FROM BED TO PRODUCTIVITY

There is one thing about me that is an absolute fact: I am not a morning person! This doesn’t mean that I’m moody, because I’m almost never moody, but I just find it very hard to wake up and get up. Once I’m up I am energised and ON though. It’s the part where I have to wake up and get up itself which is the problem for me, for as long as I can remember. Even before that, because my mum says that even as a baby I was awake in the evening and sleepy in the morning. I’m a huge night owl. To help myself make something of my day, I created a Morning Ritual.

It’s my forever life struggle to go to bed at a reasonable time and to get up at a reasonable time. If I do not pay attention to this, my routine is all over the place. I go to sleep at 5:00 or 6:00 and wake up at 14:00ish. I’ve done/experimented with this for a while actually, because since May 2020 I do not have a job to get up for, but I had to admit that it’s not the best for my lifestyle as well. I love it, but I do not get enough sunlight during the day and I’m less productive after a while; it’s just not sustainable long term. Like I said in the intro: to help myself be (especially) more productive during the day, I created a Morning Ritual. I always liked making Morning Rituals as an attempt to break my struggle, but this time I actually made one that is helpful and I want to share it with you, in case you recognised yourself in my story so far.

The big difference with my former morning rituals is that I didn’t put a time limit on everything. This always made me fail in the past, as some mornings I just did’t get up in time and I then considered everything failed and I just gave up on it. This time I put my alarm at 9:00 and try to get out before. Some mornings this is 8:15, some mornings it’s 8:45 and there are mornings where the alarm wakes me up. To wake up around that time, I do make sure that I’m in bed, ready to sleep at least before 00:00. Then to really wake up, I use this simple morning routine which really helps me and I hope it can help you too:

-Stretch.

-Breathwork Session.

-Get Up.

-Feed Babies.

-Get Dressed.

-Wash Face. -Brush Teeth/Hair.

-Oil Pulling.

-Tidy/Clean.

-Drink Water.

-Go For a Walk.

STRETCH (in bed)

This really helps me to wake up, to get my blood flowing and to feel more awake; actually being able to open my eyes. I stretch my legs as far as I can, feeling all my muscles, my feet, ankles.. my arms, shoulders and back. It’s also just a really nice feeling!

BREATHWORK SESSION (in bed) To get more oxygen into my body, to wake up even more and to start feeling more energised I do a short Breathwork session, where I visualise the energy circulate around my body whilst taking deep breaths for a few minutes.

GET UP Most of the time I feel ok-ish to get up after the stretching and the breathing. Once I’m up on my feet I maybe feel the urge to get back into my lovely looking bed for like a minute or something, but then I don’t (most of the time, haha!) and start doing something practical like:

FEED BABIES It helps when before my feet even touched the floor I’ve got 3 excited babies who can’t wait for their breakfast! GET DRESSED Whilst they’re eating I get dressed and I..

WASH FACE ..splash some cold water into my face. It really helps so much! After this I definitely feel more awake and I’m all good. BRUSH TEETH/HAIR I brush my teeth, always before breakfast, because I do intermittent fasting. I also brush my hair or actually I comb it and make sure to spread the natural oils as good as I can. This is important as I use the NO POO method, which you can read about in THIS BLOGPOST.

OIL PULLING I only do oil pulling about 3 times a week. I either use good quality olive oil or coconut oil. For me this is a huge help as I really like to look after my teeth/gums. It’s so important! TIDY/CLEAN

Most of the time, I actually let the babies out first as they are desperate to go to the toilet. Then they stay outside or on the bed and I tidy and clean. I make the bed, wipe the surfaces, sweep the floor and when necessary I clean Otis’s toilet. This is also the time that I fill up the jerry cans and the Berkey water filter if necessary.

DRINK WATER In the meantime (after oil pulling) I drink about 750-1000 ml of water. Staying hydrated is important and especially in the morning. GO FOR A WALK When I’m ready and the van is tidy I go for a walk. It’s nice to have some gentle movement in the morning. Some walks are an hour long, some are only 10 min and some are proper hikes. Just what I feel like in that moment.

By doing these things I feel more ready to be productive the rest of the day. When I come back from my walk and start to feel hungry, I either make a smoothie or eat some fruit (or both) and I do some reading or something practical. I’m not great with doing too much thinking work in the morning. I leave that for later in the day. I hope this helped and inspired you to create a Morning Ritual for yourself. It is one of the assignments in my course ‘BODY: PHYSICAL SELF-CARE’. It’s something that will help you so much. Let me know if you need some help with creating your personal one! I’m happy to create one with you, for you.

Lots of love! X