Wake up. Do your daily routine. Grab some breakfast. Make sure the kids are ready for school. Jump into your workday. Buzz through meetings and projects. Make and serve dinner. Tidy up. Binge watch something. Go to sleep. Repeat.
It’s all too easy to get stuck in a mindless loop of the daily grinds we participate in, and for many reasons, we may even cling to these routines when life gets chaotic… such as when we’re navigating the unknowns of a global pandemic. What you may notice, though, is that your daily routine can leave you feeling overwhelmed, stressed, and exhausted. For all its “safety” of being in the realm of what is known and familiar, for many of us, the routine alone doesn’t lift us up and give us the sense of inner peace and groundedness we truly crave in life.
If this sounds all too familiar, I invite you to let a little mindfulness into your world. Even if you have a packed schedule — and even if you don’t want to give up that evening streaming! — it’s easier than you think to carve out 10 – 20 minutes.
Plan ahead to make it feel even more seamless, like a natural part of your routine.
There are many great mindfulness meditations for you to try. I recommend you do some exploring of free meditation apps, like Insight Timer. I have several mindfulness meditations there under 20 minutes, including one that clocks in at 6 minutes!
Extra squeezed for time but still committed to feeling more peace and calm within?
Try some of the 1-minute mindfulness meditations on my Facebook page. Look, listen, and allow yourself to become fully grounded in the moment.
The more you incorporate mindfulness into each day, the more you will give your brain a chance to create new connections — new paths to feeling more peaceful more often. And as we all have experienced firsthand, what is familiar to us is easiest to step into.
Make mindfulness a new familiar experience for you, and you’ll more easily be able to switch gears and step into that place of clear and calm when you need it most.
