I’ve always made new year’s resolutions but never kept them. Oftentimes, I don’t remember what they are by the time the year ends. This year, I didn’t even try. There’s enough pressure in 2021. But, I started thinking that some of my habits, or lack thereof, are actually adding more stress to my life.
I wanted to start fresh with a new year and some new habits that seemed pretty exciting at first, and here we are two weeks in, and I already haven’t kept up. I’m a work in progress, I guess. So now, I am going to have to force myself or trick myself into adopting better habits so I can hurry up and be a better person.
Habit #1: I’m setting my alarm (but not for when you think)
If you are a morning person, I just don’t know how you do it. I am pretty sure that I might be a demon between the hours of 4am-7am. I’ve never been excited to wake up early and always wanted to change that. Setting alarms early in the morning may work for me for a while, but I always go back to my bad habits of staying up late and waking up late. So this time around, I am setting an alarm at night to tell myself to go to bed. Hopefully getting a solid 7-8 hours of sleep will keep any demons at bay, even with a 5am or 6am start time.
Habit #2: I’m going to read bedtime stories
I usually read to my daughter and now, I’ve decided to take up the habit myself. The constant scrolling on the phone late at night is probably keeping me up and waking me up, and jumping on my phone isn’t a good start to the day. So I decided to replace my phone with a book. I want to keep my phone plugged up at night away from the bed (along with whatever that bad blue light is that it radiates away from me at night). I have never read the Harry Potter series but I love the movies, so I asked for the books for Christmas. I will then give the series to my daughter to read for her stories.
Habit #3: I’m going to work out (but only for 10 minutes)
First off, no one needs to tell themselves to work out in any sort of way that brings them shame about their bodies. That’s not what I am advocating, and anyone that says this, deserves to be karate chopped. I don’t know karate (I am not that active), but we can find someone that is. I just wanted to start with a small time frame, like a quick 10-minute workout, to start getting healthier. I have pretty annoying lower back pain so I wanted to stretch more often and strengthen my core muscles so my back will hurt less. Ten minutes seems like something I can commit to doing and I think I could add more time later on. So far, I did great for a week and a half and then completely forgot for four days.
