Creating Habits | Practising Gratitude.

Fall jumper, my journal and dry lavander flowers.

Last few days were filled with the same rhythms, same auburn light over my white kitchen table, same smells in my coffee and same crispy morning air. Also, for about four years now, my mornings are filled with one same routine, one I try to stick to every day, and that is gratitude journaling. Let's just say, I was never a person for daily journaling. I had a journal when I was a little girl, but I mostly drew in it or collected leaves and pressed flowers or written poetry and lists. I love making lists, I love writing about my mundane life, about my ways to finding simplicity, about creating minimal home, about finding perspective through motherhood, but journaling my everyday thoughts and dreams and fears on paper is not something I love to do. But this. This is something else. This is something I was missing for a whole lot of years.

Of course, we all feel gratitude, maybe even everyday. But if you're like me before, then those gratitude thoughts tend to quickly disappear from your mind. And for a lot of years I was a child, a girl and a women who used to compare herself with others. I used to think I was not good enough, I had many fears, I created a sense of security through predictability and thus control over every part of my life. I always stuck to my plans, to my goals, and sometimes I forgot life, forgot myself, my dreams, my love for art and creating, for writing and simply being me. For being sometimes weird and with my never ending love for storytelling, for being alone in nature, for wearing clothes I really love and feel comfortable in, for speaking about things I feel passionate about and leave things that suffocate me. For years I felt I was ungrateful, I felt guilt and shame when I wanted more or something else, and with all that I wanted more things, more clothes, more and more of everything that had nothing to do with simple things that now, I know, are the real things my life is created from and about.

More than four years ago, I really started wanting to become a women who lives a truly happy life, from morning till evening, even through night dreams, a happy and fulfilling life. I read Wabi Sabi book by Beth Kempton that sparked a tiny question in me, that sparked hope and will to start noticing small, simple, mundane and imperfect parts of me, of my life and my home and to see beauty in them. And I did, I started noticing them little by little. Then I read Walden by Henry David Thoreau and during that time I spent almost whole summer at my childhood home. I was surrounded by nature, by familiar and easy things, by my family and by all the simplicity life can offer me. And I saw all the mundane beauty I didn't even notice over last years. I just passed by them, I just wasn't even present in so many moments that carried so much beauty and so much love. I didn't even see it. And then I witnessed a man changing in front of my eyes. Changing his whole being, soul and mind in front of me. With his life unfolding in front of me, with his faith he seemed he never had before being born in front of me. I started to see what life is really about. He said to my mom one day that he regrets a lot of decisions, those that made his life flew like a butterfly without even noticing it. And it stuck with me ever since. I remember it every day. At the end, his life wasn't about clothes he wore or things he had in the house, or his blanket or TV shows he watched. Professions, bank account, our cars... At the end, everything stays here. And everything we come here with is love, and everything we go from here is love, memories and moments. His life was of memories he had, of moments with us, of us putting that blanket over him when the nights were cold, of us sitting all together and drinking coffee with him, of him telling us his childhood stories over and over again, of going for walks, of standing in the warm sun, of love, of peace, of simply living mundane life. And with him closing his eyes, I opened mine. I really opened them and I knew what my life will look like, what I want to fight for and slow down for. I realized I already was full of gratitude, I just didn't know how to recognize it or expressed it with myself. I knew I wanted to wake up and start every new day with that gratitude for all those small things, I knew I wanted to be more present. I knew I wanted to write and create art and create my life around what I truly am.

And after I became a mother two years ago I finally knew what being present really stands for. Because I wanted to be present in all the moments of the day with my little family. So I started changing my home, I removed all the clutter, I created calm home with some bare walls and bare surfaces, I changed my attitude towards clothes and once I decluttered that closet I never came back to what it looked like before. I stared reading more. I started painting again. I started creating things for my home, reusing old furniture, repairing and repurposing it. I started saying no more. No to gifts, no to things, no to events, no to people. My family might even say I'm still controlling but I'm simply creating some simplicity in my home and in my family life, saying no to clutter and excess, no to stress, and still learning to let go of control in other life areas. I created my peaceful mornings, filled with few moments of fresh air, sometimes even morning walks, with brewing some warm tea in my favorite mug, with sitting still, with reading few pages, with praying and gratitude journaling. That journaling changed my days. Everything I would write on that single piece of paper would stick with me for the whole day. Sitting in my mind, giving me peace and reminding me to slow down, to be present, to stop scrolling, to read more, to walk more, to cook with my little one, to spend evenings at the riverbank collecting shells and pebbles, to rewear my clothes I already have, to spend a week at the countryside with my loved ones, to sit in that beautiful meadow and pick some wildflowers. To just be.

So, how that gratitude journaling looks like for me? Well, I have a notebook, a journal if you like. It's simple, with calming brown colors, few details and ton of blank pages. Every morning when I wake up, I immediately pull that journal from my shelf, along with a book I'm currently reading and a Bible. I put it on my living room table, lit beeswax candle in my beloved, years old, white, ceramic candle holder and then I head to my kitchen. I put some water to boil and prepare myself a cup of tea. It's usually ginger lemon tea, but these days I love making Pukka Relax Tea, a blend of fennel, chamomile and marshmallow root. It is the most delicious tea I ever drank. So now it is in my morning routine. After that, I breathe some fresh, now crisp air on my balcony. Just being still for a few moments, standing in my wool socks, with warm mug in my hands, observing autumnal tree tops and mist rolling away over house roofs. Then I go back to my warm living room, sit on my floor and put on paper those gratitude pieces of me. I write five little things and moments that simply pop in my mind when I think about gratitude. I write them down and usually I'll write why I choose them. Then I think about them for a few minutes, and then I write down few things I want to work on, I want to learn or create. After that I will write my prayer too. I don't go to church often. I simply didn't like that since I was a little girl. But I always had relationship with God, filled with conversations, filled with something more that a visit to church for me. So it stayed with me. Small but meaningful conversation. That way I'm heading to my new day with real reminders of what I want my life to look like everyday. And when I write my prayer I’ll usually write my tasks for that day, not to not to put pressure on myself or to achieve everything written, because every day brings its own miracles and its own course, but to keep in mind these tasks. At the end of the day, I will go back to my journal and mark off what I accomplished. After praying, I will read a Bible chapter or something from a reading plan on application She reads the truth. I love it, you can choose some plans for free and some you can purchase if you like. After that I will read few pages of some book. Currently I’m reading Life Is Worth Living by Fulton J. Sheen. And that is it of my journaling. It takes ten of fifteen minutes to do it. Sometimes even less.

But those few minutes of creating that morning peace really changes the way my day flows. It is still full of hardships, full of motherhood with all it's tasks and challenges, with cooking and cooking disasters, with spilled coffee, with crumbs in my rug, with scattered toys and cleaning tasks. But I'm more calmer in those moments then before. So I guess it really means something, at least for me. And those, now four journals of mine, from years I wrote in them, are full of shedding and blooming, and shifting, and healing, and learning, and creating, and loving, and losing. Of mundane life with all it's wonders.

Little suggestions:

• Read something cozy and warm like a story about autumn essentials that helps me create some hygge moments.

• Some things that brought me joy lately.

• One on welcoming autumn in my home.

• Some paths to simplicity from September.

• Story about slowing down at the countryside with my family for a whole week, and about all the things I did, found and noticed.

• I f you like my stories here, head to my Substack page, Notes from Meadow for more of them.