Be Yourself
Everyone else is taken and let’s be honest is just exhausting not being true to yourself. I find that so much in life comes back to this, whether we are choosing the clothes we wear or the job we do, the hobbies we have or the people we spend our time with. You need to be true to who you are or happiness will always feel a little bit out of reach. Understanding who you are and how you tick is such an important foundation for life. Take some time to work on your core values and life goal affirmations (there’s support on this in A Happy Lifestyle Club), make sure you are focusing on your priorities and not someone
else's and be brave at saying “no” to what doesn’t work.
Manage Your Time
Time management is a learnt skill. I hear way too often people talking about how they are no good at managing time, but do you want to know a secret? Neither was I! I’ve built in time management habits over time and not allowed my natural forgetfulness to own my life. I made a choice to be an organised person when I came to my time and you can too. There are a lot of fairly intense strategies out there, which would send most of us mere mortals running for the hills. I have found it best over the years to use these strategies as inspiration to create simple ones that work better for me. I have an easy-to-do list system, a standard routine preloaded as recurring events on my calendar and each morning I set my top 3 priorities, sometimes less, but never more. I have a full to-do list course coming out in April over in the membership club.
Basic Self-Care
We give and we give and we give and we burn out. Most of us will have heard that phrase “you can’t pour from an empty cup” but I’ll be danged if I’m willing to pour at all. I’m no cup, I’m a massive crystal vase thank you very much and I will not be tipped over. I prefer instead to overflow. When you keep pouring into your vase you eventually simply overflow, without needing to pour at all. Make sure you have a self-care care plan in place that covers some daily, some weekly and some monthly self-care. Set your working hours, both personal and professional, so you allow space for much-needed downtime too. I also choose to find ways to give that fill me up at the same time, as this means I am giving the best of me.
Build Your Support System
It takes a village to raise a child and if we are honest we are all still children in so many ways. Still learning and growing. The moment we stop growing is the moment we start dying, so embrace being a forever child and make sure you have a good village on hand. From family and friends to paid professionals to help in certain areas. Know where you can go for help when you're hitting the wall and feeling burnt out. The other important part of this is making sure that you aren’t allowing toxic people to taint your support system. It’s too easy to hold on to those that no longer have a place in our lives and while it can be tough it is important for both sides to move on.
Declutter Your Life
We seem to finally be realising that less truly is more. Less physical stuff and fewer things to do, leads us to more time, more clarity and more peace in our lives. From decluttering our to-do lists to decluttering that bloomin’ junk drawer, each step will have a positive impact on your life and not just in a functioning day to day kind of way. The more incorrect stuff we can remove the easier it is to see the path to what we do want in our lives. Decluttering and organising is another learnt skill, some people do find it more natural than others, but with the right guidance, you can ace it too. The membership includes my full Declutter and Organise course or you can purchase it as a stand-alone course for £45. Click here to check out more information on the membership.
Bring It Back To A Place Of Calm
Calm will look different to everyone and the level you require may be higher or lower than the next person. You want all the systems in your life to function in a calm manner and I always seek to remove friction. When you find yourself getting overwhelmed and not in any way calm, firstly, remember to breathe and then ask yourself “will the world really end?”. Will the world really end if it’s not perfect? Will the world really end if I don’t say yes to everything? Will the world really end if I extend this deadline?
Reset your mind, reset your space and then move forward from a place of calm.
If you're ready to move from surviving to thriving, why not join A Happy Lifestyle Club, a safe home for anyone working on or looking to work on their self-development journey seeking a happier life. We work on a number of areas to help you build a strong foundational lifestyle for the life you want, where happiness, in all its shapes and sizes, is the priority.