Hey Everyone!
Sometimes when we talk about setting goals and direction for ourselves, we are often focussing on the far away future, or something tangible, like a new job, a promotion, growing a family, meeting your dream man/woman or something similar. Am I right??!
This is all great and we can still set intentions and goals to help us achieve these things but actually for us to truly tap into our intuition, set that goal and then stay focussed on it we MUST start by setting our own wellness goals first.
If we aren’t doing anything, no matter how small, to look after our own mental health and wellbeing then we are never going to be able to find that focus to be able to get us to where we want to go.
So we start here. And my friends, we start small. Don’t worry wellness goals don’t need to be big, life altering, scary things. They can be small and built up into a ‘routine’ over time.
I always felt super triggered by the term ‘wellness routine’. I felt like I had so much on my plate already that introducing ANOTHER routine was going to be a nightmare and something that I’d end up failing at ….then I’d feel bad about failing, I’d stop the routine and….you get where I’m going here!
But then I listened to a number of podcasts around health and wellness and learned that actually introducing habits and building a wellness routine doesn’t have to be as time consuming or difficult as I originally thought.
You start small, so I did.
I started by setting my alarm in the morning 10 minutes earlier than normal. That’s it- just 10 minutes. It meant I didn’t need to rush out of bed as soon as the alarm went off. I could wake up a little more kindly and it allowed me 10 minutes to introduce some other wellness habits into my morning routine.
After getting used to this extra 10 mins (which didn’t take long I promise) I introduced three deep belly breaths. Here’s how:
· Stay laid in bed, flat on your belly
· Stretch the body out and place your hands flat on your belly
· Take one deep inhale in through your nose, feel the belly expand with air
· Release with a deep exhale through an open mouth, feel the belly deflate as it empties
· Do this three times in total
It’s super easy, but I still wake up and think to myself “do I have to do it!”, but yes I do, and I always feel more grounded once I have.
After my three deep breaths I drink an entire glass of water to wake my body up. Easy yes?! Indeed, all it takes is remembering to fill up the glass before I go to sleep.
The last ritual I introduced into those 10 minutes is journalling. Every morning I write two A5 pages of free writing. Sometimes it’s utter rubbish as I have nothing to say, other times I talk about my dreams, or some feelings I’m working through. Or I just set some intentions or small goals for the day. The key to journalling like this is to write whatever you want and then forget about it. It’s almost like a morning download, your journal is not a method of accountability. So I NEVER re-read my journal. That is not its purpose.
You will hear people all over the internet talking about their wellness rituals – they can be big and overwhelming including drinking matcha every morning, followed by 50 mins of Yoga and meditation etc…
I would love to be somebody who could stick to something like this, but quite frankly I can’t and I’m setting myself up to fail even if I try. So small steps and small habits are all you need. Pick something that feels easy and achievable to you and then splash out once a week on a Yoga class to give you a little more time to dedicate to your wellness where the teacher does a lot of the work for you :)
Give it a go and let me know what little habit you introduce to your routine!
Love, Tash xx