Change can be hard. Often you set an intention to live your best life through large, expansive overhauls to your life and daily habits. It is difficult, if not impossible to sustain such a sprint toward change. Making change permanent requires small and consistent steps toward the change you wish to see your life. These 5 daily habits will help you achieve your best life!
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The steps outlined below are easy to implement, the challenge falls within your ability to commit to them each day. Do not embark on your journey to live your best life by tackling all of these at once. Choose one, commit, make it a permanent habit in your daily routine and move on to another small change you wish to you accomplish.
#1- Setting Your Intention
Setting your intention for each day will drive you in several ways toward living your best life. This habit is really a simple task to implement. Choose a time to practice this technique each morning, I like to do this in my morning shower. I choose how I wish to envision my day going…visualizing how I wish to see myself moving through my day. Reflect on yesterday, which aspects of your behavior and choices do you wish to continue to grow in? Frame them as goal statements.
Here are some of my favorite intentions:
- Today I will focus on patience with myself and family.
- Today I will promote kindness towards everyone I have contact with.
- I will manifest happiness today.
- Today I will pause and reflect before responding.
- I will seek to see the goodness around me.
- Today I will be productive.
I like to repeat my intention throughout the day to help to focus my mindset. Set a reminder on your phone or repeat it prior to each meal. Keeping a daily intention journal is also a great way to set your mindset throughout your day. A healthy practice is to write your intention at the top of the page, then a brief entry about why this intention is important to you. This will help to focus your intention further. Setting intentions will focus each day toward being your best self and living your best life.
Be kind to yourself. This is not easy to do…you are creating a new reality for yourself. Visualization is important to setting intention, as is how you frame your intention. Work toward intentions that are framed with self love. Not that you want to lose weight, but that you will treat your body with love by feeding it with healthy and nutritious food. Repeat that intention before you put any food in your mouth.
#2- Practicing Gratitude
Practicing gratitude is proven to benefit your wellness in many ways and puts you on a path to live your best life. Grateful people have better physical and emotional health, stronger self esteem, and sleep better. Gratitude can strengthen relationships and improve your ability to deal with adversity. And it can combat depression as well!
Practicing gratitude requires commitment. Routine practice will result in a shift in your mindset and you will automatically begin having thoughts based in gratitude. I would recommend using a gratitude journal to help focus your intent in finding reasons for thankfulness. Write in your journal daily, before you get out of bed in the morning and before you go to sleep.
Small Moments, Big Reward
Look for the small moments. Thoughts of gratitude do not need to be huge thoughts. Pay attention to your surroundings and verbalize gratitude. Be thankful for a new day, for waking in the morning, for a full day.
Check out TED Talks to Promote the Practice of Gratitude here!
Finding daily inspiration that will promote your focus on gratitude is also key to shifting your mindset. I love TED Talks to help shift my mindset. I posted a link to some of my favorites above!
Spread gratitude!
Spread the practice of gratitude. Say out loud how you feel thankful. When people ask how you are, respond not with a scripted “I’m good, thanks for asking” give them a response of gratitude instead. “I am thankful for this beautiful day!” Ask your kids at dinner, not how their day was…instead ask what they were thankful for.
Think about it…when you feel truly gracious, you are filled with a warmness that you want to project outward. Live your best life in gratitude
#3- Practicing Mindfulness
Practicing mindfulness is another daily habit to support you in your journey to live your best life. Most people think of mindfulness as meditation. I personally find meditation in my life pretty challenging, with young children and full time work. Even when I do find a quiet morning, I have a hard time quieting my mind.
Meditation is expert level mindfulness. I like to find mindfulness in my every day life. So many activities you engage in are an opportunity for mindfulness. View mindfulness as moving through your day awake. So often we are on autopilot and don’t pay attention to what we are engaged in.
Mindfulness in the Everyday
Select one activity you do routine and start practicing mindfulness while you are engaged in it. I love practicing mindfulness while walking my dog. I do this at least twice a day, so it is a perfect opportunity to practice mindfulness. Take in your surroundings, the smells, the sight, the temperature. I love the warm sun on my face, or the crisp bite of the winter wind. Listening to the birds and noticing the change of seasons. So a small activity can begin your journey to be more mindful.
Mindfulness through Hobbies
Another easy method to begin to incorporate mindfulness into your life is through hobbies. When you find yourself lost in painting, crossstitch, or running…these are opportunities of mindfulness and meditation. Being in that “zone” is quieting your mind from the none stop thoughts.
Mine is baking. I love getting lost in the recipe, creating something yummy and delicious. Baking requires focus and avoiding distraction. I am mindful only to my recipe and decorating a beautiful cake, making a dish creatively mine. Find yours and get lost in it, you will find your way toward living your best life.
#4- Establish a Routine
Establishing a routine is an essential habit to step toward the ability to live your best life. Life is easily overwhelming, with so much to balance with work, home, and relationships. Having routines can help battle feelings of being overwhelmed, which in turn creates a snowball effect of negativity. Stress results in negative emotions, like complaining, feelings of resentment, and unhealthy coping mechanisms like alcohol use or overeating.
Slow and Steady
Routines become habits through practice and commitment. This can be difficult to do with a hectic life. Pick one thing, practice that until it becomes your routine. Want a cleaner house, establish a 10 minute clean-up at the end of the day. For just 10 minutes, pick up items left around the house that you moved around through the day, wipe down counters, straighten pillows and blankets. It is amazing what you can do in just 10 minutes. Do this daily until it just becomes a part of your routine. Then move on the the next routine you want to establish.
Often, we are too hard on ourselves when it comes to developing new habits and routines, or letting go of bad ones. We set unrealistic expectations for ourselves. Asking to change too many things at once, a complete overhaul to our life…setting us up for failure. Pick just one thing. You don’t lose 30 pounds, you lose one pound at a time.
Live your best life with kindness toward yourself. Shift your habits one thing at a time., slow and steady.
#5- Rise Early
Rising early in morning is a habit that will catapult you toward living your best life. Get up an hour before anyone else. Set an intention for what you want to do with this time. Use this time to read a book, take a walk, or engage in some other self care activity. Throw in a load of wash, raise your shades, make your bed…start off the day with some small tasks that will result in a productive morning. This time alone will promote the ability to center yourself for the day ahead. It is a small commitment to yourself each day.
Sleeping in is often a means of self-care touted by so many…I find waking late and having half of my morning gone, with nothing accomplished overwhelming. It sets the tone of the day in a negative way, feeling behind and like nothing has gotten done. This quiet time in the morning sets the motivation for the day ahead.
Be kind. You can not accomplish these habits in a day, a week or a month. This is a journey….live your best life in the process. These behaviors will take practice and dedication to make them habitual in your everyday life. You show yourself self-love through working on mindfulness, gratitude and challenging poor habits.
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Live your best life with small, but consistent changes. Big changes come from small commitments to daily change. Be kind, if you fall back into old patterns, tomorrow is a new day!
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