The one thing that will alter your life

What another crazy year we’ve had!

There’s been so many changes, on a personal and collective level. And I don’t know about you, but for me, one of the things that fell behind this year was self-care.

We’ve all been programmed to value our worth by the constant hustle and grind, by doing more and more. The truth is that when you constantly push and forget the simple pleasures of life you start to feel stuck, trapped and resentful.

That’s why I’d love to share some self-care practices that you can put in place to soften you and find more joy on a daily basis.

If you’d like to read about these simple self-care practices:

1. Pay attention to your feelings. Before you get out of bed ask yourself “how am I feeling today?” listen to where your energy levels are at and what you could do in this day to support that energy level and what’s coming your way.

2. Do not touch your phone for the first hour

Ignore your phone, keep it on airplane mode for the 1st hour of your morning and give yourself that space. If you’re a parent, maybe you want to wake up 30 minutes to an hour before everyone else and put some practices in place that will bring you joy like journaling, exercising, stretching, a morning walk, meditating, visualizing, etc.

3. Set your intention

There’s power in setting our intentions for the day. As spiritual teacher Gary Zukav says, "You create your reality with intentions." There are a lot of things out of our control but if you set your intention for the day you’ll be surprised to how the universe rewards you.

4. Schedule and limit your news, social and emails

Instead of having an immediate response to emails, text, news and notifications, turn all of these off and you decide how much time and at what time you’d like to look at text, answer emails or browse through the news or social media. This way you have control of your time and set a timer for these activities!

5. Move Make time to move your body, wether it’s a walk, your favorite exercise, a hike, dancing, yoga. You choose but make sure you move your body at least for 30 minutes. You’ll reap the benefits of increased endorphins and you’ll be doing your body a favor.

5. Gratitude At the end of the day, start a gratitude journal where you don’t just write down what you’re grateful for but write down why you're grateful for it. The more you count your blessings, the more you’ll receive.

7. Acknowledge and celebrate yourself Throughout the day take a look in the mirror and acknowledge yourself for something you have accomplished, it can be small or big. You get extra credit if at the end of the day you write it down. There’s scientific proof that when you put your thoughts onto paper they strengthen those neuropathways.

8. Carve time out for solo time Make sure you allocate some time for yourself, to just be, without having to rush or follow to-do lists.

9. Sleep Make sure that you get your beauty rest. This is one of the best gifts you can give yourself. When we get a good night's sleep we are giving our body and mind time to rest and reset.

I’d love to hear about your self care practices, are there any that I didn’t include on this list?

Have a fabulous day!