Call it jet lag, too much spare time or just plain boredom, but when I got home from my honeymoon in August and had an entire month before school started, I realized I desperately needed a routine. Without the structure of work or the busy semester to keep me on track, I found entire days would go by where I was “busy” all day, but somehow accomplished nothing. The Virgo in me was not happy about this lack of productivity. So, I rolled up my sleeves and got to work cleaning up my morning routine.
How you start your day is how you live your day. How you live your day is how you live your life. – Louise Hay
Routines can be your best friend or your worst enemy. There’s a reason so many people are fascinated by the daily habits and rituals of successful artists, entrepreneurs and everyone in between. A good routine is the foundation for success, but the pressure we place on ourselves to stick to a routine day in and day out, can cause a lot of stress and disappointment. As with all things in life, I try to keep my routine balanced and flexible. It’s there for me when I need it, but I don’t beat myself up if I skip a step every once in a while (or for two weeks over Christmas) – life happens!
Knowing that routines are the basis for healthy habits, Ashley over at Investmintbaker and I decided to focus on routines for our first #CleanEighteen theme. (Clean Eighteen is a year-long challenge to make space for the good by cleaning out the bad. No resolutions, no diets, no rules. Just small changes to focus on one month at a time.) By establishing your dream routine in January, the rest of the year will feel like a breeze. Ready to clean up your routine for more productive and positive days (and life, per Louise Hay!)? Read on for my journey to developing a morning routine I love, in the hopes that it helps you find your best routine.
Rise with the Sun
Our bodies naturally want to rise with the sun and sleep when it sets. Honoring our bodies circadian rhythm means we’ll experience a decrease in melatonin in the morning (energy, yay!), and an increase once the sun sets (sleepy time). Unfortunately, this means rising WITH the sun (not after it) and going to bed no later than 10pm. Every day. Yep, even on weekends.
This is one part of my routine I’m still struggling with. Between night classes, a husband that works late, and living in the city that never sleeps, it’s hard for me to get in bed by 10pm in order to feel bright-eyed and bushy-tailed when the sun comes up at 6am. Since starting my new routine, I have more consistently been waking up early on most days, largely thanks to my dog who starts licking my face at 7am. Considering I used to sleep in until 8:30 most days, and past 10am on the weekends, 7am is a huge improvement for me! As hard as was to get out of bed those first few mornings, I now love the calm of NYC at this hour and the extra time that sets a nice pace for the rest of my day.
One tip to help your body adjust to the earlier mornings? Get some light, either by heading outside, sitting by a southeast-facing window, or turning on a full spectrum light box. I like to walk my dog outside for 30 minutes or walk to a workout class nearby. The goal is to trigger your body to decrease its melatonin production, giving you more energy.
Consider Ayurvedic Morning Practices
Part of my morning routine revamp involved reading Sahara Rose’s new book, Idiot’s Guide Ayurveda. With a foreword by Deepak Chopra and a fully relatable take on Ayurveda for the modern woman, this book was life-changing. I finally understand where many of my digestive issues come from and how I can start my day with a few key practices to drastically reduce that post-lunch food coma or evening belly bloat.
Less than 20-pages into the book, I had already ordered a full set of Ayurvedic routine essentials:
- A stainless steel tongue scraper to improve digestion, taste, and the health of your GI tract.
- Oil-pulling mouthwash to improve oral health, white teeth, and prevent dry mouth. I tried straight up oil and couldn’t stomach it at 7am in the morning, but I love this oil-based mouthwash.
- Almond oil for oil massage after you bathe. Vatas aren’t supposed to use coconut oil as a moisturizer because it’s too “cooling,” but I love this almond oil and can mix in a few drops of my favorite essential oil, depending on the day.
- Ayurveda recommends using all natural products so I’m in the process of replacing all my non-natural products with alternatives like Cocokind and Youth to the People.
There are several other morning practices recommended in the book including nasal flushing with a neti pot, ear massage with oil, and gently moving your body with stretching or a few yoga poses. I go to yoga or pilates a few mornings a week, but decided to skip the nasal flush and ear massage for now.
Finding a routine you love is all about picking and choosing how YOU want to start your day, not how someone else tells you to.
In addition to Ayurvedic self-care practices, I learned the importance of “gently stoking” your digestive fire first thing in the morning. This involves drinking warm or hot water when you wake up and eating an appropriate breakfast for your dosha. For Vatas like me, that includes grounding and warming foods like sweet potatoes, grains (oatmeal), and cooked vegetables (more on that below!). Once you discover your Dosha (you can take a quiz here), and read about foods that are pacifying for your Dosha, it all becomes intuitive, I promise!
Keep a Gratitude Journal
Coming off the high from our wedding and honeymoon, I knew I needed a way to beat the infamous post-wedding blues, so I tested out the common saying, “start each day with a grateful heart.” And you know what? It WORKS. I started out by typing out 3 things I was grateful for in my iPhone notes app every morning and noticed an immediate difference in how I felt the rest of the day. You know what works even better? The Five Minute Journal.
The Five Minute Journal is based on positive psychology research and taps into the powerful trifecta of gratitude, manifestation and affirmations every morning. Combined with a quick reflection at night, it really does take just five minutes every day and has had a huge impact on my mindset and mood throughout the day. Plus, there’s inspirational quotes and fun challenges on every page that are guaranteed to put a smile on your face.
Fuel Up
Now that you’ve nourished your mind and soul with self-care and gratitude, it’s time to fuel your body. After listening to one too many podcasts raving about Bulletproof coffee, I finally decided to give it a try. The first morning was a little rough thanks to the Brain Octane oil – turns out you’re supposed to start small and work your way up to 1 tablespoon, not dump an overflowing tablespoon in on the first day. But, after a few days, I was hooked. It was as if I’d been going about my day with a permanent fog over my head and the sun was finally coming out.
I now make some variation of the below drink every morning. I pour it all in a large mug and mix with my immersion blender until it’s frothy and delicious:
- 6oz of espresso, coffee, matcha or mushroom coffee (depending on the day and my mood)
- 1 scoop collagen
- 1 tablespoon Brain Octane oil
- 1/2 teaspoon ghee
- 4oz 2% milk
- 1/2 teaspoon ashwagandha
- Sprinkle of pumpkin spice
Time for food. Abiding by the recommended Ayurvedic foods for my Vata dosha, I started incorporating cooked greens and sweet potatoes onto my breakfast plate and my tummy has never been happier. The sweet potato satisfies my morning sweet tooth, and the combo of protein (egg), fat (avocado), and fiber (sweet potato and greens) keep me full until lunch with tons of sustained energy. I used to reach for a snack bar or second cup of coffee by 10:30am but I can now go the whole morning without the slightest craving.
While Ayurveda recommends making all your meals fresh, I batch cook my sweet potatoes on Sunday so I have a week’s worth ready to be heated up and plopped on the plate with my egg and greens (which only take 3 minutes to cook). I’d rather eat the sweet potato than not because I ran out of time to bake a whole sweet potato EVERY morning. Again, you do you. I love the Ayurvedic philosophy but it’s too stressful to abide by every health rule ever written so I like to pick and choose what works for me.
My Morning Routine
Still with me? Great. After some trial-and-error with the plethora of suggested morning rituals, I now have a morning routine that I love. It makes me feel centered, energetic and focused, and I carry that feeling with me the entire day. While every day is different and I love my flexibility, my morning routine usually looks something like this:
- 7am: wake up and Ayurvedic self-care practices (tongue scraping, oil pulling, wash face, drink warm water)
- 7:15am: make and drink coffee/matcha/mushroom coffee while writing in my Five Minute Journal
- 7:30am: walk the dog for 30 minutes or exercise
- 8:30am: breakfast
- 9am: dry brush, shower and oil massage
- 9:30am: time to work/study!
All in all, routines are great, but they should never be stressful. When I was home in Colorado for two weeks, I just didn’t have the privacy or me-time to do every step in my routine and that was ok! Because I was enjoying quality time with my family and balance is all about doing what feels right in the moment. If we’re too rigid with our routines, they become burdensome instead of supportive.
A good routine should support you through stressful times, lazy days, and even great days. Once I established a routine that was intuitive and enjoyable, I was able to sustain it through the entire fall semester. Regardless of how busy or frazzled I was from school, my morning routine was the one constant that kept me calm and collected.
Now for my January #CleanEighteen challenge: add meditation and free-writing morning pages to my routine.
Thanks for reading!
xoxo