Mental Reset: Healthy Meditation/ Wind Down Habits
The key to maintaining a healthy and proficient work-life balance starts in your mind. Here are seven mental strategies to help smooth and clear your mind at the beginning and/or end of each day.
Meditation song/playlists
Music is a universal language, versatile and serving different purposes and meaning in every person’s life. Find at least one song that brings you peace and transforms you to a calm state of mind, regardless of the genre. If you are a person who finds that it is hard to choose just one song, make a playlist! As humans, we often evolve and change, and our interests often follow, so don’t hesitate to change the song or playlist as seasons come and go.
Blue light turn-off before bed
Studies have shown that watching tv or having interaction on mobile and electronic devices up to 30 minutes before you fall asleep and with-in the first 30 minutes after your wake can affect not only your quality of sleep, but also, your morning and day to follow. Allow the last half hour of your day and the first half hour of your morning to reflect and set your intentions and goals for the day. Turn the blue lights off.
What you put into your body is a reflection of your mind. The best way to have a healthy balance of eating how you should and eating how you want to eat, is to have a consistent and healthy habit of drinking water. Also, dehydration, among many things, can fog your mental state of being, so stay hydrated, always!
Stretching is an effective wind-down method because it forces you to focus on pushing your limits in a healthy and gradual way. As an adult who does not stretch, you already figure that expecting to have your middle-split in one day is unreasonable, but you know over time, with discipline and mental will, you will have it, one day. Stretching trains your mind to think about long-term goals, and it is in return reflected with your physical body’s capabilities.
Just as music serves multiple purposes in our lives, the same can be said about books. Books are to transform you as well, acting as rhetorical escapes. It is an effective mental cool-down method because a book (unless an autobiography) takes you out of your mind and into the inner working of another’s. Some books are purely fictional, allow a full escape, some books are motivational, allow you to think beyond what you already know and practice. No matter the genre, active reading takes the reader out of their own mind and into the storytellers’ instead.
Control / Be aware of your environment(s)
An ambience can make all the difference. In times where you have control over where your physical body can be and what/who surrounds it, do not take this privilege lightly. Something as arbitrary as location can affect your mental state of being. It is best to actively make sure your home and work environments are a healthy, warm, and welcoming space for you to grow, because, let’s face it, that’s where you are most of your time. Though it is true that one grows most from uncomfortable situations, you should never feel mentally uneasy about what and who you are around. Lighting, furniture, guests, the list goes on and on. Everything is a factor when it comes to space, and it has the ability to affect your mental space.
It may seem like a lot of steps towards mental meditation, but you got this! However, it doesn’t matter at all what I think. You have to positively affirm yourself and believe it. Multiple times a day, you should assure yourself in whatever it is you are actively achieving, as well as in the goals you are actively setting. It is great to have friends and family to help with reassurance, but remember that you are the only one, realistically, that truly must believe it.
Take every day as it comes. Second by second, moment by moment, thought by thought. Remember, even in times where you are not in control of situations, you can control your mind, which well in turn determines how you react to everything.
Let today be the first of a lifetime of true peace.
