ryannajuliae

I have to admit it I'm bad at maintaining routines and repetitive tasks are not my favorite things to do even though I am obsessed with systems because I think they are the solution for me to feel better and feel less stressed out.  But I am faced with the fact that I am getting older, I have too many things I need, want, and plan to do. There are so many goals and things we want to accomplish, sometimes we don't even think about if we can physically do them by the time frame we set for ourselves and even though we can physically do a bunch of tasks in a day can our mental capacity keep up?

Do we set aside time to slow down, reflect and appreciate things in our lives?

Being in lockdown for a year now, I think I have taken for granted the things I used to love when I'm still working in the office. Like lazy weekends, time with family, time to mentally recharge. Since I can do all my work from home, I have constantly working, working, working.

That is why I have been trying to create better habits, routines and make changes to improve my lifestyle, health and well being plus putting on extra effort to keep them.

No.1 Is my Sleep

I had a very irregular sleeping hour, trying to find the perfect time when I'm productive, be awake when my international clients are, and sleep when our house is not super busy, noisy, and extremely hot. Which is hard to find. But I have decided on a schedule I am planning to keep:

3 AM: Start getting ready for bed

5 AM: Shut my eyes, no more scrolling on my phone, start sleep meditation, and finding sleep

(I remember having difficulties with sleep every since I was a kid but there are times where I just easily go to sleep and don't remember how I fell asleep. Which is something I really really want to have more of)

2 PM: Wake Up and start the day

*all time is in Philippine Time or GMT+8

I have been in all the different schedules since last year and I keep changing them to try and compromise with the events from my work and life. But I find this is the best schedule that works for me even though I'll have to say no to some things.

No.2 Exercise and Diet

I don't know about you but I gained weight since the lockdown started and I have been overweight before that. I have been overweight since I was a kid and I only remember being skinny for about 2 years in my life but I had a very unhealthy eating habit that time such as only having 1 meal a day sometimes none (admittedly not my best time). 

Well, I and my sister decided to lose weight which I researched heavily as I have some conditions:

I don't want to feel deprived and hungry 24/7.

It doesn't make me feel super tired and sleepy.

My body doesn't ache.

I can't work properly if I feel all of this and I'm not happy either. So, we have decided on a keto diet which slowly just became no rice diet then occasionally little rice but often no rice.

🤷🏽‍♀️We have to adapt, diet can be expensive and we are in a Filipino household.

The good thing is the process made me more aware of what I eat to actively make better choices. We started last January and so far I lost 4kg (8.82 lbs.) without exercise. I tried to ride my bicycle for 30 minutes to 1 hour when my sister is jogging because I don't like running but because of my irregular schedule, I was not able to maintain that. But since I am maintaining a schedule now, I have added 30 minutes of exercise in my routine after waking up.

No.3 Time to reflect and learn

I have been trying to maintain a journal since forever but I'm not the type who remembers to do it daily unless I have a lot of emotions and thoughts. That is why I have scheduled it 2 times weekly on my planner and I use tarot and moonology cards as prompts to add more fun. Journaling helps a lot if you are an overthinker like me and just to reflect on myself because I am not the best at understanding my emotions and how I feel.

And of course, we should all give time to learn new things to keep improving not only our skills but ourselves as a person. Besides reading books I have added 15 minute Korean Language lessons before work which is a perfect warm-up for my brain. Why Korean Language? I am a Kpop- Kdrama fan and I'm tired of waiting for English subtitles. Also, I used to study Basic Korean and Japanese language with my friends back in High School that I mostly forgotten except for some words like "hi" "bye" and "thank you".

I'm also definitely, daydreaming of being able to travel soon.

No. 4 Slowing Down

As you can observe I have been scheduling most of the things in my life but I am also slowing down. I am no longer putting tons of tasks in a day that I know I won't be able to finish instead I am prioritizing the things I need to do and saying no to more work. Even though it's hard for me to say no to a new opportunity it also prevents me to work in the direction I want for myself. There are things I want to build and do but nothing can be done overnight instead I need to work on them step by step. 

Being 26 I feel this pressure to rush and get the things my peers have already accomplished and surpass that. I also feel like I don't have a lot of time to do the things I want. There is pressure to have my own house and family even though it may not be something I want or is ready to for.

There is a lot of you should have had this and that...

But I am here reminding myself it's okay, I set my own time.