Making time for you

Life gets so busy these days that many of us don't find the time to pause and reflect on where we are. It’s easy to become disconnected from yourself, other people and the world around you and then you may start wondering, what is life really all about?

You get stuck in a rut, repeating behaviour patterns without ever questioning why. Maybe you have daydreams of doing something different or of escaping your life, but these dreams don’t become real and tangible?

It’s easy to get stuck like this and society almost demands it of us, we've become commodities in a consumerist driven world, where are nudged to spend more money on more things to make us feel better. 

I'll feel better when I've bought that new dress, I'll feel happier when I have that new watch, I'll relax once I'm on holiday, I’ll have a glass of wine to unwind. 

But when we stop and reflect on whether these things really make us happy, we often find that they create a short-term buzz but not much overall improvement in our longer-term wellbeing.

This is where I believe we need a different approach.

This for me it starts with improving your environment, because your environment affects your mindset and your mindset affects your ability to live with positive impact and because all of these need to be in line for you to live your life with the most happiness. 

When I started to look at what in my environment wasn't serving me it emerged that there were four main areas I could make improvements in. My food and water intake, my sleeping patterns and light exposure, my movement during the day and my relationships. 

My priorities for food are eating whole and natural, homemade foods with lots of veg and very little processed food, but it started with improving my relationship with food. 

When it comes to sleep, for me the first shift was creating a bit of routine in the evenings, aiming to make my way to bed with a cup of sleepy tea by 10pm and turning off all tech to reduce blue light exposure from screens. 

I talk about movement rather than exercise, as movement is something we mostly all do everyday and so it felt easier to move more than to think about exercising when I was busy. 

These factors can all be hugely affected by our tribe of influence. When I wanted to change my habits, it helped hugely to get my partner onboard so that we could create accountability between us. 

Perhaps even more importantly though for me was that when I made space to look after myself by prioritising a few things that helped me feel better about life, my relationships improved as I had more energy to give to others.

Which of these areas do you feel you are good at? Which of them do you wish you could improve on? What is one small thing could you start today to support yourself in either food choices, sleep habits or daily moving?

Sending love and playfulness.