Academy 8 - Dollification 10 - Starting your day the right way
Hello there sweetheart!
Today we’re going to have a quick look at your morning routine and how it can be improved with a little judicious tweaking.
Most people would love to bounce out of bed at the crack of dawn, brimming with life and energy but the reality is usually different. Snooze your alarm, then snooze it again. Get out of bed and stumble to the bathroom. Then maybe wolf down some breakfast before you get ready for work or school and plan out how soon you can get some coffee into your system (and if injecting it into your veins will have a quicker effect on you).
The good news is you can change this and I imagine most of you want to. The key is to make small changes and let them bed in (no pun intended) and then make a few more and so on.
The first thing to do is just think about your regular morning routine. If my description above strikes a little too close to home, you can probably see a few easy ways to improve it, but think about what you want out of your morning (just a couple of things, a long list will have you working out you need to get up at 4:30am to have a chance to fit it all in!).
I’ll go into some specific ideas below
Stop the snooze
Hitting the snooze button will only make you feel more tired. This is difficult to hear, especially if it’s the middle of winter, but waking up and then dozing off again begins a new sleep cycle and you’re not going to be sleeping long enough to benefit from it.
The better thing to do is to be honest with yourself and set your alarm for a time that you will get up for. After a few days of this, you will feel better throughout the day.
Exercise
We’ve talked about exercise earlier in the module, but this doesn’t mean you should bounce out of bed and hit the gym or set out on a long run. Something as simple as a few jumping jacks can help you to wake up and dispel that morning feeling from your body. A 10-15 minute Yoga or stretching session or light exercise routine will be even better.
If sweat is pouring down your body, you’ve pushed a little too hard, the limit is around where you start to sweat and you can even begin when you’re lying down by tensing and relaxing different parts of your body.
Being mindful
This can feel like a waste of time, especially if you’re busy but slow down and take a little time for yourself. Really taste your breakfast or smell your coffee, try not to worry about the day ahead or focus on your schedule but just be present for a few minutes.
Practice being grateful too, you can do it when you’re brushing your teeth or moisturising but look in the mirror and think of one or two things that you’re grateful for. It doesn’t have to be anything big or serious, maybe the taste of your toothpaste seems especially pleasant today? Or the smell of your coffee?
Stick with it!
Once you’ve started, you need to keep it up so you can benefit from the changes you’re making. A small number of changes are easier to deal with, so pick one or two things and stick with them for a week, then review and decide if you need to tweak them or if you want to add something new.
You just need to give them a chance! Doing them once and hoping for the benefits isn’t enough. The changes you’ll be making will have a positive effect on you if you repeat them enough times so you need to make sure that you do your part and let the changes do theirs.
