How to practice mindfulness when working from home. Thanks, Corona.
These days, Corona days, many of us are working from home and it can be quite a daunting task. There are so many distractions waiting for us and surely most homes are on average a lot cleaner now than pre-corona. And yet, we need to focus and watch out for our mental wellbeing. On top of that, there is a growing need and yearning for a more meaningful existence in many people. And yet, work is taking a big part of our lives, certainly about a third of our every day 24-hour cycle. That is a lot of time! You may feel anxious during that time, you may want to establish a mindfulness practice into your daily life but don’t see when you should have the time for it.
Well, I have good news for you. Mindfulness can be in and around you at any given moment. Mindfulness is not necessarily about WHAT you do but about HOW you do things. It is about creating a crack in time, between a trigger and your reaction, a crack in time where you can make a decision on how to respond. From a place of love? Or from a place of fear? This crack in time is only available to you if you live in the present moment. So, again, it is about HOW you live and work. So, to give you a little nudge towards your personal nugget of mindfulness at work, I am suggesting 13 valuable tips below that you can action in order to create a more mindful work spirit and space. These tips — as a good mindfulness practice in general — are designed to reduce your stress level which is one important step toward mindful working (at home or at your usual work place).
1) Consider time as circular
Change your mindset when you think about the concept of time. Yes, time runs in a linear fashion, but consider all the different ways in which we have divided up time — hours, days, years. You will notice that there is a circular quality here as well, we have divided time into manageable bits and recurring events. Considering this fact can help you to reduce stress when you think about your days as circular. You are not running out of time because you receive a new chance every next day. A new Einstein window is awaiting you. A new 9 am , a new 11 am, a new 1 pm. Make use of this pattern by finding out which types of tasks are best for you at which time of the day. This can help you save you a lot of energy, so, monitor your own state of mind and energy throughout the various times.
2) Have a morning routine
Your morning influences your day, which influences your evening which influences your sleep, then again your morning and so on. In order to make this cycle as beneficial to you as possible, you want to have a morning routine. You will have heard of this before as it is everywhere in the world wide web; everyone seems to have a morning routine these days. But there is also a reason why everyone has a MR — it is because it is absolutely GREAT to have a MR that works for you. Important here is that you don’t merely imitate someone else’s morning routine that you find online. It is absolutely vital that you listen within, listen to your body and mind to figure out what works for you. I have created a workbook for you that you can use to build your own morning routine. You can find the workbook in the library, here. That is how crucial I find it! I personally am absolutely in LOVE with my MR and I don’t think I could start my day without it anymore. It has become a spiritual tooth brushing. I feel really a little yuck, when I don’t do at least a part of my morning routine : D
3) Meditate
Okay, so this is part of the morning routine, but it is one of the most powerful mindfulness practices and so it has to have its own point on this list. If you are not yet on the meditation train, you should jump on it right now, or even better yesterday. It is the most effective way to calm your nervous system and to create calm and presence in your life. If you already have a meditation routine, I would suggest to extend it a little further, especially under the circumstances we are experiencing at the moment. Besides in the morning, another wonderful time of the day to meditate is after work. Lying down on a couch, or sitting in a comfortable seat, closing your eyes and simply breathe and focus on your third eye, the space between your eyebrows, for ten minutes, can work absolute wonders. I have personally started doing this when I noticed that after work and commuting, my pulse is raised, my thoughts are racing and my eyes are zooming around behind closed eyelids. Ten minutes of meditation after work, can truly help you to arrive at home and move from work mode into home mode.
4) Bathe in natural light & walk
Do this best as part of your morning routine or at least right before work. Working from home can easily mess with our space and mind in the sense that we now work, sleep, eat, create, live and enjoy entertainment all in the same place. So, breaking your day into home mode and work mode can be challenging. Taking a walk in the morning can help to create a transition between the two and it replaces the commute if you are used to working from elsewhere. Also, exposing yourself to sunlight is very important for your physical and mental health. A lack of natural light can lead to depression, lack of motivation, headaches, mood swings, loss of time and a confused biorhythm. Corona lets you stay at home a lot more than before. Yes, you may be going for more walks, but in general you are doing fewer activities that would expose you to sunlight. In order to reap the benefits of natural light, expose your bare skin — face, neck, chest, hands, arms, legs. And also reduce the amount of sunscreen or skip it for your morning and afternoon walk. Sunscreen, when applied rigorously, can actually reduce the amount of Vitamin D penetrating your skin and entering your system because being one element of the UVB, it is blocked out by sun screen. Get your sunlight anywhere between sunrise and around 10 am, then avoid the peak hours around noon, and bathe some more in the afternoon hours up until sunset.
5) Set an intention for the day
Back to a more obvious mindfulness tip. Setting an intention for the day is a beautiful way to check in with yourself in the morning on how you feel in the here and now and how you want to approach work throughout the day, how you want to feel during the day. You can write it on a little piece of paper — It doesn’t have to be anything fancy — and put it next to your on your desk. Your intention could be “calm”, “powerful”, “decisive”, “happy”, “helpful”, and so on.
6) Identify 2 main points of focus for the day
This is an important point to remain focused and mindful throughout your day. You can write your TWO main points of focus underneath your intention for the day and have it near you the whole day. Looking at it regularly will help you remain focused and avoid jumping back and forth between too many small tasks.
7) Reduce your coffee intake & prioritise sleep
Isn’t it just tempting to drink coffee all day now that you are working from home and are only a few steps away from the kitchen? Well, now is the time to really listen to your body and how you truly physically react to coffee. I personally know that I can get very flighty from coffee and if I drink any past 3 pm, I am bound to sleep unwell. The energy that you can gain from drinking any coffee, leave alone the extra cup or two you might be enjoying right now, would usually be processed through frequent moving around all day, or working out, going to the gym or other activities. Being confined to your home, you may have a lot fewer possibilities to actually make use of the additional energy which can again lead to feeling even more like a caged bird that doesn’t have the space to spread her wings. Reduce your coffee or replace it entirely with a cup of herbal tea.
8) 20-20-20
This is a VERY useful rule and it tells us to look up for twenty seconds every twenty minutes into a distance of 20 feet. Now, I would like to top that to look up for sixty seconds every twenty minutes into a distance of as far as you can, into nature. If you don’t have the opportunity to look very far, take a trip to the window and take the sky, by-flying birds and clouds as your limit. Often, we forget to look up (and I teach that to myself, too) and we entangle ourselves in emotions and stressful work experiences. In order to achieve this, you can follow these steps: Set your timer to 21 minutes. When it rings, drop what you are doing right now unless you are on the phone. You don’t even need to finish that sentence you are writing. Your brain will be grateful for the break. Tap for the timer to repeat straight away. Then, look up, even stand up for 1 minute, looking into the distance, preferably into some greenery. Take it seriously and do it, but don’t take it too seriously, and hop and dance if you feel like it. I promise, by adding a minute break every twenty minutes, both from work itself but also from the screen, you will feel a lot better emotionally and psychologically by the end of your work day.
9) Move more slowly
I really like this one. Moving slowly is a wonderful mindfulness practice that you can ALWAYS apply. It is something I started doing a few years back. I noticed that I was always in a rush from activity to activity. When I cycled from place to place, you could have mistaken me for a kamikaze! When I realised the additional and absolutely self-imposed stress, I swapped my bike for my feet and a slow pace. I walked everywhere (in a small Swedish university town this is possible) and my stress level was immediately reduced. Do this now. In your apartment. Or house. Move slowly into the kitchen to get a cup of tea. Move slowly to the bathroom. Be aware of the space around you, take it in. When we stumble over things or run into corners, it is the perfect sign that we are not in the present moment. And on top of that, anger or frustration or pain creeps up through our chest, throat and perhaps even exits through our lips or eyes in the form of cursing, screaming, tears or other. Imagine you had moved slowly from place to place.
10) Tidy up your workspace
Thanks, mum! She definitely at least tried to engrain this into my system. I am not sure if it helped back then but it has certainly been showing fruit since my early adulthood. As you know, a cluttered desk shows and creates a cluttered mind. And again, we are looking at a circular event, a chicken and egg situation. The exterior circumstances create our mental state, just like our mental state creates our exterior circumstances. But you have the power to make a cut at the end of your work day and tidy up your desk/office. This helps your mind to wind down, to transition from work mode into home mode. It also is a respectful gesture toward your future self, your tomorrow self who will return to the desk and will want to start work from a place of ease.
11) Be grateful for what you have
Gratitude. There are many ways to practice this wonderful and powerful medium but this is not the place to lay them all out. Important is that you do it in whichever way. If you still have work and are in a healthy state and are safe at home, be grateful. Say it out loud right now.
I am grateful for what I have.
I honour what I have.
I am making the best of the situation at hand.
I am grateful for what I have.
If you do this for a minute before you swing your feet out of the bed in the morning, if it is a section in your journal, if it is just a piece of scrap paper, you saying it to your reflection in the mirror or out loud to your partner or friend — practice gratitude. It is an incredibly grounding practice that makes you reflect upon your life and situation and that roots you in the present moment.
12) If you are a lady, track your cycle
This is another favourite of mine and I have only recently discovered the amazing benefits of this exercise. Also, it fits beautifully with point 1) where we looked at time as a cyclical phenomenon. The same beauty applies here. The times of the day and the phases of our cycle align with the energies of the four different seasons - spring, summer, autumn and winter. But without going into too much detail about that, I want to point at one particular element right here right now, keeping the purpose of this particular blog post (Mindful WFH) in mind: track your cycle day (starting with the first day of your period), your mood and your energy level each day. Honour the phase of your cycle. Honour your mood, don’t punish yourself for it. Recognise the energy level you are at. Then: figure out which types of tasks are suitable for your current energy level and cycle phase. When I first heard about this, I was taken aback and considered it a little spacy. When I started reading on it (mainly via the Northrups — see below), I could not stop the tears. I realised that I am not built to have the same energy level every day. The follicular phase before I have my menstruation is the time for simple tasks that don’t require me to be an extrovert, presenting or creating new ideas. It is the time to finalise projects and do small, repetitive tasks. We cannot always be as energetic as we often are right after menstruation or during ovulation. It is the way she is. Honour her. Honour your beautiful, healthy body. The fact that you are going through these phases is a sign that you are healthy and powerful. Now, here is the key: When you track your cycle and create a stronger connection to your own self and body, your mindfulness level receives a beautiful boost AND by adjusting the types of tasks you do at different stages & by stopping to judge and punish yourself for inward times, you safe a loooooooooooot of energy at work and in your life.
READ: “Do Less” by Kate Northrup
13) Have an evening routine (!)
Finally, the evening. We are arriving at the other “end of the circle”. Having spoken about the importance of a morning routine and about treating time as circular, this is a don’t miss. Not many people talk about having an evening routine, but it goes hand in hand with a healthy sleep pattern and thus it will influence your morning routine also. An evening routine can include necessities such as preparing lunches and getting to bed early. But it can also include so many more elements that make you happy, such as reading, a facial evening routine, making love, talking to your partner, or even preparing the breakfast table for the following day. Add a flower and a candle for an extra treat! But all of that said, I truly believe that the ultimate secret to a good and successful morning routine is a good and healthy evening routine. It sets the stage for a deep sleep which is one of our most important and yet undervalued assets. During your sleep, your brain, your mind, spirit and body literally recover and when you don’t allow enough time for that, you may suffer from a lack of focus and motivation the next day.
Now, how are you doing with working from home? What are your tips and tricks to remain mindful? Or do you have any questions or would like to read on anything else, too? Let me know below!
