Day 12: Making Friends With Mornings

Welcome to Day 12 of the Mindful Mornings Challenge. After years of having a 'tumultuous' relationship with mornings, I've finally found a morning ritual that works for me. Join me in this practice that can be used at any point throughout your day when you find yourself either losing presence or becoming ungrounded.

Transcript

Hello and welcome to day 12 of the mindful mornings challenge here on Insight Timer.

My name is Jana Romer and it's a pleasure to be here with you starting our day together.

I have to confess I haven't always had the best relationship with mornings.

Through my childhood and teenage years and even in university I was that person that hit the snooze bar two or three times,

Flew out of bed,

Threw some toast in the toaster,

Grabbed an apple from the fridge and ran out the door last minute.

It wasn't the best way to start my mornings.

Then when I became self-employed I started to enjoy a longer more luxurious morning and I really learned the effects of changing that up.

Then came motherhood and now I wake up to a co-sleeping baby who makes the call for milk and while it's so much nicer to not wake up to an alarm clock it still takes me a minute to really start my day.

And I know that not everybody is a morning person and so I want to share the perspective of mornings aren't necessarily my thing but I've learned how to make them my thing.

I've learned how to make friends with the morning.

For anybody else who has a tumultuous relationship with mornings I just want to validate you in that there's been some incredible sleep studies that show 30% of the population is not wired for mornings and so the 70% of you that is wired for mornings you actually get to live at an advantage to the rest of society because society is designed for your circadian rhythm.

Having said that for those of you that are more like me over a long time and trial and error I finally found a practice that seems to really drop me in quite quickly and can be used at any point throughout your day when you find yourself either losing presence or ungrounded or caught in too many runaway train thought patterns.

So that's what we're gonna do.

This morning ritual can be done seated,

Standing,

Laying down.

It can be done while brushing your teeth or waiting for your toes to pop.

It can be done in the shower and really it is a kind of a shortcut practice to getting what you need out of a morning ritual.

Choose how you want to be with this today.

Ultimately freedom is what I seek in my morning practice.

You ready?

Wherever you are and whatever you are doing make sure that you are safe.

Close your eyes and place a hand on your heart.

Notice where the epicenter of thought is in your body and if you're not so much a thinker shift that cue to noticing where the epicenter of awareness rests within.

And whatever is going on inside of you right now I want you to drop an anchor of awareness down through your body.

You can track this by moving into a felt sense of awareness and in the same way that you would anchor a boat out at sea follow the anchor as it slowly lowers down through your spine and around your pelvis and then down through each of your legs until you find the inner contour of the sole of your feet.

And once you find that inner contour of the sole of your feet brush it out into the inner contours of your toes and if it helps you to do one foot at a time go ahead and do that.

The inner contour of the shape of your feet notice all the points of contact between your foot and the earth and then the other foot and the earth and you'll keep this anchor throughout the practice.

For the next three rounds of breath cycle your breath as low into your torso and into your feet as you possibly can.

And as you exhale feel from your feet all the way up through the crown of your head to release.

Let what you find inside of your body be the most interesting thing in the world.

There is nothing more important than tuning into how you feel right now.

Now this is where it gets good.

Call your spirit in.

Command your presence into your body.

You can state your name with a request to come home.

And this call is the most loving compassionate and kind call.

Come home to your body right now.

Bring your presence here.

If anybody deserves it it's you.

Come home right now.

And once you have a chance to call yourself in,

Pause in awe and wonder as the volume of presence grows within yourself.

Allow the fascination within you to build around what it feels like for your spirit to move into your body ever more deeply.

With every breath bring yourself home.

Invite yourself in.

Command your presence.

Once you feel a higher volume of presence here within yourself,

Commend yourself for arriving.

What a feeling.

Now from this place of wholeness where the body,

Mind,

And spirit now have come together to take shelter within this home,

This body,

Establish two things for yourself.

One,

What is the most important thing in your life?

And you can establish two things for yourself.

One,

What is the general feeling tone you would like to run throughout your day?

Is it presence,

To be upbeat,

Optimistic,

To be kind or compassionate?

And for you,

What is one thing that you would like to run throughout your day like a soundtrack?

And feel that now.

Commit that to felt memory.

Two,

What is your number one priority today?

What is the number one thing that you would like to do?

What is the number one thing that you need to accomplish or do or be present to today?

A number one priority.

Now see yourself at the end of your day accomplishing that priority and still feeling that feeling.

You've got this.

Today is going to be a great day.

You are capable of anything.

And just remember to be loving to yourself no matter what life throws at you today.

It's been a real pleasure to kick off today with you.

And hey,

I don't know if you realize this,

But committing to showing up to this challenge every day is extraordinary.

Prioritizing your mental health this year is absolutely necessary.

So I just want to say thank you for being one of the people committed to upleveling humanity in such a vital year of transformation.

You know,

Humanity is built one person at a time.

Thanks for doing your part.

I'll join you tomorrow on day 13.

We're just about halfway there.

We'll see you then.

Reviews

Great voice, I really enjoyed the anchoring and bringing your spirit back into your body.

Jana , I finally listened to another of your tracks. I think this makes three now. I’ve been trying to hold back until we get to the retreat. I used your meditations on Tuesday when I was in the hospital for 12 hours. My original favourite helped to centre and keep myself ready for any news the doctor brought. Now I am really looking forward to meeting you in person! Your tracks are so powerful. I can’t wait to feel your energy hand to hand. Be well.

Amazing. Thank you for acknowledging the struggles of not morning folks! Beautiful practice. I will use this often!

This was a really potent and touching practice. Thank you!

So compassionate and so gentle. What a beautiful meditation. I absolutely loved your observation that the world caters to those who are natural morning people. Eye-opening! While I am fortunate enough to be a morning person, I acknowledge and recognize that not everyone is. Thank you for being so gentle in this meditation. It was a beautiful way to start the day.

I really liked how her voice calmed me down and the words she said really meant something to me

Jana is speaking my language! I’m not a morning person and this meditation made me feel so seen! Her calm guidance to embrace freedom and seek presence through this practice was exactly what I needed. Bookmarking this one for sure!

I love this mediation. I have never been a morning person but I am learning to love them. Especially with two small kiddos. It’s my only calm time of my day. Today your words really hit home. I cried. I need to be more fun and enjoy the moments.
Thank you for sharing. 🙏😘

Another beautiful meditation! I am a morning person, however being sick has made it difficult to make morning my friend lately… This gave me a glimpse into what it used to be like as well as hopefulness. Love your meditations and soothing voice that relaxes me and calms me.

What a great meditation. I feel focus and grounded . Thank you.

That was such a unique meditation. It will stick with me forever. I really enjoyed coming home to my body. Thank you!

Very interesting for the people which are not used to meditate and don't take time for this practice. I'll share it!

I like the tone of guiding voice. Calm to make you start the day with no agitation. Also good to remember to put your body, mind and spirit all aligned.

I really like this one. She dumbed it down for me so I could understand.

I really liked how easy this was to follow. I really needed a simple session for today and with this track I got just that and even learned a bit in the process.

Thank you.

Somehow or who knows why, I had dropped out on the 11th day, seeking the perfect voice, tone, tempo, and speed of that perfect session not tasted among all others. Today, I found you again, despite initially thinking that this was not the voice that I sought. I persisted with the session and was pleasantly surprised that the girl next door's voice was it. Cocky, sensual, unexpectedly longer than normal pauses in between thoughts, you hooked me in. The search has ended.🙏🥰🧘‍♀️

I use this meditation almost everyday to ready and ground myself ❤️ Its my absolute favourite! Thank you so much 🙏🏼💜

I enjoyed this practice, is there a link to follow the course from start to finish?

Wow! What an excellent way to start my day. I will use this practice again.

love this
ha, was my childhood name
truth is we do get to choose our mood and goals etc for the day if we are willing to walk consciously. asking God what He would have me do- for Him to put those desires on my heart and align my will with His, as to be of better service... but I have to be present for all of this