Welcome to a completely different format of a video this week, and I mean literally, completely – down to the fact that yes, I am wearing my workout clothes, and my hair is in a bun with a headband. That is how I’m coming to you, because look, there is all kinds of craziness happening globally right now!
I am not here to talk to you about finance, health, or conspiracies. I am here to share with you the one thing that myself and my family are trying to do during this confusing craziness.
To find the order in the chaos, stick to routines as much as possible.
Which is exactly why I am dressed like I am! It is not my routine for this week to be shooting a video to send to you, but felt like I needed to hold onto the video I had planned for this week. I needed to send you a different type of message.
And my routine for today would be to wake up, get dressed in my workout clothes, and get ready to teach my group exercise class later today. And that’s exactly what I’m doing.
So my kids, of course, are totally out of their main routine, because they are out of school. They have virtual learning going on right now, which is kind of cool in some ways. But we talked as a family over the weekend about how this is not vacation time; that even though there is all of this change happening around us and we are not in all of our regular routine, we’re going to stick to the routine in the places that we can control.
Now I’m not making my kids get up at their normal 6:30 AM time, but they do need to be up, dressed, have breakfast, brush their teeth, and be ready to start their school day in the morning. That is how we’re doing things.
My son, Ethan, who is in junior high, said, “You know what? This is the order of my classes, I’m going to stick to that on my virtual work today. I’m going to go in that order.” In fact, right now he’s out running the mile because he would have been at P.E. right now.
My daughter, Reese, created her own schedule by saying, “Okay when do I have nutrition, when do I have lunch? What do we do after lunch? We read. That’s what I’m going to build into my schedule.”
So for the things that we can control – bedtime, dinner time, those little bits and pieces – our family is sticking to those routines. It’s helping us create a little bit of order out of the total chaos. It’s also keeping us more mentally focused today in the present, and helping us be mentally ready for when things go back to “normal”. As much as we can keep that routine, keep things how it had been, it’ll help us stay a little bit more mentally safe, mentally prepared, and focus on what we need to focus on, which is the things that we can control.
Where can you find some of the routine, and stick to that as much as possible? It will help you stay mentally healthy during this time.
With that, I hope that you, your family, your friends, that you are healthy, that you are staying safe – I will be thinking about you. Please send me any questions or comments that you have, I am here to support you.