The Simple Ritual that Turns Around a Bad Day

We’ve all had one of “those” days. You spilled your coffee. There was traffic on your commute. You spent half the morning sorting out an HR issue, then a meeting went poorly. On your way home you realize you sent an email with a typo in it, or worse, committed the dreaded reply-all. Or you’re home with the kids who, for some reason, are feral today. They’ve requested and refused seven snacks already, you stepped on a LEGO, the dog seems to be limping, there’s a mysterious liquid on the kitchen floor, and it’s only 10AM.

And you still have so much stuff you’ve got to accomplish.

There are plenty of self-soothing or grounding techniques you can try when you’re in the middle of a rough day. Here are 100 of them.

But one technique we especially love, if you’ve got the time for it, is restarting your day.

What do you mean by restarting your day?

Whether it’s mid-morning, noon, 3PM, or evening, you can cue a mental reset by performing rituals you normally do in the morning.

Think:

Take a shower
Have a cup of coffee, tea, or ice water
Exercise or do some stretches
Change clothes

While you’re taking this break for morning tasks, mentally set aside everything that has happened in the day so far. Give yourself permission to start over and try again. When you go through the physical motions of tasks your body performs in the morning, you help your mind do a reset as well.

It can be hard to give yourself an attitude adjustment when you’re actively frustrated. But by taking some time to yourself, you can change your mental state and get a fresh start.

In the shower, you can have some quiet to think through what you need to do next, or just take a moment and let your mind wander. By taking a moment to sit down and have a coffee or something to eat, you’re giving your body an energy boost to take on what’s next.

This, to me, is the perfect self-care practice. It combines the basics (take a shower!) with the more luxurious (take an hour to do all this).

While you won’t always have time to perform your whole morning routine, even doing just part of it can help you mentally prepare to go back to the grind when you’re feeling sluggish, irritated, or stalled-out on your to-do list.

Give it a try, and let us know how it goes!