Hot girl summer is right around the corner, and getting in great shape starts with getting your mindset right. Whether you are working toward a fitness/health goal, a career goal, or a financial goal, it all starts with your mindset. After all, our individual realities are reflections of our internal thoughts and beliefs. Recently, I’ve been doing a lot of research on the power of manifestation. Here are the practices I’ve picked up (and the apps to help facilitate them) that have helped me the most!
1. Meditation (try Headspace)
I have struggled with meditation in the past. I only seemed to be able to truly let my mind be blank during savasana after a particularly strenuous yoga class. Then I discovered guided meditation, and that all changed. Having someone to walk you through a visualization is so beneficial. Sometimes you need someone to let you know it’s okay if you can’t stop thinking about what to have for dinner. Just having awareness of your thoughts and feelings, without trying to force or change anything, is sometimes all you need. Recently I learned in my yoga teacher training, that just attempting to meditate is all that’s required to be beneficial. Just give it a shot! If you’re completely new to meditation, try the free 10-day basics course to get started.
2. Morning Routine (try Fabulous)
Having an established routine every morning is one of the single greatest practices that has helped me to get my day (and my mindset) off to a great start. I absolutely LOVE my morning routine now, and I try my best to make it a priority no matter what. Set time aside for a luxurious skincare routine, to make (and enjoy!) a matcha latte, journal, or go for a walk. I used to have a checklist in my notes app (which is a great option as well), but then I found Fabulous. This habit tracker helps you build out a robust routine bit by bit so it feels totally manageable. I particularly love the habits it suggests you adopt (based on research) like drinking water and eating a great breakfast. Adding these items into my morning routine, with a time allotment, has helped me incredibly. Otherwise, I might have made it to 2 pm without drinking or eating a thing and starting to get lightheaded – not good!
3. Affirmations (try ThinkUp)
Positive affirmations are an extremely powerful tool for achieving desired life outcomes. Repeating carefully selected positive statements to ourselves trains the subconscious mind to eventually believe them. Saying affirmations is a practice that takes consistency, but over time we can strengthen the neural pathways, or beliefs, that are helpful and weaken those that are not. I like ThinkUp because it has an extensive library of affirmations to choose from, which is especially helpful if you are not sure how to structure them at first. Plus, you can record affirmations in your own voice. Listening to your own voice can help your subconscious mind believe what you are saying a whole lot faster. Affirmations are also a great way to banish that negative self-talk we are all so guilty of.
You don’t necessarily need apps for any of these practices, but they have certainly helped me to make these practices into habits and to stick with them over time!
