Hands up if your day begins as you sip on a hot cup of coffee while your iPhone starts to belt out notifications that make it clear your day has truly begun. Yep, you can bet our hands are right up there with you! Emails, texts, and phone calls to reply to and you haven’t even had breakfast yet!
Wouldn’t it be nice to escape this familiar routine and reclaim your morning, rejuvenate your mind, and end it all with a rewarding cup of coffee? We thought so! That’s why we’d like to encourage you to slow down and try our 5 morning rituals to kickstart your day!
Set Your Intention For The Day
Most times we jump right into our day without even thinking about our own well-being - about our goals or the emotions we want to feel throughout the day. The downside to this is that not slowing down to think about yourself a little can lead to a lot of unwanted stress, anxiety, and unhappiness. Instead, we’d like to encourage you (before even getting out of bed) to think about how you want to feel. Perhaps you have a big presentation coming up and you want to go through your day feeling confident. Perfect, so now you know your goal for the day is to feel confident. It sounds simple, but hang on to that intention all day long and you’ll be surprised at how wonderful you feel at the end of the day.
Move Your Body
We’re not talking about a heart pumping, sweat-breaking cardio session (that can wait), but rather, do a little stretching as you wake up. Maybe you stayed up a little (or a lot) past your bedtime, or you were tossing and turning all night...these super annoying sleep interruptions can cause pretty stiff joints the next day, so a good stretch can loosen you up while also getting you motivated for the day. Here are 15 Yoga Stretches you can get started with!
Actually Write Down Your To-Do List
Life gets busy quickly whether we like it or not, and maybe it’s just us, but it seems that when it rains it pours. To help you prevent feeling overwhelmed, a morning must-do is to jot down your 3 most important tasks for the day. You might even find that when you write them down, it suddenly becomes much less stressful than it was in your head. Choose any medium you like, whether it be a Moleskine diary you keep in your bedside drawer, the backside of last weeks grocery list, or even the “Notes” app on your phone. Let’s be real, scratching off those 3 tasks is a realistic goal compared to the other 1000 things you’ll add to your list as the day goes on!
Ignore Technology
20 minutes. When you wake up in the morning, give yourself 20 minutes completely and utterly free from technology and anything with a screen. That’s not too much to ask for, is it? Our minds are especially receptive in the morning, and turning on the news or scrolling through the latest Twitter stories can have negative effects on your brain without you even realizing it. Generally speaking, most media outlets are all about addressing what is wrong in the world, and don’t get us wrong, it’s important to be aware, but it can also be exhausting. Instead, get lost in one of those beautiful adult coloring books, do a crossword puzzle, or turn on your favorite playlist and have a mini dance party with yourself - we’re not judgin’ 😉
Strike A Superhero Pose
If you’re a Grey’s Anatomy fan, you may remember an episode where Amelia Shepard’s character stands in the OR readying herself for a marathon surgery with fists clenched on her hips, chest puffed up, and a powerful look on her face. She goes on to explain to another character her reasoning for doing this, “A scientific study showed that if you stand in the Superhero Pose for 5 minutes… you will not only feel more confident you will perform measurably better.”
(via Tumblr)
We know what you’re thinking, “Grey’s Anatomy is just a fictional, over-dramatic TV show!” and while you’re right about that, there is actual scientific evidence to back up the Superhero Pose. Get familiar with Amy Cuddy, PhD in Psychology from Princeton University and professor at Harvard Business School. She delivered a popular TED talk (which you can watch here) wherein she gave examples of both animals and humans showing power and dominance through their body language. Try it out, you’ll be surprised how ready you are to tackle your day!
