Daily design - give yourself the title ‘author of my life’

Food nourishes the body and mind but positivity can nourish the soul. How to be mentally prepared before breakfast.

What we put in our body, nutrition-wise, is what determines our health and wellness to an extent, yet if we neglect our mental situation we are neglecting the other half of our self which is essential to our wellbeing. The way in which we manage our whole selves can contribute to our long-term goals as well as being better equipped to function effectively on a day-to-day basis. Rather than allow the stresses and strains we encounter to become factors which reduce our abilities, we need to endeavour to find methods which get us through it all with minimal detriment.

Experts have outlined a personal and individual way in which we can create our ‘dream life’ by starting with designing how we want our day to go; a daily design if you like. If we follow simple guidelines laid out by ourselves which all contribute to our own personal self-management, we can strive to achieve daily happiness and positivity which in turn stretch to support our longer term goals.

So how to create our daily design…

Every morning, before breakfast – and that really does mean every morning if we want this to work – we need to make a note of exactly how we would like our day to go. If you feel like passing this note on to a friend or family member in order for them to observe your progress or simply for you to feel like you have shared your plans and may then stick to them better, this can help with motivation and accountability. The rest is down to will power and mental strength in the knowledge that we are our own creators, we are responsible for our happiness and our choices. We have to actively create our own reactions to the world around us not simply allow external influences to affect us but to approach them with a background base of our own desires and ability.

So basically we make a positive prediction as to how our day will go, based on the desired outcomes of what we know we are about to face. For example, if there’s a work thing coming up that day, we describe to ourselves exactly how we hope it will go and write it down, or making sure you eat healthily, what you want to achieve from exercise that day, etc. Then at the end of the day we can consult our preferred outcomes and compare them with how everything actually went down. The idea is to predetermine the way we want things to go, then in the back of our minds that is what we have set out to achieve, and may encourage us to get there. Thus helping us to reach our daily design goals.

Make a list of all the things you want to achieve that day, but in realistic terms – it won’t benefit us in the slightest if we set unreachable targets and then fail to achieve them, this sets a negative standing from the get go. So rather begin by stating what you know you will be faced with and giving a simple outline of how you would prefer it to turn out. Then at the end of that day take some time out doing something you enjoy like a walk, a hot bath, a long stretch and sit down to take a look at your ‘note to self’ and reflect on your actual day referring back to the points you made. A reflective recap if you like; how did you do versus your predictions?

Give yourself the new titles of ‘author of my life’, ‘creator of my own happiness’ and work through your days with that personal power that we all have inside of us to channel our feelings, emotions, reactions in the most positive manner we can. We need to be mindful during all our actions, and a daily design plan can help to remind us exactly how and what it is we are being mindful of. We can set ourselves up to succeed, because we know we can, we know it is possible, we just need to believe it.

So before breakfast give yourself ten minutes to set out your day on paper, digitally or literally, remind yourself of what you did well or didn’t manage to do yesterday and set yourself out to do better within this day’s new challenges. If you’re sending these messages on to an allocated person, you may want to take the time to write to each other or make a call to discuss the outcomes of the day. This can really help to create encouragement and be more accountable. Once we begin to assess our daily performance we become more aware of our shortcomings as well as our successes and can begin to work on our designs to balance out the things which we tend to fail at; noticing and working on our tendencies to create a more positive result.

The first step is to want to do this. The next would be to pinpoint your go-to person or people with whom you will exchange your daily designs with; the most effective would be someone or those who wish to take part as opposed to analysing yours alone. Then set some guidelines with said compadres, such as what time you will exchange your notes each morning, whether this includes weekends and social lives as well as working lives, what time you will recap with one another at the end of the day, etc. Keep in mind that your main objective is to reach your own set of results, not compare them with someone else’s, nor try to exceed your own expectations or capabilities but rather utilise this as a tool for achieving personal positivity and happiness. This in turn can help to achieve peace, an aide in helping us to manage our own life, keep us inspired and self-motivated, push the direction our life is going, and very importantly help us to keep the promises we make to ourselves.

Daily Design – design your own day, and therefore destiny, and live life your way!