How to reach a calmer you in 10 days

Day-to-day challenges left you feeling chaotic ? No need to take work-leave too long. Because more than meditate, here’s some life hacks on how to reach a calmer you in merely 10 days.

Day 1-Meditate.

Life, again and again, unrolls you to the infinite demands of achieving things. Sometimes no one reminds you that we were once lost our health, and now we are okay. We were once considered coffee treat was a luxury in the midst of saving up to pay the mortgage. We were once suffered and survived, and now we forgot to feel blessed about it. 

Meditate turns your mind back to your surrounding, stabilizing the state of your ambition to not get carried away and exceeding your sense of gratitude. My meditation sessions are guided by the tranquilizing voice of Chel Hamilton in Meditation Minis Podcast, a compacted 12 minutes session I find very helpful meditating anywhere.

Day 2-Social media detox.

It’s time to decrease the height of your book stacks. Instead of waiting for more likes, more retweet, and continuing to stare at the screen like its the last resort, open that one book you’ve been meaning to read and enhance your perspective.

Nothing creates the unnecessary spark of anxieties in waiting for foolish responses played by the social media nowadays. 

Lurking over and over your WhatsApp in every split 10 seconds without clear objectives, is a sign that you’re in the emergency need of a social media detox. You will begin to realize, that you have a lush life if you just set your phone away for 3 hours. Go to the supermarket, sniff that expensive soap bars you never intended to buy. Take a peek of those cute kittens in the nearest pet shop. Do a stargazing tonight. We used to not having it before, so why can’t we put the cellphone down?

Day 3-The art of being a listener.

There’s nothing wrong with less speaking at certain moments. We misjudged the importance of listening and waiting. These things teach us patience and sincerity to broader elements in our life, up to a different level of psychology.

Occasionally teaching ourselves to hold our impulsive mind and learn to empathize to others can create a surprising path of self-soothing awareness. An agenda to lend an ear makes bonuses in carrying wisdom and calmer vibe inside your heart.

Day 4-Mindful and stay grounded for simple stuff.

The best things in life are free. Even if it’s not, the pure joys are found when we relinquished the habit of overthink every spontaneous impulse we did. Take a stroll outside barefooted and feel the heat of the pavements hit you with the reality that life is not just about that darn thing you’ve been contorted this whole day. 

Let the sun, the brisk of air and the trees that grow probably older than your grandparents, rescue your mind to the basic and simple mindful things you forgot to choose as we climb the stairs of being a grown-up. Oh how we miss those days of childish playing around, petting your cat, gallop a little in your walk, take a plunge in public pools, or do the silliest dance in your room (or maybe in the isle of your favorite supermarket? It won’t hurt?!). Anything that drops you the good vibe.

Day 5-Accepting that you can, just, be ordinary.

Aren’t we just tired of having to prove ourselves at every point of our life? Is it a must to stand out in the crowd all the time?

It turns out that sitting in the crowd once and while can really draw more stable breathing rythim, and might even drive you to a better inclusion in your social environment.

There is a theory first initiated by Dr. Marilynn B. Brewer in 1991 and continue evolving, called Optimal distinctiveness. It tells you about a social psychological theory seeking to understand ingroup–outgroup differences. It asserts that individuals desire to attain an optimal balance of inclusion and distinctiveness within and between social groups and situations (Brewer, 2003). https:/en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optimal_distinctiveness_theory.

The study shown, our identities are determined by the uniqueness that stands among others. Nevertheless, we tend to balance it with the sameness with the rest of the social group in order to fulfilled the need of inclusion.

“Brewer asserts that individuals will only define themselves in terms of appropriate social identities that are “optimally distinctive” and will refuse identities which are either too assimilated or too different.” 

But for this time being, let’s forget that the world doesn’t always have to relate to some theory, rather the calmness of being you, whether under the spotlight or sitting peaceful and collected, observing all the love surround you and just-let-go. it’s okay.

Day 6-When in disappointment, bear with it. 

Changing the course of your feelings takes time. Forcing false happiness when you barely get the grip of it, is like making a U-turn in the wrong direction. Instead of healing, it can break you silently . Time has proven, that letting your disappointments go through your mind and a solitary contemplation is actually bringing the reality together in front of you. As long as you are not prone to endangered yourself and others, a good cry can reset your heart and mind. Preparing it towards a calmer, fresh start.

Day 7-Talking to strangers. 

Some parents might not recommend this if you’re a minor, but what can we say, strangers, are a charming mystery. The least of people that would communicate to us with a minimum filter of judgments. They can be your uber driver, the lady that happens to sit next to you in a hospital waiting aisle, or anyone. It is all depended on your mood, whether it’s in the friendly-zone or not.

Day 8-Go out and look at other perspective in people’s life. 

In most cases, our list of hopes are piling up each day. For a long time, these expectations began to form as an unsolicited standard of life. We became self-absorbed and ambition-driven. 

Seeing a mother carrying her 2-year-old toddler to the doctor she can barely afford, with a weary smile. An autistic teenager that crying out in a state-of-happiness playing with the water in public swimming pools. Or just notice how people are sweating their way out of commuter train just to go home and have a good bath and a simple meal.

Blessings are sometimes overlooked. If you just step out of the banality of life, you’ll see the world are not as bad as you think it is.

Day 9-Find your daily sanctuary.

Yes, with a good coffee or warm tea.

Call that hilarious friend of yours for hours. Live like decades ago where laughter can just be a dial away. Even better, take a dress down brunch occasionally, where comfort meets fun, for the sake of being real. If in friendless circumstances, dive in your loneliness for a good breath of fresh air is always a liberating routine. It wasn’t the lavish holidays nor the staycation you planned with a family that magnifies the soul of self-contemplation.

As it is stated once, by a fantastic poet Marianne Moore, “The cure for loneliness is solitude.”

Day 10-Immersed more in loving yourself.

We came here as an entity and rebuilt as an identity by the social perceptions, moral compass, and stereotypes. A stigma that made us lost in the wave of so many disparaging thoughts. We need to understand, that a collected soul comes from the size of your trust in yourself. 

Trust bond strongly with love, and the key to enter it is to keep feeding good affirmations to your heart. Start from believing that even your body loves you just the way you are. When they ached, they tried to alarmed you by sending signals that rarely to be over-protective. 

This may seem like a hard concept to process, so let’s take a case of Ashanty, a wife of Indonesian famous musician, Anang. She has had terrible headaches for weeks, in 2013. She decided to followed it through with a check-up to the hospital. It turns out the doctor found that she  has meningitis, and in an early stage they are able to be treated. Meningitis is a deadly inflammation of the brain’s tissue, and she was glad that she took an act on the symptoms instead of just ignoring it.

But there is also the case of Michael J.Fox. He has been living his life to the fullest, thus suffering from Parkinson’s Diseases for years. He even made himself a philantrophic actor by committing himself to the disease’s research and establishing the world’s largest non-profit institution; The Michael J.Fox Foundation. 

Anxieties about pain will generally subside if you learn to accept it. Occasionally, it could be a blessing in disguise. By the time you turn your situations, into an advocacy to help others.

If you can learn to grasp that your body loves you, you’ll start taking care of it better. Wake up in the morning with a positive mindset, and count the blessings you still owned. Start from being alive.