Feel The Day More

Our level of presence each day determines how connected and happy we are in our lives.

Have you ever felt disconnected from what you were doing each day? Like you were going through the motions, watching the clock to stop work so you could get home. Or maybe you're sitting at the dinner table with your family, wondering if there was a better way to connect with everyone.

We can feel disheartened or restless when we long for something more in our lives but feel like each day repeats the same. Prolonged dissatisfaction with our lives can cause people to fall out of love with others, give up on maintaining their health, or impact our drive because it doesn't feel like things matter. So it's essential to actively engage and drive our lives for deeper relationships, more profound satisfaction in our careers, and greater reasons to be healthy and happy.

Earlier on in my software career, I struggled with the question, "Why did I sign up for this?". Every day was the same - wake up, 4 min shower, drink the pot of coffee that auto-brewed at 6 am, maybe grab something to eat on the rush out the door to commute in. Once at work, feel overwhelmed with all the work that needed to be done. Feel like I'm always failing, always too slow, or not doing enough to impact the projects I was assigned. Rush home, eat dinner and try to sleep before everything repeated the next day.

I didn't realize it then, but this is a recipe for burning out. I wasn't eating well and not exercising at all because I never had time. But the stress and overwhelm was making me miserable, so it was time for a change. It was time to take charge.

So I plotted out time to run, deal with the stress, and committed to running every day. I signed up for a marathon to make sure I ran. On the runs, I started to plan things to distract myself from how much I did not love running! I began reading personal development books and take courses to help me become more effective on the job.

With a little bit of stress management, plus courses that pushed me to be more proactive in my life, I started to see things change. The more I took actions I directed versus reacting to the world, the happier and more fun the days became.

That's what made the big difference - taking more control on directing my mind and actions each day. Direct the day to feel the day.

So how can you better direct your day?

1. Morning routine: Have time in the morning to activate your body, get your mind right, and get the nutrition you'll need for the day.
2. Know your #1 must complete - Before you start work or delve into emails, know the one thing that will move your big project, ambition, or goal forward if you complete it by the end of the day. Try to get it done before you start responding to emails and others.
3. Daily Question habit - Have questions you ask yourself every day to prime your mind for excitement, curiosity, and joy. Examples: What am I most excited about today? What situations might I learn something today? What if I could make a part of my day more fun?
4. Push the first domino early in the day - Do something you have control of when you get up, like make your bed, tidy up, take a shower, something that's not too tough to do that gives you a little momentum.
5. Do things a little different - If you feel like you are in a rut, do things in a new order, take another way to work or home, and the like. If you could do things 1% different, what would you do?

When we direct our day, we feel our day!