SMALL BUSINESS RITUALS
Recently I did a poll on Instagram and as I expected 95% of people who interacted with that post were Business Owners so I then did another little poll to see how many of those business owners had a morning ritual that opened the container of their work day in a conscious and mindful manner.
Only 3 people had sort of ritual that acted as a solid demarcation between personal time and focused, monotasking, deep work, business time. So it doesn't surprise me if you're working for yourself and you're feeling overwhelmed! You might even be feeling like your personal life and work-life are completely blurred and are just the one thing.
Why is this dangerous? Because if your personal life and identity are entirely wrapped up in your business when your business goes through peaks and troughs, which it will, because that's what they do this will have a direct affect on your self-esteem and sense of self-worth which is a little bit scary.
To remedy this we need to make sure that we're working towards systems and structures that are clear containers and have clear directions. Now this isn't to say that you need to be a taskmaster or you need to work superhard you might be a Projector or a Reflector and you might need to work in a really different way to most people especially to someone like me who's a Generator. But no matter what kind of energy levels you have knowing what you're meant to do and when and having a single focus for what you're creating or producing is a medicine within the attention economy.
Working in this way in short 45 minutes stints (for optimal productivity) then taking a little break with just a couple of tasks that you can focus on and give your full attention to is one of the ways that we also avoid burnout.
So as I promised on my instagram I've put together a couple of my favourite little rituals that help me make strong energetic containers in my workday. These are some of mine, I invite you to make them your own or come up with completely new ones but I do stress the need to have something that tells your nervous system that you're in work mode and then also tell your nervous system that you're in relaxation mode.
Smells
So this one comes from not only working with nervous system regulation but also working with my human design, in human design my strongest scent is smell so this is something that I can draw on to create more power and more magic in my daily life.
Our nervous system also has a strong response to different smells, as you would know if you've ever smelt lavender essential oil for getting calm and if we start to smell a certain scent while we're undertaking certain tasks we’ll start to get in the right into flow state or the mode that we need to complete that task.
Really simply you might have a room mist or a humidifier with essential oils. When I used to work in the Design industry I always had to have lemon on because it's really good for intelligence. You could just change the scent according to the task or for each day if you're working two different day themes or topics.
I also love to burn some sage from my garden with lavender or spray a room mist at the beginning and end of each Coaching session. This is to clear my own energy-filled and to get me back into my own sovereign state because I am highly engaged and care so much about my clients the feelings from sessions can bleed into my daily life if I don't have that demarcation.
A note on scent and hormones if you are working with estrogen dominance you do not want to be ingesting or having any synthetic fragrances in your environment including processed fragrances like essential oils. Fresh flowers or dried flowers are ok but take it easy if you're not working with estrogen dominance don't worry about this if not, this is just a note for those that are.
Candle magik
This one is new for me and it's one of my favourites so it’s part of my morning opening ritual and this is where I light a candle on my desk in a particular colour and I also take a moment to pull a card while the candle is lit I have a particular playlist going so that my body has all of these sensors knowing that this is the time of day and I blow the candle out when I’ve finished this ritual and it sits on my desk unburnt which is actually also when it's doing magik!
Right now I have a yellow candle (for enhancing networking and social skills, and bringing in new career opportunities.)
This is where I get my candles from, they’re French and don’t drip and I am always on the hunt for beautiful brass candlesticks from local antique supplies.
Monday Morning CEO ritual
This one is a little bit less fun but you can make it as fun as you like I spend one hour, the first hour of every week which is 9-10am on Mondays where I go through all of my CEO tasks so what this looks like is:
looking at sales from the previous week looking at analytics from my content from the previous week and using those numbers to inform my plan and action for the week ahead
I also look at any project that I have coming up over the week
I use this one hour to plot what I'm going to work on in the week ahead a do of course have some toss pre-scheduled for a very long time but at this is where I do any adjusting and that I need
I take a moment to really slowly intentionally start my week noticing what cycle the moon is in and my menstrual cycle is and the level of my energy and if there's anything extra going on that week that I need to prepare for
I do this slowly with a nice playlist nice cup of tea and I use it as a time to really allow my business to be treated how it deserves to be treated with respect and dental nurse and full attention.
Intuitive Intention tune in
Some of you will know that I am a certified Akashic Records reader and I only do Akashic Records readings for Kula members, I'm not sure what this is going to look like in the future but that's what's going on right now. But I love to use Akashic Records in my own life and especially in my business planning.
So every single morning when I sit down at my desk after I've pulled my card I allow 30 seconds of no input, with my feet planted on the floor and tune into my Akashic Records and ask for a guidance on the day. Sometimes what comes through is really obvious and sometimes it comes through as a bit more abstract.
Some messages I've received of late have been on honouring where my energy is at that day and to notice systems and structures (as in planning) and I also find it quite interesting because these intuitive downloads come through usually before I've really dove into the meaning of the card that I pulled and every single day when I read and connect even deeper I recognise that they're saying the same thing to me!
Inviting more ritual, conscious boundaries and containers into your work week is going to strengthen your energy, give you more creative capacity and also just honour yourself, your business and your energy in a much more sustainable way.
If this article has sparked a desire in you to work better, more consciously and in better alignment with your energy check out our Conscious Business Coaching opportunities here (there are only a couple of places left for 2022!).
I'm so excited for you to try some of these rituals or to connect with your own and I cannot wait to see them in real-time so please share your rituals in your stories share what works and what doesn't work and tag me @honeybachancoaching so that you can be featured in ours!