It's Day 5 of my 100 Day Blog Challenge. Today I'm talking about:
Morning Coffee Ritual
I have this problem a lot. I come to an idea or a title and I'm like... Yeah... What were you thinking? I was like that yesterday and here I am again today. I know what I was thinking, but now it seems lengthy.
Yesterday, I talked about goals, and today I'm going to expand on that. Because goal setting alone doesn't work. The things I set out yesterday are the START and that's it. It's not the heavy lifting.
Before we get to the coffee ritual, let's expand on how to move beyond each goal you wrote down. Probably when you determined what your goals are, you needed to decide what steps to take to get there and what habits you need to take daily to move toward the big target that seems to loom so far in the distance. That's normal. Most people know what they want and have no idea how to get there. Here's a process to breaking down the goal.
Say for example you want to lose weight. What things do you need to do? Okay, first of all...
Let's change that goal to "Get Healthy" because that's the ultimate aim for most of us, not a number on the scale. Lose weight often comes with a lot of negative connotations, so it's far better to say "get healthy" or "get to XXX lbs." Make sure your goal is positive.
What are things you need to do? Track the food you eat? Drink more water? Exercise? Drink less? Eat less [fill in the blank]? Get XXX hours sleep? Food prep and menu plan?
How do you make the goal manageable? What can you control today?
Write down all the things that can help you to get to the goal. All the habits you need to do regularly.
For example:
Goal: Get Healthy
Habit: Drinking more water every day.
Strategy 1: Figure out how much you should drink (half your body weight in ounces, btw). Then break down when you should do that during the day. Say you need to drink 100 oz. You don't want to leave that all until the night. Think about when you will drink that water in intervals throughout the day.
Strategy 2: Create a tracker so you're not guesstimating
Strategy 3: Flavor the water? Drink sparkling water?
Goal: Get Healthy
Habit: Menu Plan
Strategy 1: Decide how often you will plan (weekly, monthly, every six weeks, etc.). Sit down on a designated day and make your menu.
Strategy 2: Make your grocery list from your plan
Strategy 3: Write your food plan in your daily planner so you can readily see what you will be eating.
Strategy 4: Food prep so you won't eat something else or get takeout because you're hungry or tired when it's time to cook.
Goal; Get Healthy
Habit: Exercise (this is actually my break down for this one)
When: each night
Strategy 1: Take a walk with the dog.
Strategy 2: if it's too late or the weather is bad, march at home while watching a movie for 30 minutes.
Strategy 3: March or stretch while coffee is brewing.
How often: Every day
Do this sort of break down for each goal. Figure out what you need to do weekly and daily. The habits you need to do. It might be one thing daily/weekly; it might be several things. Write them down on a one sheet just like you did your goals on the other side of the page. The key is ONE SHEET. That's because you're going to slip it into the back side of your page protector where you have your goals. So on one side you have your goals. On the other side, you have your daily habits/weekly habits.
Now, do we get to have coffee?
Yes, now coffee!!
Now, you're going to take your favorite coffee, tea or other morning beverage, the one-sheet you created, a pen, a notebook or planner, and your affirmations then go cwtched up in your favorite chair. Get comfy.
Note: cwtch up is Welsh and means to cuddle up.
Don't have affirmations? Here are my favs in a pdf.
Now, look, I know I've previously said I'm not a morning person and I'm not much for morning routines, but this doesn't need to take long. It works best if it's done at the beginning of your day, during a quiet time for yourself.
So you're going to take the things you gathered and cuddle up in your chair. Enjoy the quiet. Sip your coffee and read over your affirmations. Feel them in your heart. What I mean is BELIEVE them. If you pray, you might want to add is a little prayer for a good day here. Then take your one sheet and look over your goals. If any intuition about them comes into your head, write it in your notebook. If no intuition/inspiration comes up, that's okay. Move on to the other side of the one-sheet. Review the habit or habits you will be doing to help you reach your goals. Think about how you're doing, how you're progressing and how you can move forward from here. If something new comes up, write it in your notebook. Eventually, you might choose to add it to your one-sheet. In your notebook/planner, sketch out your daily plan. When will you engage in these habits? What other things might you need in your schedule?
That's it. It's very lowkey. I prefer subdued light, and I'm sipping my coffee the whole time. It's just a laid-back quiet time while I prep for my day. Get centered. Remind myself of the game plan.
It doesn't need to take long, five to ten minutes, if that's the quiet time you can carve out. Longer if you have the time, just don't let it get so involved that it overtakes actually starting into your day.
That's my morning coffee ritual.
What's up today?
Same as yesterday. More snow. Lots of writing. Tomorrow will be something new.
Love you more than coffee!
~~Brynn
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