Four Essential Daily Routines for Mental & Physical Health

We think this topic is fun! We’re going to share with you our daily routines.

We can't live without our daily routines. We do the same thing repeatedly because it's essential to our mental health, our physical health, and our overall health. And the really cool thing about this, when it’s established for long periods of time, it has long-term benefits.

Even when we travel, we practice our daily routine. We credit our daily routine with the reason we don't get jet lag and the reason we don't get sick when we travel.

Everyone says, “Oh well, I've been thrown out of my normal routine. I had a work thing come up; I gained all this weight over the holidays; I got sick during travel.” Things that throw you out of your normal routine…all excuses!

Make sure your routine is concise, enough to fit in a small window of time; and replicable.

CONSISTENT HABITS LEAD TO SUCCESS

No matter what your lifestyle throws at you, a daily routine has so many benefits. And practice your daily routine first thing when you wake up, and then the last thing you do before you go to bed.

1. GRATITUDE - The first thing we start our day with and the last thing we end our day with is gratitude. Gratitude is the key that unlocks everything.

Think of at least three things you're grateful for, and just hold each one of them with love in your heart. Maybe you like to record what you’re grateful for in a notebook or journal. You might want to keep it next to your bed. Or keep it on your phone. Whatever works for you, as long as it’s easily accessible.

We also have a mantra practice, and it flows very cohesively into the next routine.

2. MEDITATION - The second thing we do in our daily routine is meditation. This is a non-negotiable every single day. Even if Max is traveling, he’ll meditate on flights.

Meditation has so many benefits. If you start your day when you’re stressed, maybe challenges with your family or work-related, meditation can really calm and center you. When you have an established routine of meditation, you’re able to create space between your thoughts and the energy field happening around you. If we stay mindful, we can stay calm and centered, and not react.

For instance, if you get cut off in traffic, or a loved one says something that you perceive as hurtful. How can you create that space to not react, to look at your thoughts and think, “Is this the absolute truth? How can I look at this from a different perspective?” Creating that space is the first step to reducing your anxiety, which helps to strengthen your immunity. Even your digestion benefits when you turn your thoughts inward.

Meditation doesn't have to be a super long practice. You can start with one minute; you can start with five minutes. Whatever you feel is best for you, as long as you're sitting with your eyes closed. Make sure you're comfortable and your spine is straight. And try to sit in the same spot every single day. Make sure the room is quiet. You can use binaural beats if you have headphones. And having the same essential oil blend diffused every single time is going to really trigger your body to go deeply into meditation.

3. YOGA – Our third daily routine is yoga, moving a little bit every single day through spinal rolls or sun salutations.

The benefits of a daily yoga routine connect your breath to your body, and really sets the tone for how you want to show up in your daily interactions. It doesn’t have to be a very long practice for you. Liz enjoys going to a yoga studio and practices for an hour or two! If you only have a few minutes, do a couple of cat cows, some sun salutations and go on with your day.

Not everyone has to do yoga. You may love to run. You may prefer to resistance training at the gym. Max enjoys a home-practice routine so when he travels he’s able to keep the same routine, eliminating barriers and excuses of not being able to keep his routine commitment.

4. ESSENTIAL OILS – Our final daily routine is the practice of essential oils. We use essential oils three different ways: aromatically by diffusing them, topically on our skin, and internally.

Taking them internally is our favorite way to use essential oils because the oils go directly into the bloodstream.

Essential oils really set the tone for the day. We both have a morning blend of essential oils but then, depending on what’s happening in our life at the time, we’ll use certain oils topically.

For instance, when we really need to get stuff done, we’ll use a doTERRA blend called Motivate. It gives us a good kick in the butt! And we’ve used Helichrysum when our tattoos were healing.

And both of us like to use Rose. Rose is one of the highest vibrational oils, and just smelling it every single morning puts us in the zone. Using a roller ball, we’re able to hit some of the main absorption points, starting behind one ear, tracking all the way in front of the throat, and ending up at the back of the other ear, and then on both wrists and in both elbow creases.

Liz’s morning ingestion blend is three oils: Frankincense, the King of all oils; Copaiba, great for anxiety, skin, and digestion; and Turmeric, which is great for skin, metabolism and inflammation.

For Max, his morning ingestion blend is Frankincense; Melissa, which is considered the oil of life and super antiviral; Copaiba; great for anxiety; Lavender, which has a lot of plant synergy with the Copaiba; Turmeric; and Yarrow|Pom, great for meditation, and is called the Benjamin Button oil for skin.

You might want to put Melissa and Yarrow|Pom in veggie caps because they’re considered harsh palate-wise and will burn your throat swallowing them.

Disclaimer here: Before starting an essential oil routine, we highly recommend you have a consult on essential oils, which is something we also do. Please remember, not all essential oils are created equal so you can talk to us before you start taking essential oils. We’d rather you be safe than sorry.

We have diffusers in every corner of our apartment, one on the kitchen countertop and we always have them running. If we’re really focused on work, we’ll use an oil that’s energizing and for focus. If we want to chill and meditate, we’ll use an oil that’s relaxing.

The main thing with these routines is they’re easy to ingrain them into your life. If you have to travel to a studio to do your yoga, then sometimes it's hard to maintain that on the road. If we only had one diffuser that we had to move around the house every single time, that's another barrier for change, right? Keeping your gratitude journal right next to your bedside makes it easier for you to access your gratitude list. We want to make it as easy as possible for you to have really awesome and healthy routines that are going to propel you to whatever goal you want to receive.

Gratitude. Meditation. Yoga. Workout. Essential oils. These are our essential daily routines. And we’re consistent with it. It’s like second nature to us. Starting a routine is challenging. It's hard, so having a routine established for a long period of time is going to make you really good at it.

We hope these tips are awesome and applicable to you.

Please make your health non-negotiable. Whatever your situation, we know you can do something, even if it’s meditation for 5 minutes each day!

Make your health non-negotiable.