How to Wake Up Happy
Transcript
Tia Graham:
Steph, my wonderful sister, you, most days, I'm going to guess 93, 95% of your mornings, depending on what's going on, you wake up in a pretty good mood. You wake up with energy, with excitement for what you're going to do. And how do you think you do that?
Steph:
I wake up in a good mood, I think because of personality, of who I am. I think it's probably more nature versus nurture. I am a morning person. I wake up excited to do my day, and I am grateful to be awake. I just, I like mornings. Breakfast is my favorite meal. I just, I like waking up, and I like morning.
Tia Graham:
How much do you believe, because you said you're sort of, well, you're excited, you're looking forward to the day, how much of how you're spending your time ... I know if you're working or I know you were studying in university, now you are in a new profession, being a teacher, how much do you think that looking forward to what you're going to do contributes to how you feel when you wake up?
Steph:
I think it highly contributes to it. I think back to a time where I was in a job where I wasn't enjoying myself going into work, and those were days where it was harder to get out of bed. Those were the days where you thought to yourself, can I call in sick? You don't want to go, you don't want to get up. So I think, yeah, I think what you have planned for the day definitely contributes to how you feel about your day starting out.
Tia Graham:
Right, right. You always have had a very easygoing, laid-back approach to life. Your feathers don't get ruffled too easily. You go with the flow. There's just this ease. And I wish I had more of it for sure, especially when it comes to parenting, especially. What advice do you have for someone who's not like that, who's maybe more uptight, gets triggered easy. What advice do you have for someone that really has an intention to be more relaxed and more laid-back?
Steph:
I think it comes to managing stress. As a younger mother, I was way more likely to be triggered and way more likely to yell at my kid. Now that I'm older, I think I know how to manage stress better. So I think I have taken the time to reflect on my life and make it so that I am not as stressed out and taken the time to build a life that I enjoy. And so that it has to be a pretty big item to stress me out. I make sure that I always am keeping a perspective on what the size of the problem is.
Steph:
There's often times I'll catch myself about to react to something, and then I think, this doesn't deserve a reaction, and I don't react. I just think, oh, no big deal. You know what I mean? And kind of just try to change directions in a calm way, instead of letting whatever's bothering me actually get to me, because I think I am very aware of my position in the world and that my problems are very minor to what they could be. I don't think the problems I have are problems that are worth getting so upset over. It's just usually some small things. I think I always have known that things could be a lot worse. So I think I'm pretty easy going when it comes to problems.
Steph:
As for letting things roll off my back, I think I'm someone who I really have never put in too much value or put in too much power into other people's hands. I really don't put a lot of emphasis on what other people think of me. And I've always been a very introspective person and very analytical of what I think. And so I think I focus more on what I think, rather than what other people think, because that's just, again, I think that's kind of how I was born. I was that person that I think a lot about what I think. I don't really think about what other people think.
Tia Graham:
You have redesigned your life so that there's less stress. And I believe that people might not think or know that they actually have a lot of choices to redesign. So first is that awareness of, oh wow, there's a lot of stress in my life. I need to pause, evaluate, and then what do I change, so that just from the time you wake up to the time you go to bed, there is less stress. Which, I mean, I definitely went down that journey. That's the reason why I left my corporate job and wanted to work from home and be around the kids more, because I was at a point where it was too much and it wasn't fun.
Tia Graham:
So what advice do you have for people who are in a lower point, whether it be because of, they could be going through a really bad breakup. They could be having a challenge with kids. They could not like the job that they're in. If they're in a place where they feel stuck, not happy, and you said it, just like, oh, I'll just sort of call in sick, I'd rather kind of [inaudible 00:06:30]. I just wish I could stay in bed. Whatever's going on, I don't want to get up and deal with it.
Steph:
You don't want to participate.
Tia Graham:
Yeah. So what advice do you have for people that are in that place right now?
Steph:
Reach out, ask for help. Be willing to admit it, like say it first, right? That's where it starts, is just even admit it to yourself. Write it down. I am unhappy. Just admitting is the first I think problem, or taking accountability for where you are in your life is obviously, I think, something that needs to happen.
Tia Graham:
So accepting.
Steph:
Accepting and being accountable for the choices you're making and where you've gotten to so far. You need to take accountability for that. I got myself here. I can get myself out of it. So if you are in a place where you're not happy, just know that change is inevitable. So I believe in obviously everything being connected in our world, and I like to live my life in a way of balance. So if you're in a down period, you have to remind yourself that the up is coming, because everything always goes in circles. We see the sun and the moon every day, seasons come and go. Everything is always coming and going.
Steph:
And so you are part of the world and you're connected to the world. So you will have an up period eventually. And so I like to just think about how, when you're in those up periods, you really have to enjoy it. And when you're in those down periods, you have to stick through it and you have to keep going, because those downs are what give you the ups. You wouldn't have an up if you didn't have a down.
Tia Graham:
You wouldn't know what the up feels like.
Steph:
You wouldn't know if it was always [crosstalk 00:08:16]. Yeah, it's like the light and the dark, the up and the down. So there's a lot of polarity in our world. There's the opposite. So if you're in a down right now, just know that it's not forever and you will eventually get out of it soon. And get to know yourself. That's something that, when I was in a really dark period in my life, I realized that I was disconnected from myself. So you just have to get to know yourself and get to know what is going to make you feel better.
Steph:
For me, it's music, taking a bath. I like quiet. I like to get away from people. I like to go somewhere where there's zero people. Just getting to know what is going to make you feel better.
Tia Graham:
Super good advice. Okay, I'll ask you one last question. Because I get asked this often, and I'd love to hear your thoughts on this, is what advice do you have for when you wake up and you're not necessarily in a really low period of your life, but you wake up and you're just in a bad mood? You're off. You just, you're not feeling positive. What do you do in the morning, sort of that first half hour, first hour, to change your perspective, to change your outlook, and turn the day around?
Steph:
I'm trying to think back. So I definitely use music. If I'm having a day where I'm like, oh, today's going to be rough, or oh, I don't really want to be here, I always just put on music quietly in the background, as I'm washing my face, brushing my teeth, putting on makeup. And I like to put on music that's upbeat. I'll put on some Stevie Wonder or just that music that-
Tia Graham:
Makes you feel good.
Steph:
Yeah, kind of move to and smile. And something I picked up in the last year, too, is just to be more mindful. So to pick up on things, I started a gratitude journal. So I do in the morning, I try to list three things I'm grateful for. And then you write a goal for the day. And it's just, it's usually four words. So it takes, it's not even three minutes. It takes a minute. It takes very quick, and I write that down, and I find that when I set that goal and when I write things that I'm mindful of or I write things that I'm grateful for, I tend to be more mindful of things that make me grateful.
Steph:
So I look for those moments in that morning routine where there's like ordinary miracles, just like driving to work, you'll get on the road and you'll just see the way the clouds look, and you're like, wow, like, thank you. You just have to find those little bit of moments. My mom, our mom, her advice, or I don't know where she got it from, but I think it stuck with me ever since she's told me, is that life is made up of every day moments. That's what life is. So if you can't find the joy in just those everyday moments, you can't just be waiting for that big, great day of celebration.
Tia Graham:
The [crosstalk 00:11:28] or the vacation.
Steph:
Yeah, you can't. It's like you have to find the joy in those moments. I find joy in just looking up and seeing the cloud formation. I find joy in just seeing the smile on my child's face. I find joy in that first sip of coffee every morning.
Tia Graham:
Me, too.
Steph:
Right? That's light. That is where happiness comes from, is being mindful and aware and in the present moment of those little gifts that are presented every single day.
Tia Graham:
I couldn't agree more. And you, with the gratitude practice and then plus the music, you're rewiring your brain to notice more things to be grateful for. Because you're starting off with that practice and bringing attention to it, then your perspective on the world is changing because of that.
Steph:
It's like, what path do you want to get down? If you're getting on the path, like, I want to go down this way. I don't want to start off my day complaining about something. No, I want to start my day off on this [crosstalk 00:12:28], thankful for the things I do have.
Tia Graham:
I just thought of one more question. So you recently made the decision to get off social media. So how has that affected your well being? How has that changed your life, of making a decision to get off a lot of the social media channels and stop scrolling and looking?
Steph:
It hasn't been that long, so I haven't seen any major impacts yet. I do notice more now, people absentminded scrolling. I notice now when people are constantly grabbing for their phone and need their phone in their hand. For the first week that I was off, I found myself doing it, like just picking up my phone and opening it, and for no reason. It's just that-
Tia Graham:
Habit.
Steph:
That habit of needing that thing in front of you. So as soon as I got off it, I was very aware of how addicted I was to it, that I wasn't aware of it when I was addicted to it.
Tia Graham:
Yeah, makes sense.
Steph:
I also, I guess now that, I hadn't really thought about it, but now that I think about it, I think I am not comparing myself to others as much, because I'm not constantly looking at other people's lives, snapshots of other people's lives, which is the highlight reel of their life. So I feel like I'm definitely a lot more able to curb my materialistic wants in the world.
Tia Graham:
That's big.
Steph:
Because I'm not comparing myself to what other people have that I don't have.
Tia Graham:
Right. Right. And I would think, I'm still on social media, I actually use it a lot for Arrive at Happy. But I would think that, and you could tell me if this is true, that, I mean, by not comparing, you're just more in your life. There isn't, like you said, the pockets of looking at what other people have or what they're doing. You're just moving through your life. And I know all the research shows how much it affects your mindset, how difficult it is. I know for teenagers, it really, really can cause depression for a lot of different reasons. So just closing out all of that, I'm going to call it noise.
Steph:
It's junk. It's junk. It's stuff that's not really serving you. I've gone back onto Facebook once in the last month or two. And I really find myself being like, this is junk.
Tia Graham:
There's nothing really valuable.
Steph:
There's nothing really valuable here.
Tia Graham:
Yeah. Interesting. So maybe you'll be inspired to also...
Steph:
Yeah, I definitely challenge you to at least start with a day. Don't go on social media for a day and try to be mindful of how many times you pick up your phone and automatically start to write Instagram or write Facebook.
Tia Graham:
Click on one of those icons.
Steph:
And just at least if you do one day, just be mindful of that moment that you go to it, gravitate to it.
Tia Graham:
Yes, yes.
Steph:
And start to be aware.
Tia Graham:
Yes, absolutely. Well, thank you for chatting with me.
Steph:
[inaudible 00:15:47]
Tia Graham:
Yeah, you share a lot of great tips, and I'm honored to talk with you.
Steph:
Thank you for being my sister and for spreading happiness around the world.
Tia Graham:
I'm trying, I'm trying.
Steph:
Bye.