Five Healthy Habits I’m Taking Into 2021

In 2020, I overhauled my life…. quite literally! At the start of 2020 I was at the lowest point in my life, I was miserable and actually quite depressed (I just hid it well). Fast forward to the middle of 2020 and after a huge change in my life, my way of thinking, life, and mindset began to change dramatically. I began investing in myself and my self-development and by the end of 2020, I was a completely different person to the start of the year.

I can honestly say that I am the happiest I’ve ever been. I’m confident in myself and my judgement and I’ve implemented a number of non-negotiable habits into my life which have made it even better. I’m planning to dedicate a whole post to this transformation at some stage soon, but today I wanted to share the 5 healthy habits that I created in 2020, that I’m continuing with this year and beyond. These are all super simple things that have totally helped to overhaul my life, and I hope they might be able to help you too!

 

REDUCING SUGAR

I can’t believe I’m even writing this but during most of 2020, I was totally addicted to Party Mix lollies…. to the point where I was going through 2 packs a week! 🙈 Two packets of sugar filled lollies every week, religiously! Plus chocolate and all the other sweet sugary things that I was incorporating into my diet. I had such insane sugar cravings, and right after lunch all I could think about was party mix. So bad right?

Around the start of November I made a conscious effort to reduce my sugar dramatically as I knew it was so not good for me. Since I was still craving that sugar hit, I started buying bliss balls and would have one or two of them every afternoon at afternoon tea. I can now happily say I haven’t bought a pack of party mix for four months now. I just make sure I have a stash of bliss balls, and if I’m feeling like something sweet, I’ll have one of them instead! I also have a recipe for make your own bliss balls! Reducing my sugar has had a huge impact on my mental clarity and I feel so much better for it!

 

AN EVENING ROUTINE

In 2020 I used to just head off to bed whenever I felt like it. And often I wouldn’t end off turning off my light until around 11.30pm. I had no evening routine, no wind down time, and would usually spend right up until I went to sleep on my phone.  I knew my lack of routine was impacting on my sleep, and I would wake up multiple times a night and have overall terrible sleeps.

From the end of 2020, I began to make a conscious effort to go to bed at the same time each night and wake up at the same time each morning. No excuses. While it was a bit weird at the start heading off to bed at 9pm, I now really really look forward to it. I have my evening routine where I wash my face and do my skincare, then journal while I listen to peaceful music or subliminal playlists. I’ll then do a short meditation right before I go to sleep. I try to avoid going on my phone (except to stop my music), and I have my lights off by 10pm. This whole new routine has seen me look forward to going off to bed for some quiet, relaxing time to myself, and it’s made a huge difference in how fast I fall asleep. I’m now usually out like a light just after 10pm and sleep more solidly through the night.

 

STRESS LESS

This one is easy to say… not so easy to practise. But I can honestly say so far in 2021, I’ve been the least stressed and anxious that I’ve ever felt. This is down to two practises I’ve implemented in my life towards the end of 2020.

1. Asking myself can I control it? If the answer is no, then I let go of the worry as this is something I have no control over. I can only choose how I respond and go from there.
2. Go with the flow. Honestly, since I’ve just started going with the flow, life has gotten so much easier. I don’t worry about things I have no control over, and for everything else I just take the steps that I intuitively feel I should take.

While this is so easy to say, it also becomes easy to implement after a bit of practise. I go by the 2 minute rule. I’m allowed to be angry/annoyed/stressed for 2 minutes, then I’m done and I get over it and on with life. I also make a point of looking for the silver lining – every negative thing has a positive thing, so it’s important to look for what’s good. This also makes a massive impact in how I deal with stress and negative things!

I’ll likely touch on these practises in another blog post around how I personally deal with stress and things that pop up in life.

STOP WORRYING WHAT OTHERS THINK

This kind of ties in with the ‘stress less’ thing, as many of us worry what others think about us and this causes anxiety, stress and worry. The truth is that no one likely cares or even notices what we worry about! No matter what you do in life, there will always be people that don’t agree with you or like you (for whatever reason), and a good way to look it as it’s not you, it’s them. Since I’ve stopped worrying about what other people think, and doing things that I feel good about, my confidence has increased, my anxiety has decreased, and I am finally feeling like I’m living my true life. It’s definitely a good feeling, and a very healthy way to live a life!

 

LESS SCREEN TIME

I’ve been making a conscious effort to reduce my phone screen time lately, and can happily say I’m down to around 2-3 hours a day. Of course, I work online so there’s a few more hours every day on my laptop which is unavoidable. I am really making an effort to step away from my screen and work smarter. So less scrolling, less mucking about online and more productive tasks and then putting my phone down. In the mornings I leave my phone on airplane mode so I’m less tempted to check it until after I’ve had breakfast and some play time with Jack. When we go out, I leave my phone in my bag (save for a few cheeky snaps of my wee boy!). I block my time on my phone, and regularly use the screen time monitor so I know how much I’ve used it that day. All of these things have helped me bring my screen time down from around 4-5 hours to 2-3 hours a day – and it’s freed up a lot more time for offline things like reading or journalling!