Wellbeing

How to supercharge your mornings

Make every day special as soon as you open your eyes, with these simple mindfulness rituals

What’s the first thing you do when you open your eyes in the morning? For many, mornings can be a dead space between sleep and work, but according to Sinead Duffy, yoga teacher, aromatherapist and founder of Yogandha (yogandha.com), how we use this time could set the tone for our day ahead. “Morning is the critical time to set your rituals as this is when your thoughts about your day take shape.” says Sinead. “If you consciously shape your thoughts and practices in the morning, you will transform your experience of your day, yourself, and others.” Here are seven rituals to bring a grounding to your mind and body that will ripple into your day.

Be woke to waking. Every morning, we experience a major shift in consciousness – it’s called waking up. We’re so used to it, we don’t even take notice, but we move out of a sleep state into full-body awareness. It can be magical to try to catch this moment; just be aware –“I’m awake”. Bringing consciousness to your very first moments will transform your day and bring more mindfulness and presence into your entire waking day.

Mindfulness in bed: a 60-second body scan. Before you get out of bed, let your awareness pass through your body. Start with the feet – how are they feeling? Then work all the way up – don’t try to change anything, just be fully aware of how you find yourself to be this morning. If you come to any aches or pains, try not to judge them in any way, and try not to let your mind wander off to why the aches or pains are there and what you can do about them. Just be fully aware – there’s no more to it than that.

Choose your emotion as well as your outfit. Imagine you can walk into an ‘emotion store’, browse, pick out the emotion you quite fancy feeling for the rest of the day, get it, and walk out the door basking in your chosen emotion. Well you can. Most people think that emotions come and go beyond our control, but in fact they are entirely within our control. This is the heart of mindfulness – events, both good and bad, will happen. It is not these events that change how we feel, it is our reaction to the events. And our reactions are entirely under our own control. I am not saying that it’s easy to control our reactions but to acknowledge that it’s possible is the first step. And if you do all seven steps of this morning ritual every morning, you’ll get pretty good at it pretty quickly. Then, when you have a taste of that emotional self-mastery, you’ll discover it’s so sweet and you’ll be more committed to these morning rituals! (Not sure what emotion to go for? Gratitude is a great choice as it keeps less savoury emotions at bay!)

Self-massage. If your habit is to fall out of bed and into the shower, try to switch your shower for an underarm wash and an all-over body massage with a cleansing essential oil blend. Most people have chronically dry skin because water is very drying on the skin. Throw soap and ‘I never have time to moisturise my whole body’ into the mix and dry skin is simply unavoidable. You may already use a cleansing oil for your face; oils cleanse, especially when packed with powerful essential oils. If you are addicted to a frothy clean, remember, the thing that makes the froth is SLS (sodium laurel sulfate), a major baddie. Get addicted to breathing in sweet fennel, juniper berry and nature’s finest instead! Your skin, mind and body will be glad you did. Try the body oil Yogandha Detox (£26.99, yogandha.com). The fact that the essential oils are also anti-fungal, anti-inflammatory, anti-spasmodic and instantly happifying, well, that’s just a bonus! And if you must get into the shower, put the oil on before or during your shower to protect your skin and get the most mind, body and skin benefits.

Stretch. Sitting is the new smoking. Spending a good proportion of your time sitting may be unavoidable when you work, so ensure you have a good stretch in the morning and intermittent stretches during the day. The spine wants and needs to be moved in all the ways it moves – forward, backward, side-to-side, and twisting. Because the spine is literally the centre of our existence, we tend to take it for granted; to go on taking it for granted, give it a bit of love in the morning. So, get on a yoga mat, do the cat pose; do the poses you know. There’s no need to go online for ideas — if you know some poses, they’re like old friends you can come back to. And if need some guidance, yoga books are ideal.

And breathe. If you do have a meditative practice, doing it in the morning will have a massive impact on your day – in how you relate to people and situations. If you don’t, just try taking a few minutes to breathe. Don’t try to force yourself to breathe slower or deeper, just breathe and feel the breath (spoiler alert: you’re now meditating). Apply an essential oil roll-on to your pulse points and breathe in the fragrant oils. Our sense of smell sends direct messages to our brain, so when we smell calming scents it signals for us to relax. I recommend Ground (£17.99, yogandha.com) as it was formulated using oils that have been revered for their grounding and meditative properties.

Have a mindful breakfast. Are you hungry in the morning? Hunger is the first vital element of good digestion. Be aware and try to only eat if you’re actually hungry. If you’re working from home, try waiting until hunger kicks in. It’s a sensation we often cheat ourselves out of due to eating out of habit. When you do feel hungry, it sets the scene for mindful eating (think how you tend to really savour food when you’ve had to wait for it). If you don’t feel particularly hungry but need to eat before going out, have ginger tea, which will help stimulate your hunger. Be aware of your tummy and how ready it is for food, and when you do eat, savour every morsel. This awareness, both of hunger and of taste, is an amazing tool that will keep you mindful throughout the day. Remember to truly enjoy the little things, as well as maintain optimal weight, health and overall wellbeing.