After publishing the last article – how to change negative inner conversations – I received a specific question:
I wonder, how could I do this in the morning to help myself to get out of the bed. This is very hard for me. To get up and start the day!
As it’s something I’ve struggled with myself, I decided to write a separate how-to article.
It’s hard to get up in the morning and start the day when we have nothing to look forward to.
Read on.
Grumpy Gorilla photo by Eric Kilby.
Why We Don’t Wake up Happy and Energised
Have you noticed what are the common patterns of days when you do not wake up happy and full of energy? How do you feel? How do you expect your day to go?
For me it’s when I’ve fallen into a rut of focusing on what I don’t like or want – the negative, the noise. Then I feel bored, depleted, even fearful. I don’t want to wake up in the morning, because I have nothing to look forward to.
Due to our unfocused attention – undisciplined and untrained mind and focus – we get stuck. Our focus is on what’s loudest around us – usually other people’s needs and complaints. Problems.
We pay more attention to what others want from us, than our own feelings and desires. We fail to take care of our own needs, our inner balance and harmony.
What Would It Take?
So, what is the solution? When is it easy to get up in the morning?
On one hand – when we are so excited about something that we can barely sleep, we can’t wait for the next day to begin. But that is an extreme and it would not be a comfortable way of life every day.
A milder example is when we are looking forward to something – we are excited and happy, but we can sleep and get up in the morning easily, knowing that the next day will be a good one.
Or maybe our life is order – in an easy and pleasant flow – we just know that every day will be a good one, we will have something to be thankful and happy about.
In short – it is easy to wake up in the morning and start the day – when we have something personally meaningful to look forward to – when we have something to guide our attention and focus toward that gives us joy, happiness and energy.
How Will We Get There?
Alright, but how do we get to the point where we are looking forward to the next day, when we wake up content and ready to get the day started?
Well, gradually. By changing our focus step by step. By consistently guiding our attention toward what we want, what gives us energy, what is meaningful to us. By practicing daily an improved mood and new inner conversations – that imply that we already do wake up happy and energised.
What Might Slow Us Down.
Schedule and duties – we have a busy schedule, full of duties and responsibilities, we can accomplish much, but we feel stressed at the end of the day, making it hard to relax, let go and look forward to the next day. We feel depleted, our energy is not flowing easily, therefore it is hard to focus upon how we would like to feel.
Other people – it is easy to blame other people, with their needs and problems, what they need from us, especially if they are loud about it.
Own feelings and emotions – it is all too easy to fall back into our practiced negative thought patterns, when we have not taken the time to guide our emotions and focus our attention upon what matters to us.
Get off track – when we don’t know what we want – how we would like to feel – it is easy to get off track, into old patterns and focus upon what is loudest.
Double Up
Here’s how we’re going to do – to avoid biting off more than we can chew – we will focus upon feeling two times better. Waking up with twice the energy as before, twice as rested, expecting twice as much meaning in your day.
Double Rainbow photo by James Wheeler”.
Why double up? Because it is easier to believe in – to feel as real and sustain the feeling – of our lives improving gradually, than radically over night.
Imagine waking up with twice the energy than before, your day going two times smoother and easier, you having twice the fun.
Two times better is noticeably better, but still believable. We can imagine and feel something as two timer better, or something bad and unwanted as two times smaller, with relative ease. It would be much harder to imagine and feel as real our lives being perfect in every way.
Two times better is noticeably better, but still believable.
When doubling up – find your own point of balance – between the improvement you seek and your ability to feel it as real.
How-To
Here are three steps to creating a new mood and inner conversations to make it easier to wake up in the morning and start the day.
Hot Mocha for Breakfast photo by Cheryl.
1.General feeling/mood
Focus upon the general feeling or mood you want to have in the morning. For example – ease, fun, flow, joy, energy, meaning. Focus on the idea, not details that could support it.
What would it feel like to wake up energised and looking forward to the day?
What would it feel like to have ease and fun during the day?
2.Remember when..
To intensify the feeling and believe it – imagine you have already been waking up easily, full of energy for a week or month. It takes out the effort of trying to change or make something happen – as you are already living it.
3.Conversation
Lastly, create a new conversation, from the new mood. It may be someone noticing changes in you and commenting on it, congratulating you on the positive changes you’ve made. Or a conversation with yourself is just fine – it’s gonna be a good day, I’m having a great day, I woke up full of energy and was eager to start the day.
Practice It!
Practice the new mood and inner conversations daily. Feel it! Feeling and consistency will help make it stick.
I’d recommend setting aside 20 minutes in the evening to sit down and meditate – to calm the mind and emotions, relax and release. Then imagine the new mood, feel it as real as possible, but without effort. Take it as slow as you need to – feeling a bit better, feeling two times better, feeling it as your new mood for the past month, as a done deal. Then create a new conversation that implies the change – that can further amplify the new mood and help it feel as real. Keep it short and simple, so that you can use the conversation to recall the feeling/mood during the day.
What to Expect?
How soon can you expect results/changes? Depends. How bad did you feel before? How hard was it to get up in the morning? Then take small steps, daily.
Generally, you can expect changes within days – you will feel better, more optimistic about the next day, it will be slightly easier to get up in the morning and start the day, the day will go easier and smoother.
Notice these small changes. Accept them. Celebrate them. You created them!
To Sum It Up:
It’s hard to get up in the morning and start the day when we have nothing to look forward to – when the day promises only to deplete us.
We can turn it around by starting to imagine a different day – with twice as much fun, ease, meaning, flow. With consistent practice, our feelings/mood and inner conversations will change.
Let me know how you applied this method – was it easy or difficult, what changes did you notice?