Archive | January 2022

My Morning Routine — Slow Living

So, following up on my last post on how not to carry out your morning routine, this is what I actually do do every day.

Morning Routine With Cup of Coffee

Lately I’ve noticed that it’s become quite the rage on YouTube for everyone to vlog about their morning routines, especially the slow living ones.

Well, I don’t have a vlog or a YouTube channel. However I do have this blog. So I thought I’d share my morning routine here.

I’m not a morning person at all. I have a hard time getting up early, although sometimes I’ll suffer from the opposite problem and go to bed too early. Then I’ll wake up at 3 in the morning and I can’t get back to sleep.

Although I think perhaps the reason I sometimes wake up in the middle of the night is precisely because of the anxiety I feel about not being a morning person. Because of the pressure I feel — which most night owls like me would probably identify with — to get up earlier. Which makes me feel like I ought to wake up earlier. Then said anxiety makes me overdo it and I wake up too early.

Because let’s face it. We live in a society which tells us that morning people are overall BETTER and SUPERIOR to the rest of the mortals in the world: morning people are supposedly more productive, morning people catch the worm, etc.

Because since they get up so early supposedly they work more hours than night owls. Although if you stopped to actually calculate it, if you work 8 hours a day from, say, 5 o’clock in the afternoon till 1 in the morning, you’re still working exactly the same number of hours as someone who works from 9 to 5.

But it just feels like the person who started work earlier worked more hours, because he began earlier. Never mind that the person who started working later also finishes later. People still get the impression that the person who started work earlier, worked more hours.

But that’s getting off the subject, which is how I begin my day (regardless of what hour I actually begin it lol).

I recently took a meditation course. I would really recommend it, it’s called Sahaj Samadhi meditation and it is THE BEST technique of meditation I have ever tried, and I’ve tried many. But maybe I’ll write more about this in another blog post one day………….

So as I was saying, I recently learnt a new form of meditation. The teacher advised us to begin our day first thing with meditation. We should meditate as soon as we wake up, she said. Before our first cup of coffee. Before we even brush our teeth.

But I found that it just simply didn’t work for me. Because I usually wake up raging with hunger. So then I spend the whole meditation only dreaming about breakfast.

I guess you really just have to do what works for you. So I start my day by brushing my teeth.

After that I wash my face. I just use water, I find that works best for me. I usually take a shower the night before and do my facial routine at that moment, which includes moisturizing my face with oil. So by washing your face with only water you’re not removing the healthy oils you put on it the night before.

At least that is what works for me. If you’ve got an extremely oily face naturally though you might not want to do this. I have combination skin so it’s fairly dry except for my nose.

Next I need to have something to eat because as I said I always wake up raging with hunger. Something light, so I can meditate. I like to start with a glass of fruit juice supplemented with supplements.

After that, with hunger pangs appeased for a few minutes, I do indeed feel free to meditate.

After meditation I take a few moments for gratitude time. Then I envision what I want, or whatever I’m working towards.

I continue with a fairly long yoga routine and a workout. If I’m running short on time though I’ll usually postpone it till the evening.

After that it’s “official morning drink” time haha. I’m too lazy to boil water. I don’t have a kettle and even if I did I’m just too impatient to wait for the water to boil anyway. So I usually just prepare a cold drink such as a smoothie.

(Note: I’ve since then bought a kettle, best investment ever and it only costs around 20€. I now make about 3-4 cups of tea every day.)

Although most people start their day with hot chocolate — when I visited France I began each day with a croissant and a bowl of hot chocolate — I like to drink Eko. Eko is made of barley, malt and chicory.

When I lived with a family in Italy we began every day with a mug of Orzo and I loved it. Orzo is simply barley and you dissolve it in milk the same way you do hot chocolate or cocoa.

After I returned from Italy I searched everywhere for soluble barley and I couldn’t find any. But eventually I did discover Eko, which is nearly the same thing.

But as I said, I’m usually too lazy, too impatient and too hungry to wait for some frozen liquid to heat up and boil. So I just have Eko cold.

My breakfast changes every day and in accordance with my changing moods. I tried having the same thing for breakfast every day but I got bored. I need change!

If I had a shower the night before I just jump straightaway into my day. But if I hadn’t, because sometimes I’m just too tired and I conk out without taking a shower, this is the moment for a shower.

I talk extensively about my natural hair care routine in several posts on this blog, so if you’re interested you can check them out. Basically, I don’t use sulphate shampoo and I haven’t done so in about 3 and a half years.

If you wanna know what I use instead of shampoo (and no, it’s not baking soda and vinegar, ugh! Those left my hair drier than a broom!) do have a look through the blog posts in this category.

I know about some people who like to begin their days with a refreshing and energizing walk………… out in the middle of nature………. surrounded by birdsong and waving green leaves, the soft pounding of the ocean………..

But this is the view out my window, and when I go out the door of my high-rise apartment building.

Grey Skies and Highrise Buildings

So alas, faint little birdsong or waving green leaves to be had in my walk, I fear. Maybe the cooing of a few pigeons……………

And although I am indeed blessed to be able to go and listen to the waves pounding against the sand whenever I want, I have to walk half an hour in order to be able to do so. So unfortunately it’s not something I’m usually able to get around to on a typical, rushed and frenzied day.

After the shower it’s time to begin my day. I never do the same things from one day to the next. And because of this current situation I’ve been fortunate enough to now work partly from home. So I don’t have a fixed work schedule and it changes from day to day.

If you’d like to incorporate some relaxing reading into your daily routine, I’d love it if you began with some of my novels. You can check them out here: Thrillers by Moi.

So how do you begin your day? Have you heard about slow living? Don’t hesitate to leave me some (positive, non-spammy) comments below.

Adorable black cat

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Influencers’ Morning Routine vs. MY Morning Routine

If you watch YouTube videos, you might have discovered that it’s all the rage these days to uncover popular Influencers’ morning routines.
I understand that. I watch all the morning routine videos YouTube throws at me, because I’m curious to find out what successful people do every day in order to be successful.
So here is a comparison of my morning routine versus popular influencers’ morning routines:

Influencer making breakfast

Influencer’s Unrealistic Morning Routine*:

*(Based upon an amalgam of real YouTubers’ real videos)

When I first wake up I try to spend a couple hours without looking at my phone. (Says the influencer.)

I disconnect and just devote the first hours of the day to myself and have some quiet me time. I then drink a big glass of water, do some yoga, run 50 miles and have a cup of coffee.

Then it’s time for my shower, where I use all natural homemade products that I made myself.

After my shower I enjoy an all-natural breakfast with homemade bread and all homemade foods. Check out my videos with recipes for homemade rye bread, homemade spelt bread and gluten-free corn bread. I make them every day! (Winsome smile.)

Then I spend some time journaling. I find it helps me to put myself together and I recommend everyone practise journaling as a part of their daily lives.

I practise meditation — I trained with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi himself in my last trip to the Himalayas.

Then I take about an hour to read the Bible and pray.

After that I do my hair and my makeup and get dressed.

Only after I finish all that do I get into my car and drive to my job as CEO of a major international banking corporation.

Now, this is me when I try to follow that Unrealistic Influencer’s Morning Routine:

MY Morning Routine:

I get up, spend about half an hour trying to resist the urge to see if anyone has sent me an exciting whatsapp inviting me on a trip to Africa and then in the end I can’t resist any longer, and I spend about an hour on the phone checking all my groups and all my emails.

And then since I’m lazy and don’t feel like getting out of bed yet, I lounge around some more and read up on all the news.

After that I have a big glass of water and a big glass of diatomaceous earth. I take half a teaspoon of diatomaceous earth (make sure it’s “food grade”, I take it because it’s supposed to make your hair grow) stirred into a glass of water.

Then I spend a long time preparing the cat’s supplements. Then I have juice and supplements as well.

After that it’s time for yoga where I put on a podcast and listen to the podcast while I do yoga.

After the yoga routine I find the podcast so fascinating that I then need to listen to another one. Then another one. And finally another one. So then I just spend the rest of the morning listening to podcasts and do nothing else.

Then I realize it is now lunchtime and I haven’t eaten breakfast yet.

So I go to have breakfast, which might include store-bought items like sliced sandwich bread from a plastic package (as opposed to fresh baked baguettes which is what most people eat here in Europe, but I’m too lazy to get dressed and run down to the bakery), supermarket brand jam and UHT milk.

I eat breakfast while I spend the whole afternoon watching YouTube videos. By the time I finish breakfast it’s dinner time.

And I haven’t even practised meditation yet.

So I sit in meditation, fall asleep and sleep until the next morning. Where I do all these same things all over again.

One day I’ll get that popular and successful influencer’s morning routine down pat!

If you’d like something to read during your evening routine before you go to bed, I’d like to suggest you check out my thrillers. You can check them out here: Thrillers by Moi.

So what does your morning routine look like? Do you do what the influencers do? Do leave me some comments down below. I LURRRVE to receive (positive, non-spammy) comments.

Black kitty cat

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