My Mindful Morning Routine

Mornings for me have become the time of day I nurture my relationship with myself.  I spend time in my sacred place, I meditate, and I get to know me.  Working with my word of the year - mindful - I've realized that it is up to me to see the good or the bad in everything.  I started meditating in the morning - hell, I started meditating in general - to get a hold on my emotions.  With living my life and the stress of my job, it started to seem as if things were just happening to me - emotions, feelings, my reactions.  If stress hit me all I could do was breakdown and cry.  It kept coming in waves.  As soon as I'd catch my breath another exhausting emotion would overtake me.  I would beat myself up for these perceived emotional failures for days on end until after some turn of events my load would lighten.  I'd have one good day.  Then it would happen again, another storm to force myself through.  Mindfulness has helped me realize that by letting go of the things I can not control, I can regain control of myself.

One of my quotes this year is to live less out of habit and more out of intent.  I want to be the one choosing to feel a certain way when a certain thing happens.  I want to gain more control over my emotions and thus having more control over how I live my life.  Making mindfulness a habit & a state to enter when needed is my goal.  The only way to develop a habit or a skill is to implement it and practice it.  Since I knew that I wanted to center myself before work in order to react appropriately to shit happening, mornings became the perfect time to implement this self-care, mindfulness routine.  Here's a look into my mornings:

Wake up early

Each day I try to wake up around 5:30 am.  Some days are later than others, but I've realized once I overcome that hurdle of actually pushing myself out of bed this early rising makes me prepared for the day.  Not just because I'm spending time with myself but because I'm awake, alert, and mentally ready to get shit going.  Waking up early means I'm not rushing around trying to fit too much in.  I need to get better about not hitting that snooze button though - I'm working on it.

Do tasks with intention

When I wake up I immediately go into the bathroom.  I brush my teeth & wash my face.  Doing things with intention means I'm focused on these tasks.  I am aware of the toothbrush in my hand, how the bristles feel against my gums, the minty fresh taste of the toothpaste.  I also try to move with rhythm.  I find this helps me to be aware.  My time spent in the bathroom is one even tempered movement with concentration on each action.  

After I leave the bathroom, I quickly flip on the coffee maker then slide out of the door to take Sweetie out for the morning.  This is the best part because I get to really greet the day.  Doing tasks with intention is about refocusing your mind.  Mindfulness is about being aware and every task is a chance to focus your mind on that task and stop the jibber-jabber from your brain.  So focusing on that first breath of air out in the open, feeling the chill on my skin, feeling Sweetie gently tug as we trod across the grass, then asphalt to reach our front lawn.

Meditate

After we come in and I pour a bowl of food for Sweetie, I head downstairs to my altar.  I've mentioned my altar before and it is simply the place I go to meditate.  It is a scared me space.  It is not an altar to any deity or god, it is an altar to the person I'd like to be.  Here I light my candles with intention, I light incense or diffuse essential oils (my three current favorite blends here), I clear my head again, and I do my daily tarot one, two, or three card pull.

After I pull my cards and interpret them, I will often pull an affirmation card to either inspire me for the day or to use as a mantra for meditation.  I sit on my pillow in front of my sacred space, clear my mind and focus on the mantra.  If I don't use the affirmation card as a mantra I simply clear my mind and focus on my breath.  For me, focusing on my breath means I imagine sitting by a giant lake in the woods.  When I inhale the water is still.  When I exhale ripples form across the still water.  It is this that helps me keep an even mind.  If my mind wanders, I simply imagine this lake again to bring the focus back to my breath.  Meditation isn't necessarily about escape it is about learning to move into this stillness with ease.  If I have about 10 minutes to spare I listen to this 10 Minute Chakra Meditation and focus on each of my chakras as the music progresses.

Get ready for the day

Once I have finished this, I round up Sweetie and we head back upstairs.  I brew my coffee, gather my lunch things, and head back to the bedroom.  It is now that I sort of rejoin normal life.  YouTube usually plays in the background while I sip my coffee and browse social media.  At about 6:20 am, if I'm a good sport, I get dressed for the day, kiss Sweetie good bye and then head out to the car.  On a good day I'm out of my driveway by 6:30 am, leaving enough time to get to work.  

I continue to practice mindfulness through out the day - changing the paper in the copier with intent, taking a few minutes to center myself, diffusing calming essential oils through my jewelry, and recognizing when emotion gets the best of me and moving through it.  Over all, working mindfulness and meditation into my morning routine has helped me overcome disappointment I've had in myself.  And when I do get emotional, I try not to let it bother me.  I try not to see it as weakness.  I embrace it as a moment that will pass.  

The biggest thing I've learned from the word Mindful is that mindfulness is a habit that replaces self-destruction (thank you Pinterest!).  Before I embraced this sense of self-acceptance, self-alignment, and self-forgiveness I was wearing myself down by blaming myself for not having control...of myself.  I can tell you right now that I didn't know mindfulness was the thing I needed in my life and I didn't know mindful would be so powerful for me when I picked as my word of the year for 2017.  I have since come to realize that these storms that I would have to exhaust myself to push through were mere rain clouds.  In one of my most recent full moon readings I pulled the Tower for what I should release.  I read that as I should release the drama - not every rain cloud is a hurricane.

Since I think I suck at summing up the importance of mindfulness in this post, please check out my Pinterest board filled with mindful quotes, mindfulness guides, and mindfulness habits.  The only way you'l get it (like the only way I got it) was to have the right quote speak to you at the right time.

If you feel slightly overwhelmed in your day to day life, perhaps a journey toward mindfulness is for you.  However, this practice is not the end all to self care.  I encourage you to seek help, if needed.  Please do not use the internet to self diagnose...not everything can be solved with even breath.  I do hope that you can find peace with your emotions and align yourself with your highest being.

Do you practice mindfulness?  Do you have a morning routine or ritual to prepare you for the day?

xoxo, Moe