“Today, just take time to smell the roses, enjoy those little things about your life, your family, spouse, friends, job. Forget about the thorns -the pains and problems they cause you – and enjoy life.”
― Bernard Kelvin Clive, Your Dreams Will Not Die.
I’ve picked up alot of habits this year.
And nope, I won’t lie to you that all of them were pretty. I’m human too.
Still, I’m indulging in some important activities that I never used to take seriously till now.
And I’d be sharing ten of them today.
Ten super important ones with amazing results in little time.
One quick reminder though: habits aren’t created in a day. Or five.
They need consistency and consistency for a period of time, so much that even when you, for some reason or another do not carry them out, your entire self feels weird.
You know those kind of habits, yes?
Well here are ten of my favorite ten minutes, quick activities that would do wonders for you if you could give them a try!
1. Get some early morning sunshine and air.
And by early, I do mean early early.
Laziness needs to go.
For over a year, I was dangerously low on calcium and I didn’t even realize it on time.
And apparently, Vitamin D too.
I wasn’t always a morning person and the sun would hardly ever catch me in it!
(Ignorance sure can be a dangerous thing.)
All around, it’s popular medical prescription for patients with hair loss, acne, joint aches and bones to take in some more morning sunlight for about five to ten minutes as lack of vitamin D is often suspected as one of the problems.
A dermatologist I recently came across however said exposing your entire self to the sun isn’t necessary as he usually recommends the lower body parts.
And apart from all of this, it helps with minor hormonal problems, reduces the risk of mental deterioration and even reduces fat!
Plus, if you’re not the breakfast time, like I wasn’t, this helps you get hungry (and really thirsty) after all that soaking in of rays — it’s a win win,people!
2. Stress yourself some more.
Yep. You read right.
And yes, this sure can be done in as little as ten minutes.
Through the little things.
I decided to do something about how inactive I usually am during weekdays (mostly in bed, writing), and as I don’t always find the time to exercise for half an hour, I did some research and found out some pretty simple ways to.
Like changing channels on the TV without the remote.
Sounds like work, eh? Good!
It’s why our Great grandparents lived longer and happier lives, they moved their butts more.
They didn’t have all that we do today that makes us naturally lazy.
Even as little as taking the stairs counts.
According to an article I read on the weekend and I quote:
“…A person weighing 160 lbs. will burn 102 calories walking up and down stairs for 10 minutes. By running, the calories burned will increase to 191. For a person who weighs 200 lbs., walking up and down stairs burns 127 calories in 10 minutes, while running the stairs burns 239 calories…”
Even the little minutes can go a long way.
3. Clean the surfaces we often ignore.
Like our door knobs, like our office desks, our keyboards, our steering wheels,even our Smartphones!
It is strongly believed that your smartphone most likely carries 500 times more bacteria than your toilet seat.
Yes. No lie.
The calculations vary but a lot of study confirms this.
I was shocked when I found out about this at first, but after reasoning it out, I wasn’t that baffled anymore.
We wash our toilets every once in a while (right?), but how many of us clean our phones?
Not a lot.
And they are so dangerous simply because we disregard them, yet we come in contact with them a lot during the day.
Plus they are so easy to clean and all can be done under 10 short minutes.
4. Easy at the table. Savour your meals.
Do not rush that tasty meal. Just don’t.
Food is one of the beautiful , yummy, awesomely awesome, magical things living beings enjoys (yeah, I’m a die hard foodie, and if I wasn’t in this niche, I’d definitely be in the food niche, driving you all crazy, I promise.)
Life is hard enough. Why not take your time with the good things in it?
Studies have confirmed that just by eating slower, you lose calories!
That means you can lose as much as 20 pounds in a year apparently,and you do not have to change anything but how fast you eat.
They say this is because our brains take over 10 minutes to register when we’re full and if we keep pushing all that food down too fast, we naturally overfeed.
You didn’t know this?
Now eat like you do.
5. Document your life.
Late last year, I came across my diary from five years back, when I was in my second year in high school and still finding my feet.
I kept the diary for close to a year and as I went over it now, I couldn’t help but grin all through.
I didn’t even know I still had this, but it was bringing back so many sweet and bitter and crazy memories and it all felt so good.
That was when it hit me, I just need to document more.
I can’t wait to be 25 and changing my baby’s diapers and reaching for some powder and then stumbling on my journal of right now.
Hehe.
I started documenting more from my birthday last year December and the video I made with my girlfriends — it never gets old.
Document more. Take more pictures. Your future self would thank you.
6. Exercise your brain too.
Nobody likes stressing their heads, but actually, this is a good thing.
Activities that we usually carry out for fun, (when we didn’t play all our games online),as little as memorizing stuffs, practicing crosswords ,Scrabbles,or even trying to figure out a riddle or a puzzle puts our brains to serious work, which eventually leads to improved IQ, sharper reasoning skills and even the ability to work better under pressure.
7. Detox your entire body.
When we hear detox, we’re thinking months of staying on a diet and exercising for hours.
Or this:
Now while these detox processes sure are effective , so are a good number of others that don’t take too much time — precisely ten minutes and less.
My favourites?
– Drinking plenty of water. Don’t scare yourself off with trying to start with eight glasses at once.
– Green tea
– Deep breathing exercises
– Use of natural products more generally
– Dry brush your skin
– Vitamin C intake
But my favourite favourite?
Practice hydrotherapy .
How?
Take a very hot bath for about five minutes, letting the water go all over you, (especially your back).
Then take a 30 seconds cold shower.
Do this three times and then get into bed for a while.
The feeling alone from this? Literally magical!
Treat your body better.
8. Count your blessings out loud.
Sometimes it’s not enough to just visualize all of them up in our heads.
Because times would come when we would feel so down, we won’t have the energy or willpower to think of all the things not going terribly wrong.
So put them down, from now, and everyday.
Write them and paste them on your bedroom door, write them in your phone’s notepad and set your favourites as reminders to go off at certain hours of the week (this is how I do mine, and it works too well for me), write them in your journal, anything.
Just make sure you have them stored somewhere else apart from your head
9. Sit in silence.
Very few people know how to truly enjoy their own company, and without that, it’s hard to know how to maximize it.
So here it goes:
Your alone time is a good time. Bask in it.
Making out time for at least ten minutes of complete stillness and quietness, all alone, has the ability to do plenty for you.
Infact, most experts would tell you that ten minutes alone of silence and visualizing peaceful sceneairos like the beach, has the ability to thicken your grey matters and grow your brain.
Silent time is you relating with your inner consciousness, and that’s important.
10. Remind yourself of the law of cause and effect before your day begins.
Everything you give out always comes back to you — good or bad.
Never forget that.
Everyday before I set out I try to think on these words carefully for two reasons:
I need to consciously treat the next person exactly how I’d like to be treated. I need to understand fire for fire would always leave me getting burnt too and I don’t need to see immediate repercussions for anything.
And secondly, because anybody who doesn’t remember this law of life and acts irresponsibly isn’t worth me killing myself over.
The law is still effective. Nothing has changed. I can choose to stay in the place of peace knowing this.
Every morning, this is my reminder. What’s yours?
What habits have you picked up lately and how well has it been working for you?
I’d love to hear all about it, including your thoughts generally, through the comments section.
Pretty please?
And one quick favour from you, if this was helpful, please use any of the social share buttons to share this with anyone you think needs to see this too. Thank you in advance ?
It’s the last week in October, darlings! Make it count!
Deliciously Yours To Savour,
Loveasuquo.com
