Openings & Closings in Our Days
Do you feel like you’re on a hamster wheel each morning, running as fast as you can to get “all the things” done?
You aren’t alone.
A 2022 Stress America study found that 27% noted significant daily overwhelm. Most noted was, “Young adult women(aged 18 to 34)were more likely to report feeling overwhelming stress on most days compared to older women, or to men aged 35 and older.”(https://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2022/10/multiple-stressors-no-function). If this is you, you don’t have to stay in overwhelm. Small daily habits bring a shift from chaos to calm. Small daily habits shift this paradigm in your life.
One place? The kitchen.
If the kitchen is the heart of the home, it needs to be a powerhouse. Not a decorator’s dream sort of powerhouse, but highly functioning, ready to work with you, not against you. We run our kitchen like a restaurant-there is a rhythm & flow to its morning opening & its evening closing down.
When the heart of the home functions well, it takes pressure off mom. We don’t have anything in the kitchen we don’t need. There’s beauty in function. There’s rest in not having all sorts of extras to dust & maintain daily.
Most mornings start the same. Soft lighting on, candle lit, warm fire started on chilly mornings, a soft instrumental playlist, coffee pot heating water for herbal tea, nourishment being cooked. Its predictability offers calm over chaos, its simplicity means everything is easy to grab & use.
With straightforward kitchen opening, a daily rhythm of beauty is being cultivated. While each part of this morning flow benefits me, my family gets benefits as well. I thought predictability would feel boring. I was wrong, it’s freeing & sets the tone for the day.
And so if it was a restaurant, this would be called an opening & closing procedure; 𝗯𝘂𝘁 𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗰𝗲 𝗶𝘁’𝘀 𝗵𝗼𝗺𝗲, 𝘄𝗲 𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗹 𝗶𝘁 𝗮𝘁𝗺𝗼𝘀𝗽𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲, creation of daily rhythms decrease overwhelm & usher in places & spaces for beauty.
