Simple starts and small shifts

I’ve been meditating daily for the last 5 years. It is the first thing I do when I wake up in the morning. I absolutely love starting my day this way because it helps me feel grounded, centered, and more aware.

Meditation has so many benefits from stress reduction, to improving focus, and mindfulness, just to name a few. Implementing a daily meditation practice has changed my life and helped me become softer around the edges, more open, and more accepting. I look forward to it, even on the days when it feels like my mind is all over the place. Once I am able to drop into my meditation and get behind those thoughts everything just feels better because I can see things more clearly.

Last week I ended up getting the flu. Ugh, right? I slowed down and rested, moved my teaching online, and decided to prioritize sleep over my morning routine. My morning meditation happened after I taught and sometimes not until right before I went to sleep.

It was a necessary and needed shift in my day as my cough kept me awake at night. The funny thing was my days felt totally off. I didn’t have those quiet moments in my morning to get focused, grounded, and centered. Things that normally wouldn’t bother me, did. I felt more anxious and agitated than I normally am, and life felt a little harder.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I realize I was also sick, but I know myself well enough to know that wasn’t what was off.

That one small shift in my day left me feeling off-center and ungrounded. But it is precisely that one small thing that sets the tone for my days. It helps me start each day with intention, gratitude, kindness, and love for myself and others.

Instead of taking those intentional moments for myself in the morning so I can feel calm, grounded, centered, and focused, my day just started. I was giving to others before I took any time to fill my cup. And while once upon a time that was how my whole life was structured, I have come far enough in my journey to know that doesn’t serve me.

We all know what happens when we are last on the list if we even make it there at all. We promise that we will make time for ourselves. But suddenly, the whole day has passed and we are crawling into bed realizing that we made an empty promise to ourselves. And it’s a slippery slope, one empty promise leads to another until we feel stressed out and overwhelmed.

Once I noticed that I wasn’t feeling the way I wanted to, I decided it was time to change things up again. Our habits are not static, they change with us so it’s important to check in with them. My shift in my morning habit was necessary and needed, but once I realized it wasn’t working for me it was time to shift again. Luckily I was feeling better and was sleeping through the night. But I would have shifted back to the morning even if I wasn’t sleeping through the night. I know that carving out even a small amount of time would have helped me feel the way I wanted to.

Sometimes all it takes is a small shift or changing our approach and suddenly our habit starts to flow. As a friend recently said to me, “keep what works and ditch the things that don’t” and I couldn’t agree more.

Be true to yourself and realistic about what works for your life. Trust your gut when it is telling you something is or is not working. Be open to change. Learn how to adapt and shift your habits to make them flow in your life. Decide what successful habits look like to you and then go after them. Keep your eyes on your own page and do you. 💙