📝🧘🏽‍♀️ Journal, Meditate, Pray, Repeat🧎🏽‍♀️‍➡️🔁: The Keys to A Complete Mindset Shift for Spiritual Self-Care This Year

Last week, I spilled the beans on how my life was pre-nighttime routine & what my nighttime routine looks like now. Today, we’re diving into my mindset shift since changing up my evening flow. 🌛 Who would’ve thought small changes can make big differences? Leggo…

Post-Nighttime Routine Mindset Shift: Unbothered 🤷🏽‍♀️

The Behavior Towards Mindset Shift 🛌

Who would’ve thought that changing up how you wake up & go to bed could have such an impact on your life? Waking up without being in a rush allows me to get my attitude right. I already don’t like to have conversations the first hour after I wake up, so having 90 minutes before clocking in to be in silence works wonders! 💯 The last person anyone wants to be around is a grump, so I try not to be that person!

     Listen honey, I don’t feel like “ugh I gotta go to work” the majority of the time. The things I do in my morning routine set the tone for my day. I wake up & look forward to spending time in The Word. 🛐 I look forward to sitting in the quietness & darkness of the early morning. If you start off serene, it’s easier to continue to be serene afterward. 

     Even though my morning routine sets the tone for my day, my nighttime routine is the foundation for it all. Think about it: the manner in which you wind down before bed impacts how you sleep. How well you slept impacts how you feel when you wake up & a lot of how you function throughout the day. I can attest to this because, baby, when I don’t get enough sleep, I have the grumps in a major way. 😾 You can either rise with the grins or the grumps; it’s your choice.

The Connection to a Mindset Shift 🔌

Connecting to my spiritual side has grounded me a lot. In my younger & dumber years, I questioned everything. Now on one hand, I’m super logical so being inquisitive is just in my nature. I love to solve stuff, so I stay full of questions. 🧩 On the other hand though, some things you just don’t question, & spirituality is one of them. Not everything can be explained in a manner that everyone can understand fully.

     Religious practices haven’t really been my thing. I’ve never been religious, but I’ve always been spiritual. There are too many things that I’ve experienced & seen in my 46 years that can only be explained by an act of a Higher Power. Ridiculous things like:

• Standing in the line of someone shooting & not getting hit 
• Getting a blowout in the far left lane & spinning across I-85 in rush hour traffic to the opposite median & a tractor trailer missing hitting me by less than 1 second
• Not having a clue how I was gonna make ends meet but never going without a meal or place to stay
• Doing wild & crazy stuff that I probably should’ve been to jail for…

Nothing 👏🏽but 👏🏽God👏🏽, you hear me???

     Getting older & maturing more has brought me a lot closer to my spiritual side. As a child, I had too many questions, logical questions, that had me side-eying the Bible stories. On top of that, old school preaching went right over my head. I was just there because my mom made us go, but I wasn’t soaking up a thing. 🧽 In fact, I didn’t start understanding sermons until I started listening to pastors that were around my adult age. They spoke my language so I caught their messages.

     With more age & more life experience came more time spent building my relationship with God. One belief I didn’t let go from growing up is nobody can define how your relationship with your Higher Power is supposed to look. Whether I’m in church 7 days a week or 7 days a year, my relationship is mine & yours is yours. Keep your eyes on your own paper & stick to worrying about whether you’ll be one of the chosen when you pass on, bookie. 😉

The Tea on My Mindset Shift 🫖 

It’s funny how things seem to happen when you need them to but also seem coincidental. There are 3 apps & 2 email subscriptions I read Monday-Friday that speak life into my soul. 🥰 There have been days that something has happened or is on my mind, & one of the inspirational passages I have for the day is exactly what I was going through or thinking of. Other days it might be something that I need to forward to someone close to me that’s going through things. The Lord sends me lil nuggets quite frequently, & I pay attention. 

     Between those apps, my sister suggesting I catch an Atlanta church’s service online, & the church my neighbor invited us to (which we’ve now joined), my soul gets fed daily & has pushed me to turn over a new leaf. 🍃 Spiritual self-care helps me pour into other categories of self-care & urge other people to do so as well. If I can help it, I won’t miss church (whether in person or online). My week feels off when I do miss it, & I have to work twice as hard to stay off the naughty list. 

     Praying has become so much easier with more understanding. I have whole convos with God about what I need & what I’m thankful for. 🗣️ I think I express way more gratitude now than I ask for something. I keep a prayer journal going, so often that I created one for Intentional. I think I’ll use Soulful Serenity for my 2025 journal instead of sticking to my Intentional Journal. It may zen me out even more than I already am…🤔

     I also started a prayer board this year. I just took a cork board, labeled some envelopes for the category of prayers, & add prayers in the appropriate envelop whenever they come to mind. 🙏 I don’t add many as often now as I did earlier in the year, but I still do periodically. I also haven’t purged them to move them into the Answered Prayers envelope. I’m pretty sure I’ve had quite a few answered despite 2024 being a hot & heavy mess.

Putting It All Together 🤲🏽

In a weird way, my nighttime routine gives me a new surge of energy most nights. ⚡️ Maybe it’s because I feel lighter after unpacking all of my thoughts & feelings in my journal. ✍🏾 Or that my goals & affirmations for the next day are set so I’m focused. 📋 Or the calming vibes I have after meditating & doing a yoga session. 🧘🏽‍♀️ Maybe the warmth that overcomes me when I read the Bible & pray. 🧎🏽‍♀️‍➡️Whatever it is, it gives me good vibes every time!

     It’s always good to have some new tricks up your sleeve to try out. I tend to get new ideas from podcasts, social media posts, & books that I’m always down to test. You can’t honestly knock something until you try it, & I’ve learned that life is too short to not experience everything you have the opportunity to do. There’s so much I would’ve missed out on if I chose to not try new things. 💯

     As 2024 comes to an end (prayerfully taking all of its shenanigans with it), it’s time to figure out what’s next. 🧐 Where do you want your life to be 365 days from now? Who do you want to be? Do you want something different for your career, family, finances, or health? Now is the time to set the tone for your next play, but start with something small like a new nighttime or morning routine. Shake up the monotony, spark a mindset shift, & thank me later!