3 Habits to Add Peace to Your Day

Feeling more peace in your day can come easily when you implement these habits that have absolutely changed my life!

The older I get, the busier I become and the more chaotic life can feel if I let it. I have always felt really strongly about taking initiative and owning the fact that I am the only person responsible for how my life feels. I cannot control what happens to me, but I can control my actions and my thoughts, which in turn determine the overall feeling of my life. I have implemented 3 ways to feel more peace in my life that have been game-changers and have unbelievably changed my life.

1. To feel more peace, I wake up before my kids. If I wake up at the same time that my kids do, I feel disoriented and it’s hard to take control of my day. I wake up at least an hour before they do each morning so that I can read something positive like my scriptures, make my bed, get dressed in my activewear for the gym or bike ride, get some laundry done, unload the dishwasher and feel organized before I get them out of their cribs. Going along with this, I always put my phone away from my bed so that I’m not tempted to look at it first thing in the morning. I like to choose what I ingest right away rather than opening up my phone and not knowing what I’m going to see on a social outlet or email. There will time for that later!
2. To feel more peace, I find moments in the day to remember to BREATHE. I have tried to focus on being mindful lately because I realized that I was getting caught up in my head not living in the present moment. I’ve been thinking about what I needed to accomplish next or what is on my to-do list and I have realized that this has been causing me a lot of unnecessary anxiety. When I’m feeling uptight, I pause and breathe in and out deeply. I have noticed that when I’m feeling like this, I’m taking shallow breaths and not allowing myself to fully inhale like I should. As I start to breathe deeper, I focus on the sensations in my body (feet on the floor, etc) and my surroundings…details like the beautiful sound of my babies’ talking and the joy that they are. I like to sit and be in the moment, and I find that drinking something good helps the moment to feel more luxurious. Taking a moment to sit and enjoy some tea allows me to focus on enjoying the moment and be present in my current surroundings rather than thinking about my endless to-do list. Let’s be honest; it won’t ever end! It’s our job to do what helps us live in the moment. Honest Tea recently re-launched their glass bottle line, which features three new flavors; Golden Turmeric Pineapple Herbal Tea flavor, Lemon Grove Maple Black Tea flavor, Mango Maté Black Tea flavor, and my favorite flavor, the Organic Golden Turmeric Pineapple Herbal Tea. It’s Just a Tad Sweet and 25 calories for the entire bottle! I love that enjoying a great tasting tea is another moment to appreciate and bring me back to here and now. From their very start, Honest Tea has been focused on making great-tasting, organic beverages widely available. What’s most impressive to me is that in 20 years, that focus has remained the same. Every bottle of this honestly tasty tea is USDA Certified Organic and uses Fair Trade Certified tea leaves and cane sugar. The tea and sugar cane used in their teas are sourced sustainably and the practices improves farming, healthcare, and education in those areas. Read more about their mission here! Try slowing down a bit to focus on your breath and being in the present moment, and let me know what you think. I’m excited to see how this changes your life for the better like it has mine.
3. To feel more peace, I ALWAYS, always, always clean up my house before bed. I read this book recently, and the main point that stuck with me is that a habit is choice that we make ONCE. Just once! This totally simplified this principle for me. We no longer debate about whether we should wait until the morning to clean up because the decision has been made and that’s just what we do. The power of habit, in looking at habits as this one-time decision and then living in that decision that I only had to make once, has been absolutely life-changing for me. It’s not up for debate each day, the choice has been made and that’s what I do. Having a clean house feels fresh, calm and peaceful. Having a clean house to wake up to, instead of waking up to chaos and having to clean it is such a great feeling. I can then choose to feel my morning with positive experiences before the kids wake up. When I’m in a clean house, I can then take a moment for myself, sip some tea, and bring myself to the present moment.

This post is in partnership with Honest Tea. Thank you Honest Tea for sponsoring this post!