Hello, beautiful soul!

Today, I want to share with you an inside peek of what it’s like to wake up with me! … In other words, I’m sharing my morning ritual, PLUS an easy-to-follow 6-step process for how you can create an invigorating and enlivening morning ritual of your very own!

So why are rituals important, and why do I LOVE them so much?!

Rituals create habits that become the patterns that ultimately shape our destiny. They also create sacred uninterrupted time, which helps us to connect to ourselves, the moment, and the divine.

Inside peek time!…

Each morning, I…

• Rise between 7 & 7:30 AM – puppy cuddles!
• Take Byron (my toy Aussie) outside
• Put a pot of water on, at the lowest setting, to warm it slightly
• Start the shower, dry brush my skin, and hop in the shower!
• Apply Rutz Skincare’s Body Nectar body oil all over! Follow with tinted moisturizer, curl eyelashes, and slick on Stila mascara & lip stain, then Burt’s Bees lip balm.
• Squeeze the juice of 1/2 a lemon into my favorite mug and add warm water – sip throughout the remainder of my morning
• Recite my morning ritual from Jeannine Yoder & write at least 1 page in my journal
• Pull a Goddess Guidance Oracle Card from my Doreen Virtue deck, and place in the picture frame in my work space
• Complete a timed segment of 2 60-minute tasks & 1 30-minute task (the most important things I must do that day) with 5-15 minute breaks in between

It’s not always perfect, and I don’t always complete this ritual in its entirety, but I do my best! My intention is to start my day off feeling awake, alive, and invigorated so that I have the energy to show up throughout my day for myself, loved ones, and of course, the women I serve!

Create Your Own Morning Ritual!

Start by asking yourself what feels sacred to you. What are you doing when you feel most connected and alive in your life?

If it’s moving your body, do that. If it’s meditating, journaling, drawing, or painting, do that!

Always follow your own intuition, because only you know what’s best for you and what will be the most incredible start to your day.

My 6-part formula for creating a totally invigorating morning ritual:

1. Clarify

Clear your mind and mental chatter with morning pages, a mind dump, a to do list, write down your worries, or answer the question: “How am I being called to serve today?”

2. Affirm

Start with your fears. What thoughts stop you or get in your way or living the life you REALLY want? Create the opposite of those thoughts and write them as “I am” statements. Read them aloud to yourself each morning as part of your ritual to affirm that you’re amazing and can do anything you desire! You are unstoppable, sister-love!

3. Surrender

Ask a question of the universe or choose your own way of releasing control in some area of your life. Ask for guidance or support wherever you feel stuck. It’s a fact of life that you won’t always know the answers. That’s part of being human, it’s normal, it’s okay, and quite frankly it’s a damn good thing! If you knew everything, there’d be no point of living. And if you stop learning, you stop growing, which means you start dying. (Sorry – tough love.) It’s just true! So instead of spending all day worrying about finding the solutions, release those worries, fears, and doubts, and the answers will come to you in unexpected forms. You’ll receive what you deeply need versus what you thought you needed.

4. Create

Determine what the most important thing to do today is, and do it. I like to use the Pomodoro Method, basically following a 60-60-30 minute increment workflow with 5-15 minute breaks in between segments. I always make sure that one of the 60-minute tasks is more creative than administrative, like scheduling social media posts, writing blogs, or creating marketing materials. During my breaks, I do something really nourishing that totally blisses me out, like eating a  healthy meal or playing with my puppy. This helps me to maintain focus & energy and hold myself accountable for accomplishing the most important things of the day, first thing in the morning. Ever since I’ve started using this system, I’ve felt like laser focused and productive, versus feeling stressed at the end of the week when I have all the things I’ve pushed aside from the week to finish in order to tie up loose ends.

*Note: this is sort of my “bridge” between my morning ritual and my work day. As always, do what works for you! It doesn’t have to take this much time, and what you feel called to “create” may look entirely different from this! 

5. Nourish

I like to nourish my body each morning by sipping warm lemon water. I feel that it helps me to start the day off with a gentle detox, and it’s really quick and easy. This is my “non-negotiable” aspect of my morning ritual. So even if nothing else gets done if I have a morning that goes haywire, this is my saving grace. I also aim to eat something really nourishing and cleansing, like a green smoothie or avocado on Ezekiel toast, or some fruit if I’m not feeling very hungry. This helps to maintain my hormonal levels and resist an energy crash later in the day.

Being kind to my body allows me to be fully present and effective in every area of my life. I imagine that by doing these things, I am sending a message to my body that says: “I love you so much that I want you to be as healthy & vibrant as possible! I’m giving you this gift so that you can reciprocate by giving me energy and mental clarity I need to purposefully live my life today.” At the end of the day, our relationships with our bodies are just that –  a relationship! Which means there’s a cycle of giving and receiving. I invite you to hold this frame for yourself while making decisions about how to fuel your body and give it more energy, through food or exercise.

6. Prioritize

Make this ritualistic time totally untouchable & non-negotiable. As much as possible, resist the urge to schedule anything else during this time. Make it yours, and give yourself this gift fully. Also, try to keep your phone off or at least on airplane mode for the duration of your ritual time to minimize distractions that take you out of the moment. Choose one item from your list of “morning ritual to-do’s” that is something you do no matter what! So even if you wake up late, which item is most important to you that you can still complete that day?

I’d love to know in the comments section, do you have a morning ritual? If you do, what is it? What makes YOU feel alive? If you don’t, what will your new morning ritual look like?

I can’t wait to hear from you!

Love & Light,

Emily