Wake up early
My life in Bali is quite busy, but I manage to organize my days around my commitments.
Normally I wake up between 6 am and 6:30 am, I love the quite hours of early morning when the guests are still sleeping, my place is silent and I love to listen to the birds waking up, recently we have 2 little owls that sleep on our roof during the day, in the early morning they come back from the night’s hunt happy and singing!
Usually I do a breathing practice while still in bed, energizing pranayama, or I do a visualization of how I would like my day to evolve. It does not always go according to my mind’s image!
Oil pulling
As soon as my feet touch the floor my dogs and my cat start circling me for morning breakfast, but before I go to my kitchen/ living area I take a nice gulp of coconut oil in my mouth and I swish the oil in my mouth for about 5-7 minutes while I feed the animals, this is an Ayurvedic practice called Gandush, meant to detoxify and cleanse your mouth of bacteria that can cause problems in your gums and teeth.
During this process the saliva increases in your mouth and detoxification occurs, when you spit the oil, it should be whitish. I suggest spitting the oil into the trash or compost as it can clog the drains!
Rinse your mouth with warm water afterwards.
When done, I drink at least 500 ml of warm water with lemon and sometimes turmeric juice. The lemon can help if you have a sluggish digestion and wake things up!
We can talk about alkalizing your system in another post as is a wide subject.
Walk, walk, walk
As soon as the dogs are ready to go I take them for a brisk walk of at least 40 minutes, if you don’t have dogs, take yourself for a walk!
Sometimes, since I live by the water, I walk to the beach and if the tide and sea are good I go for a long swim. Swimming and looking at the fishes is my favorite activity, I love the silence and peace under water, it is a different world!
I find that while I am swimming my mind goes into a sort of meditation and slows down.
By now when I come back it is almost 8am. Some days I do a good 45 minutes of movement, yoga, high intensity cardio, or weights, or balance exercises. I have a routine and every day I work on different parts of the body. Other days if I can’t fit outdoor and indoor practice I split the 2 between morning and late afternoon.
Take time to cook
I only eat twice a day. Breakfast is my favorite meal of the day. I make sure that it is nutritious enough to make me feel nourished until maybe 2pm. When I snack on nuts, or a fruit or a piece of parmesan! Something really small, sometimes just a juice, a couple of carrot sticks. Simple!
The afternoon is always a busy time for me, trying new recipes, shooting pictures, studying about my next topic, accounting, taking care of guest requests, desk work and creative work until about 6pm.
I then take a break, or a short walk with the dogs or a swim! Half an hour is enough, then I prepare our supper, we have early dinner, between 7 pm-7:30 pm. I like to give my body time to digest before I go to bed!
Dinner: all what you need in your plate
Dinner is a wide subject. My view on nutrition is to combine in your meals an abundance of fresh, if possible organic, variety of fruit and vegetables, with many colors, each color brings different minerals and vitamins to you.
Whole grains (there is not only wheat and rice)I realize that very few people eat the others! Barley, oats, rye, millet and counting!
Legumes, for your plant protein, I don’t eat meat since long time, but good quality hormones free lean meat, once in a while can be part of your meals, I eat fish sometimes, the ones that are rich in Omega 3, sardines, anchovies, mackerel or salmon, for example.
Lots of seeds and nuts on my plates, healthy fat, like avocado, extra virgin olive oil and coconut oil. The subject is too vast to approach in a paragraph; it will be the topic for a separate post!
I limit the sugar content in my food, to the bare minimum, but this again is a long chapter!
After dinner, I always drink herbal tea; it’s good for digesting and for a good sleep!
Whole food post link
Bed time
Reading is my best option, while during the day my reading is more like studying; at night is reading for the pleasure of a good story!
When I go to bed I do a relaxation of the body, go through every part, like a check up, letting go of tension, I do a conscious softening of my mouth, shoulders and feet, often I massage my feet with different aromatherapy oils, depends on the mood of the evening, different oil for different purpose!
Looks like a lot to do in a day to care for yourself, but is just about routine!
Not every day is the same of course, some days I have maybe just 1 hour for my practices.
Nota bene:
Do what you can, a little is better than nothing!
