Wake up, get dressed and live a new day.

Its time to wake up, get dressed and live a new day. 

Screen shot of our dry erase board with the kid's at home schedule during the pandemic.

Keeping unity in the house can always be a challenge, even without being confined by a pandemic. For us to maintain our unity, we have to have some sense of normality.

Keeping a sense of “Normal Life” is what differentiates between Living Life or just existing. Maintaining unity in our house is how we nurture and support Hope. We do this by trying to live by the 12 Traditions of recovery.

Tradition One: Our common welfare Has to come first. Our individual growth and well-being depend on our family’s unity.

There are seven specific actions we employ in our house. To help bring some normality to us.

Set a regular wake up time:

We wake our kids up every day at a set time. It would be so much easier to let them sleep in, to sleep in ourselves. After all, we have no specific time to be at the office. The kids do not have a tardy bell they are trying to beat. But we know from personal experience that sleeping all day leads to being even more tired and feeds pessimism.

Get Dressed:

So why do we make our kids, and ourselves, get up and get dressed every day? Because getting dressed is the most straightforward action, any of us can take to keep some balance. Lying around the house in our PJs may seem like the ideal way to take advantage of this forced time at home. But in reality, it is one of the quickest ways to depression.

Read a Daily Affirmation and meditate:

I know, I know, everyone is talking about how important meditation is. Well, if so many gurus and experts are talking about the benefits. Maybe we need to take the advice to heart. Here is my guiltless plug. I love meditation. I use our own 12 Steps Meditations from JnP. If meditation doesn’t seem to be your thing. At the very least, find some form of daily affirmations. My wife loves Mike Dooly’s ‘Notes from the Universe.’ We need something positive at the beginning of every day. To help balance out the doom and gloom.

Have a plan or schedule for the day:

We had to come up with some sort of program. Not having our kids on a schedule made it impossible for us to stay on top of our work at home. Not having ourselves on a schedule made for day after day of feeling unaccomplished and self-criticizing disappointment. So, we came up with a very light, time blocked based program. 

Exercise:

Again, nothing new here. We’ve all heard it time and time again. Stay active! Don’t waste away. Find some simple exercise routine and stick with it. One day at a time. With not having karate class two to three times a week. It has become that much more vital for me to have a routine at home. My routine consists of morning yoga. – Yes, I said yoga. I love the Daily Yoga app. they have a vast library of programs and a very active positive global community. I follow it with a Tabata style workout and dynamic kicking and boxing drills. (At least most days)

Set time away from electronics:

We do limit ourselves and our kids’ time in front of the TV, their tablets, and phones. We are learning to be creative. Through Facetime and gaming consoles, we allow them to do virtual sleepovers with their friends. But we limit their time (and ours).

Except for time online for school or work, our times on our electronic devices are limited to 2hrs a day. If anyone wants more time, we have to earn it. That is done through a daily house responsibility system. Which might be explained at another time.

Journal/Inventory:

Finally, record your day. Whether you do it nightly or periodically, we all look back from time to time. If you follow any 12 Step program, you know that inventory is a significant part of recovery. It doesn’t matter what your affliction is. If you want to come to terms with it. If you desire any positive growth. There is nothing more beneficial than putting pen to paper. 

We have always been an active family.

We have learned to use activeness as our way of dealing with anxiety, depression, addiction, and ADHD that exist in our house. For us to fall into a daily habit of sleeping all day, binge-watching Netflix, and continuous virtual battles on the Xbox. Would bring disunity, aggravation, feelings of hopelessness, and aloneness. Even in a full house. 

We lean on that First Tradition for unity. To nurture and promote Hope in our household. Teach our family to be stronger together. To see how our actions or inactions affect those around us. We use the First Tradition to help us Live together in unity instead of separately in despair.

“Always aspire to inspire before we expire.”

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