How to onboard a new health practice before you actually do it.
Some of my tried and tested ways to 'mentally prep'.
Sometimes, despite wanting to do something different within our day or week, we continue with what we’ve always done. Staying in default mode can feel frustrating, and the shame gremlins begin to cavort in our thoughts.
I encourage you to go easy on yourself. It’s not just you! Everyone feels this. Our mind feels safer doing what it has always done. Our mind will resist even when the status quo isn’t supporting our day to day vitality. I now sometimes call mine Sally (!) after listening to a podcast ep featuring the brilliant Mo Gawdat. To make a positive change and choose it again and again takes dedicated awareness and a splash of what I call mental prep.
So many talk about meal prep, batch or bulk cooking and other aspects of physical preparedness. Instead, here are some tips for the less appreciated but important mental prep:
1. break.it.down.
Visualise yourself doing the new practice. How does it work? When will you do it? What do you need to make it work? How might you feel after you’ve done the thing? Life and its many demands can cause time to zip by. In the greater context of a busy life, even a practice that WE KNOW will improve our daily vitality can feel overwhelming to onboard. My version of breaking it down is this: I take a moment in the evening to think about the next day. I loosely think about meals, when I might be able to catch a solo moment, what kind of movement I can fit in etc. 30 seconds of prior thought the night before. That’s it!
2. Inch into it.
If you’re eager to onboard a new morning practice (like a green juice, a different type of breakfast, a different movement or shower routine), but first thing on a weekday is hectic in your home, try out the new practice on the weekend so you can get the hang of it without the pressure of the morning rush. Or, instead of committing to a practice every day, try it solidly once a week on the same day to begin with.
3. Learn to lean into the mental rigour of your choices.
Ask yourself if you are willing to engage with something hard or different. Craving the result but not embracing the process usually ends in disappointment. In my opinion, far too much ‘health chat’ focusses on the result. When in practice, it’s really loving and being interested in the process of doing that usually yields the most satisfying outcomes. This is actually one of the many reasons I began writing a weekly email. I wanted to deeply engage in the process of doing, and be accountable even when it feels hard.
With all of this, we are aiming for joy, ease and curiosity. These are my own personal baselines for health on a daily basis. Keep on establishing, practising and noticing and I’ll see you back here next week!
Sophie’s Marketplace
A few bits and pieces I’m loving, maybe you will too.
Frantoio Muraglia Octopus ceramic extra virgin olive oil. The magic combination of a rainbow octopus illustration and a hand made ceramic vessel containing olive oil from Apulia = love at first sight for me. At home we have a large stainless steel 10 litre Sansone olive oil dispenser which is so extra but also absolutely essential when you love olive oil as much as we do. I use this ceramic vessel to refill from the Sansone again and again while looking cute on the bench.
Kelmarna Community Farm CSA veggie box. For Auckland based readers, this CSA box is wonderful. Nutrient dense, seasonal vegetables grown in healthy soil. Pick up weekly on Wednesdays. We always eat a larger variety of plants when we’re signed up to this. Many people choose to continue their subscription season after season, however Kelmarna occasionally have spare slots, so it never hurts to email and see if there’s space.
» first monthly food/kitchen feature starts next week!