentions can be as simple as, today I want to brush my teeth, or today I want to make a plan to further my education. The possibilities and endless and all focused on you.

3. Make a connection

Connection is so important for our welling being, you may feel connected to others, your pets, the world around you, or you may not. You make feel well connected to yourself your thoughts, feelings and emotions, but what if you're not.

Let's look at some steps to help you get out of your own way.

While taking a mindful moment perhaps in the shower, or as you take a first sip of coffee, what are you feeling?

By noticing what we are feeling in the morning or indeed at any time of day we are learning a new skill of attunement with ourselves. Take a moment to pause, what are you feeling, tired, worried, anxious, happy, grateful. These don't always have to be negative, noticing when we are content and happy are immensely useful tools when we are not feeling as positive.

If we notice a negative feeling or emotion name it - Angry, hurt we can acknowledge the feeling; do we need to do something about it right now or can we write it down to come back to when we have the space and time to process it fully. This is not to push the feeling or thought aside but to acknowledge it, accept it and know that we need to make time for it. Rather than attempt to suppress it and find it leaking into our day uncontrollably. This acceptance is a key skill for us to learn, by accepting our thoughts, experiences and emotions as they are, without judgement we allow ourselves to make that connection.

This is a skill we can lean and will inevitably take practice, at first it may feel counter productive to accept our thoughts and emotions without pushing them away but when we can learn to accept without judgement we can help ourselves let go of negative, unhelpful feelings and feel more grounded and connected to ourselves and others.

Self-compassion

Having and building self-compassion is a big part of connecting to yourself, learning self-compassion, self-acceptance and self-love in connecting to yourself is a continual and daily process. Some days it will feel natural and others it may be more difficult and harder to reach. firstyly and always it means acceptance of us, our feelings, emotions and thoughts and focusing on the good and letting go of the negative judgments we are actively choosing to be kind to ourselves. One morning and one step, one thought and one feeling, at a time.

4. Connection with nature

We are connected to the world around, the environment we find ourselves in can have huge implications on our emotional wellbeing. Finding time to connect with nature helps us to release tension and has positive effects on our stress levels.

This is so important there is dedicated post Read more at Environmental Therapy

5. Affirmations

Starting the morning with an affirmation can be a helpful way of manifesting what you want to happen in the day ahead and to attach positive thoughts to it. An affirmation is a positive word or statement to help you challenge and overcome negative thoughts. In repeating our chosen phrase we are putting our emphasis, to believe in our words and taking steps toward positive change in our lives. in saying our affirmations out loud we are stating our own intention to value our wants and needs, speaking to ourselves in a positive and kind way, being our own cheerleader.

Read more at Affirmations and positive self talk

6. Make a plan

We can't do it all! Be realistic about what you want and what you need to achieve for the day. There will always be things that need to get done, and things you want to do, it shouldn't be that one takes more importance over the other, that is a fast road to burn out.

Accept that you can't accomplish everything everyday and that's absolutely ok.

Instead, agree with yourself what is reasonable for you, to balance your own 'want to do' and 'need to do'.

Generally we can get one big thing, three medium things, three small things, two self care things and one want. So keep your daily to-do list not bigger than 10 needs and wants. Balanced to what you specifically need and want, finding time to get things done and care for yourself in the process.

Are there things you need to achieve in the day, real adulting tasks? Bite the bullet and get that done first, once that is out of the way you day seems to open up and any other medium or small tasks don't seem as bad, you're also one step closer to your 'want to do' tasks, exciting!

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Read more at Making Mindful