I love reading, but sometimes it can hard for me to find the time and energy to read after a long day at work. By the time I get home, eat dinner, do any work I need to for school, and work on the blog… I am exhausted. It’s a lot easier to just turn on the TV and watch a repeat of Friends or binge a show on Netflix. And I don’t think there’s anything wrong with watching TV! But recently, I realized that I was always reaching for the TV remote, and never for my book, and I wanted to change that. I didn’t want to stop watching TV; I just wanted to get back into the habit of reading.

Reading is a habit like anything else, and it takes time to train yourself back into the habit – even when it’s something that you love doing. So I’ve been making a little bit of time every day, usually sometime before bed, to do at least a little bit of reading. I usually read on my iPad, because it’s so much lighter and easier for me to hold than an actual book, but I’ve also been using the Nook app on my phone to get in a few pages of reading while I’m in bed before I fall asleep. Reading on the smaller phone screen isn’t my favorite, but I’m getting used to it and it helps me when I’m feeling too tired for anything else.

I’ve also been trying to get in one meditation through the Headspace app every day. I haven’t been quite as successful in forming this habit as I have reading, but it’s something that I’m still working on. I started using Headspace over a year ago, but once I finished the “Basic” meditation pack, and the time jumped from 3 or 5 minutes to 10 minutes, I started struggling to stick with it. Recently, though, the app started doing a new featured meditation every day, and I’ve been really into those! I like doing them at the beginning of my day at work – it helps me to get focused, and keeps me from getting overwhelmed trying to decide what to start to work on first. I’ve been struggling to transfer this habit to the weekends, but I just learned that I can use Headspace through my Alexa, so maybe that will help me!

I’d love to hear any suggestions any of you have!