Simple Morning Routine for Self Care (Exercise Topic)

[Casers]

I did an experiment where I committed to a new morning routine for 7 days. I read a book, went for a walk, and showered. Pretty simple, and it had a dramatic effect on my mood and outlook on the day. Here’s a vlog from my experiment:

How to Make Morning Routine - Self-Care Tips for Quarantine

How it helped me:

• It helped me feel like I am starting my day on a win, which made me feel good the whole day.
• It helped me feel like I am prioritizing taking care of myself, which made me feel healthier and look at myself in a more positive light.
• It helped me feel like I was making progress in my mental health, which made me feel more hopeful and strong.

Some useful notes from my experiment:

• I let it be okay when I didn’t get it perfect.
• I focused on keeping the habit. When I woke up late, I adjusted and did what I could – I decided reading for 3 minutes is better than not reading! Walking to the edge of the driveway is better than not walking!
• I celebrated my progress! In my case, it was filming this video every day. In your case it may be posting here every day.

Next Steps:

Try this experiment yourself, and post your reflections here.

Begin right now by rating each area 1-10, with 10 being the best, and explain why you gave that rating:

• How do you feel about your mornings?
• How do you feel at the end of your days?
• How do you feel about yourself on a daily basis?

Then, commit to trying this activity for 7 days. You can post daily here to celebrate your progress and have others encourage you. At the end of the challenge, respond to the initial question set again and notice on any ways you saw this routine improve your daily relating to yourself, your mornings, and your days.

[NateTriesAgain]

I commit to trying this for the next 7 days!

Starting Journal:

• 4 for my mornings. I don’t like starting my day feeling tossed by the wind or like I’m already behind. One redeeming thing about my mornings is that my daughter and I have a “day date” before her brothers wake up. But I don’t like that she wakes me up, that I’m reacting to her and not ready for her.
• 7 for my days. I have been trying to allow myself freedom from any expectations after my kids go to sleep, so I have been enjoying my nights more and being kinder to myself.
• 6 for myself. I have been trying to fight for the “in the arena” perspective, and I am fighting to believe the truth about myself instead of shame – in process here, but I’ve had some progress! Which is why 6 is actually a pretty good score for me!

Excited to give this a go, thanks for leading the way on taking care of ourselves @casers !

[Micro]

Oh man, “survival mode”. Yep. That’s it. And it has to change.

• Mornings : 3. Meh. I’m usually a morning person but with quarantine I barely sleep. So when I wake up it’s either too late to really enjoy the morning or too early to have enough rest… Vicious circle.
• Days: 5. It depends on the day, but I see myself having more and more difficult to just wake up. I try to re-create some habits but it requires a lot of energy these days. When I follow those, day feels better. But when I don’t, it’s worse.
• Myself: 2. I just really don’t feel comfortable in my own skin these days. I need fresh air. I need to feel a bit more active. I need daily objectives, things that bring some motivation back.

Time to give it a try for 7 days.
Doing something repeatedly is a real challenge to me, but here we go.
Notebook is ready too, it helps me to stay motivated:

Thanks @Casers -

[NateTriesAgain]

let’s do this!!

[NateTriesAgain]

Taylor and I ended up giving our first morning a go! We woke up 45m late (pretty on par with our current habit), but got up with Ellie and had a small “day date”, then invited her to do the morning routine with us! So we sat at the table together and read, and then we went and showered together before her brothers woke up. Then we made a snack and got them into their car (which I invented a third seat for their two-seater, so they all got to drive in it), and Taylor and I jogged beside them around the neighborhood.

I noticed that this was so helpful to not wake up feeling like I’m trying to make decisions on this part of my day…to feel like I already knew what I was doing…like I was taking care of myself, like it was manageable and simple and good…like it wasn’t overwhelming or difficult, like I didn’t have to do so many things at once…it allowed for my day to take one step at a time, which allowed for me to be present and have clarity…it was an excellent morning and set me up to feel good about my day!

Great Day One

[Micro]

@NateTriesAgain Oh man, that’s inspiring! It’s such a good way to start!

First morning: woke up later than expected… I should work on sleeping schedules as well but I’ll do it progressively, not all at once. The day before I prepared something to read already. So I just read in bed and I realized how much I missed that… how much it feels good to just read and rest. Time is different during these moments. Later I went out, during about an hour I think, mostly in the neighbourhoods. Sun was here (allergies too, meh), I enjoyed seeing so many flowers in front of people’s houses. There was quite a few people doing some exercise. I also realized how much my body is like a marshmallow, how much I need to be more active again, even just a little… Back home, I took a shower that made me feel rested and energized. During the afternoon, I had enough motivation to go to the post office and send some mail to a friend - mail that has been waiting for too long.

Honestly, between health struggles/current treatments, quarantine/being alone and just the whole depression/anxiety package, I didn’t feel energized for a long time. It doesn’t suppress the sadness in the back of my mind, but it helps. It feels good. It’s needed.

I also realized: when I try something that is 100% self-care, I have automatic thoughts that makes me want to delay it or procrastinate. Like “I don’t have to go outside”; “I can take a shower later”; “I could come back home now, it’s enough”. So it’s like a sequence of actions with inner restraints that I have to push back constantly. I did it today, so I want to believe that it’s something. Honestly, for a first day it’s already motivating to just track this experience and do it as a community thing.

Okay, now it’s 11pm here, time to turn off the computer.

[NateTriesAgain]

Day Two

Started a little earlier than yesterday (630a, still 30m late), but life with kids was messy, and we didn’t end up completing until ~845a/9a. We read for 30m and went on a walk after breakfast as a family. Taylor and I have both noted how epic this foundation for our day has been. It makes a world of difference in our mental energy / capacity when we wake up and don’t already have to create a plan and feel behind. We start our day feeling accomplished (and connected with God). We’ve already been outside, and a lot of days I don’t get outside until after 3p when I get off work…all of this has been a great start. And though it was imperfect today, it’s still super impactful.

[Micro]

Day 2: It’s been more difficult than the first day. Woke up anxious for some reasons so my mind was racing with tons of mixed thoughts. Still read in bed, this time for a longer moment. Then a shorter walk, but as I was still anxious I didn’t enjoy the walk in itself/I was too disconnected from the present moment. Was a bit disappointed by myself because of this. Tho I still felt energized thanks to the sunny weather. <3

Day 3: I woke up a little earlier, with more and more automatic thoughts to procrastinate, meh. I decided to try it differently this time by reading while drinking some coffee - not in bed. It was actually more relaxing and enjoyable this morning! When I have those automatic thoughts, it makes things more difficult so I have to “stop thinking” and just do something. The walk was different too: I decided to go to a different place. To me, changing the routine by adding some variety is really motivating. Also it doesn’t matter how long the walk is. Just being outside, breathing some fresh air and being a little active first thing in the day is already something that nourrishes my motivation to just take care of myself during the day. Which is something that was really missing. Today was a short walk, but I want to consider it as being enough and not feel guilty about it.

[NateTriesAgain]

Day 3-6 – Mostly fighting for pieces! Friday and Monday (today) were both days that I had to leave early to go and do fixes on our rental property. Friday, I was able to get a dedicated reading time in. Monday I was able to go on a walk with my daughter and read an article from a magazine (short because I only had 5m). Saturday and Sunday we got quality reading time and a good walk in. Most mornings are disorganized because our kids wake up at different times / breakfast / etc, but I love that we have been persisting through the difficulty to cling to pieces of the habit that we can each day, and each day getting /something/ done for our morning / mental health. It has felt good to get a “Win” in, and to practice being imperfect.

Also, as a side note, we get to the end of our days and are crazy sweaty and gross because kids and life and house stuff. So we end up showering before we go to bed and don’t need to shower in the morning. It hasn’t been something we’ve been able to keep as a part of our routine and haven’t come up with a replacement for it. But, again, love that we’ve persisted even though it’s imperfect.

[NateTriesAgain]

Day 7 – Completed the challenge! We had a great reading time this morning and a nice walk/run afterwards. Here’s my post-challenge journal:

7 – I feel more oriented in my mornings, like I have more of a track of what I’m trying to accomplish. Things are still scattered because kids…and doing a habit that requires them (because Taylor and I can’t leave the house at the same time before the kids wake up, so we have to do it when the kids wake up, etc) can be challenging because it slows things down…but overall, I feel more directed and accomplished every morning. And it has helped me get into the Bible (what we’ve been reading), which is something that has really challenged me and produced a lot of thought provoking time.
7 – I feel mostly unchanged about my days. I didn’t notice a real effect after the day was over because so much happens in our days that our mornings and our “Days” almost feel like separate events.
6 – I didn’t notice this effect much of a change on how I feel about myself, other than giving me the satisfaction of waking up and having a focus and a bit of accomplishment boost my morning experience.

Overall this was a really solid and simple experiment, and I received a lot of benefit from it. I’m happy that I did it, and I would recommend it to anyone wanting to experiment with something for their own mental health because it’s so accessible. It’s easy to do, easy to complete, and feels like a good bit of momentum-building in my own personal growth journey.

Thanks again for leading the way, @casers!

[NateTriesAgain]

Oh, and here’s a neat picture of me and my family on one of our morning walks:

[anon17277947]

I love this! Thanks for sharing!

[Micro]

(Update) For the past couple of days I had a break with the routine. Day 4: I didn’t do it. So I felt like I was really failing. I was disappointed and ashamed. And this mindset influenced the following days: “you failed once, so why even trying tomorrow?”.

Creating a routine is, in itself, a real obstacle to me. Though, after a few days of reflection, I decided to keep trying rather than staying in this “all or nothing” mindset.

It’s okay to fail. It’s okay not to reach your goals the first time. And… you can’t fail as long as you try. The most important thing I’ve been reminded through this challenge is: keep trying. No matter what the results are. The worst thing is to prevent ourselves to actually take care of ourselves. To delete any possibility to try, fail or succeed. It’s okay to fall. It’s okay to rest. Just keep trying.

My main goal is not doing only 7 days. I want to keep doing it after the challenge.
Right now, a way for me to see this as a process is to keep counting the days when I actually did it. I didn’t want to start again from “day 1”, as it would give me the impression that my previous efforts were not worth it. I don’t ignore the break. But I chose to approach the journaling part in a way that is meaningful/helpful to me.

Day 4: Sunny day! I was super energized while waking up, for no obvious reason. I just embraced that feeling as much as possible. Decided this time to sit at a window and read there. A bit of chill music in the background. It was really relaxing. I also did a bit of stretching before going out, just to waken my body/muscles. I did the same walk as before, in my neighbourhood + a short part in nature. This time, with music on my ears. Back home, I prepared a real breakfast, which is something that didn’t happen since… oh wow. Years? It feels good to wake up without feeling any pressure in regards of time. It’s been several months that I’m not working and I just recalled how it was in the morning: 5AM, quick shower, putting stuff in my bag and going out to get on the train… Today is the very first time I actually enjoy the time I have now in the morning.

Day 5: Didn’t hear the alarm clock, yay! Woke up twice and felt asleep again. This time the walk was at the end of the morning. Walked during certainly half an hour then decided to sit at a specific place that I appreciate, and read there. I was right under and tree and could feel the wind. I don’t know for how long (try to avoid to look at the hour, as much as possible). But it was great, reading outside. Though, the weather changed and I had to go back home. At least, the time I was outside, I really enjoyed it. As I was depressed almost all day long yesterday, I still had this morning achievement in my mind, and it helped.

[Micro]

Day 6: Very calm morning. I woke up at the hour that was set the day before, without falling back to sleep. Which is a good thing! (: Was very sleepy during the routine, but did it anyway. Was bit rainy outside. Basically just a “nope” day. But still glad I went outside and relaxed while reading. The warm cofffee after that was more than needed.

Day 7: I started the day with overthinking. I woke up nervous and anxious about way too many things. So I decided to get up as quick as possible and just took a shower, then I went out for a walk. As usual, when I’m anxious, I don’t really enjoy the walk in itself. My mind is just lost somewhere else. Though, I wanted to take some photos - which ended to be a motivational stack of images to just keep going on for the next days. Had fun doing this, even though it’s a bit silly.