Back to the Grind! January Theme: Routines and Productivity

Happy Belated New Year!

Okay, so maybe I’m not in the Bahamas anymore. I’m back in the blustery Chicago cold, and back to the grind! My break was glorious and work-free, and while I started it with a bit of stomach bug, I was proud that I honored my personal themes of spaciousness and connection while I was away. It wasn’t as simple as you might think – not having easy access to internet while I was on the Disney cruise was super helpful, but towards the end I had that massive itch to Google random topics and see how many emails had built up over the 4 days (about 300).
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The only “work” I did on my trip was to reflect and create a plan for the next three months and how I wanted to operate. From those reflections and considering my themes for this year, I decided I wanted to use the month of January to set better boundaries for my work and home lives, which means putting together a sustainable routine that delineates the two.

Before I left for vacation, the two were meshing together in a really bad way. And I wanted to be able to shut my work brain off as soon as my kids and husband arrived home, so, I started this week (my first official week of 2017) with a new schedule, including shifting my sleep/wake schedule 2 hours earlier, and exercising early in the morning so that I can have more time and energy during my work day. Yesterday and today, I did 6am barre classes and it has given me a good energy bump (only a tad bit of caffeine needed!) for my day and makes it easier for me to hit the pillow at 9:30pm, in lieu of my midnight bedtime. I am pretty sure that this week’s routine won’t last indefinitely, because I obviously know that with each weekly (and perhaps daily) reflection will come some adjustments toward the right routine. But, I’ll stick with the parts of if that do work well…until they don’t.

How has your first week of 2017 been? Do you have any themes for the year and month like I do? Have you kickstarted a new routine? What are you using to hold yourself accountable? Feel free to leave a comment below and let me know how are things going! We’re in this together!

I’ve missed you, but I’m glad I took a break. I hope you got some rest too! So excited to rock out 2017 with you!