Sadie Salazar, therapist and COO of Sage Therapy, considers herself to be a Type-A, recovering perfectionist who can be prone to anxiety. To have the best day possible, she uses her mornings to ground herself.
“What I found that really works well for me is making sure that I’m getting up early so that it actually feels like I have time to myself,” Salazar tells CNBC Make It.
“If I don’t wake up on time, it will throw everything off, and then it just compresses the morning so that I feel rushed and chaotic. I think that’s the biggest ritual. No matter what, I’m getting up when the alarm goes off.”
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Salazar likes to use the additional time she builds into her mornings for activities that are unrelated to work or household chores. “Maybe it’s reading a chapter of a book or listening to a little bit of a podcast, or taking some extra time to walk my dog,” she says.
As a mom with a new baby, Salazar finds that waking up at 7 a.m. affords her time to prioritize self-care.
But to avoid putting too much pressure on herself, she doesn’t try to stick to a routine that makes each morning look the same.
No matter what, I’m getting up when the alarm goes off.
Sadie Salazar
Therapist and COO of Sage Therapy
“A big thing is giving permission for other routines and rituals to ebb and flow. I would love to be the kind of person that does a workout every morning or listens to a podcast or a book or something, but I personally find it hard sometimes to stick with routine,” Salazar says.
“No one wants to start their day feeling like you’ve already failed at something.”
Her only commitment is getting up early, and then Salazar decides how she would like to spend her creative hour, in the moment.
“It’s less structured. It gives me the opportunity to really generate creativity and just have a part of my day that feels rejuvenating, instead of that routine I rush through to get on with, like all of the other tasks of the day,” she says.
She also aims to get dressed for work to help her stay focused, even though she works from home.
“There’s so much temptation to wear our comfy clothes and just kind of lounge about, and I found very quickly that I was just not feeling as motivated or creative,” Salazar says.
“I try to resist the temptation to stay in pajama bottoms, and really get myself ready for the day [to] feel like I’m actually going to work. [And] actually getting out of the house is really helpful, especially for those days where maybe I’m working remotely back to back.”
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