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Vacation Reset: 3 Habits I Want to Change.

Ahh vacation.  Such a wonderful time for some self reflection.  I love getting away from my routines.  It’s so easy for me to fall into habits in my day to day life without really being intentional about if that habit is something I want to be doing.  It’s nice to get away, reset, and come back home being intentional about what habits I keep and what habits I let go of.  Vacation are a great time for behavior audit.

So here are 3 behaviors I wanna change:

1.  Getting on my phone first thing in the morning.  

As soon as my alarm goes off (after snoozing it several times), I grab my phone and check emails/Instagram immediately.  I’d love to have a morning routine that doesn’t involve social media/work.  Have you guys heard of the 6-minute Miracle Morning? I’ve listened to a couple podcasts on it.  From what I understand, you choose to wake up earlier (rather than just waking up and having to immediately get ready for work) and complete your 6-minute morning routine.  I want to try.  (obvi if you are trying to get out of an exercise obsession you shouldn’t do step 6.)

2. Avoiding Houston’s trails because I figure they all stink.

We don’t have any plans to move to California anytime soon (insert sad face).  Houston is an affordable place to live and I don’t want Andrew or me to have to work for forever AND both Andrew and I love being close to our parents.  While Houston doesn’t have epic trails that lead to the ocean…they do have trails.  

If you’ve been following along on IG, you know I’ve been going to the Houston Arboretum a lot lately.  I like it because it’s only for hiking.  There are rules and you aren’t supposed to run or bike on the trails.  It’s supposed to be a calm and peaceful place.  There are people who occasionally run by me and on the inside I’m all yelling, “didn’t you read the rules!!!” I’d love to meet clients their for walk & talk appointments in the future.  It’s only 5 minutes away from one of the offices I see clients at and 10 minutes away from my house.  

I’ve loved my arboretum experience every time I’ve been, except on Sunday when Andrew and I were there this dog tried to eat Maggie.  If you can’t control you dog/didn’t make effort to socialize it properly, I’m not sure you should be at a place where children are.  And if you are (perhaps you got you dog later his/her life and didn’t have the chance to socialize it), you should know your dog and know if your pup should have a muzzle on.

3. Getting stuck in restaurant food ruts.

Houston has incredible food! I tend to not get too excited for Thai/Asian/Chinese food…I just want to eat Mexican food for every meal!  But after having Ramen in LA and LOVING it, I want to find an epic Ramen and/or Pho restaurant in Houston that is “our place”.  Also wanna try milk tea from this place that serves milk tea in a light bulb.  Wait…what? A lightbulb? YES!

Are there any behaviors you’d like to reset? 

31 comments

  1. This is my kind of reset. How nice that you have such a fun trail near by! Columbia is not a super hot spot, but we do have a handful of nice trails we rotate through. 
    I would really like to stop looking at my phone before bed. I’ve seen many other people zap that habit and be happy with the results. I already don’t get as much sleep as I’d like, so I don’t need to cut it even more short.

  2. All the yes! I totally agree with the first one- I was doing great at charging my phone in the kitchen so I wouldn’t touch it until I was ready to go for the day, but have fallen off the wagon. Other habits I want to reset –> making time for afternoon reading (a book) rather than reading on my computer. Being more present in general. Ha so I guess I can sum all those up as get off technology ;)

  3. Not checking my phone first thing in the morning is a BIG one for me. I really need a change in my routine!

  4. I want to start my day reflecting on at least 3 things I am grateful for. I recently started to do this and it makes me appreciate things all day a bit more.

  5. There is a great Ramen place called Jinya Ramen in Midtown! I would definitely check it out!

    Also, if you ever go to Austin, my favorite ramen place is called Ramen Tatsu-ya and they have something called deconstructed ramen. It is amazing. 

    As far as pho, I live in Spring so my preferred places to go are out here. However, the entire Bellaire area hosts some of the best Asian restaurants and grocery stores. I am sure any pho place in that area would be amazing. :) 

  6. Number one all the way!! I need to detach myself from my dang phone in the evenings and in the morning. I have the ability to check periodically throughout the day, so there’s no need to when I’m at home with Matt and our cats. Thank you for this. I even had this exact thought this morning. I wouldn’t be running late if I didn’t spend time on social media.

    • Andrew had a roommate in college who ALWAYS watched the sports channel first thing in the morning. Andrew was always like “what happened in sports from 11pm to 7am that makes you NEED to watch the sports channel asap in the morning?” (Andrew isn’t a sports fan lol.) BUT the point of that is I feel the same about social media. I so agree with you, I’m not gonna miss anything from 10pm to whenever I wake up.

  7. I haven’t been to the arboretum in a while, but seeing your posts it just reminds me that I am due for a visit! If you haven’t tried Jinya Ramen you should definitely try it! They even have vegetarian ramen if you are feeling that for the day. :) Also as far as Pho, I recommend Pho Dien in Chinatown and if you are looking for milk tea either Share Tea or Kung Fu Tea are great options! I work near Chinatown so I am always there grabbing tea or food. lol If you ever try these places I would definitely love to see your posts on them!

  8. I want to get out of the habit of going on my phone so much before bed! I spend a half hour on it.. which is not good!

  9. Love this and looking forward to a vacation to reset as well. I need to be better about checking, responding, and generally being communicative with respect to my personal email. I dread Sitting down and going through emails, I dread wasting time typing responses, and I dread any follow up actions I need to take. I know this sounds seriously anti-social but between ALL of the school and activity info for three kids, Facebook blowing up with the latest Washington action (and then getting me worked up), trying to keep up with current events, school events, Instagram, etc., I just get so overwhelmed that I shut down and can’t deal with the basics. So maybe I need to put email first so I can stay organized and responsive and limit my time on the other things so I don’t get sensory overload. Introvert probs.

  10. I agree with you on the phone aspect- putting mine away before bed is a habit I would like to reset. That and eating too much sugar!

    • Hey Katie! Thanks for commenting. The phone before bed seems like a common habit everyone wants to reset haha! I feel like the whole “we all eat too much sugar” is such a fear mongering thing the media sells us. Our bodies can process sugar just fine…it’s our minds that get in the way. Once we label sugar as bad we crave it more because it’s off limits. I eat sugar everyday and I feel this is the healthiest I’ve ever been. The days when I avoided sugar all day/week and then would binge on sugar at night…those were the crappy days. Sweet snacks throughout the day keep me sane and not longing for/obsessing about food. So for me, I’m keeping the sugar:)

  11. I’d love to stop my negative self talk. I’m always the hardest on myself and I definitely need to work on that bad habit. I’d also like to focus less on ‘when” I should eat and more on eating when I’m hungry.

    • Something that worked for me for stopping negative self talk was every time I was aware I was bashing myself…I would start to pray instead (not sure if you believe in a higher power or not). Helped me so much and I still use it to this day. Something else that worked was having a go-to positive affirmation to say when I heard the negative self talk pop up. Here’s a whole bunch of positive affirmations that worked for me: https://www.pinterest.com/immaeatthat/body-positivitey-haes/

  12. I love the Houston arboretum but do not go nearly enough! There are not many woodsy walking trails in Houston but if you want to ride your bike they are currently building and making new trails all the time. One of my favorite trails is going past 43rd towards Alabonson on the White Oak trail. After a certain point the bayou is no longer cemented and flows like a small river. My favorite state to travel to is Colorado and I feel a little like I’m in Colorado when I hit that point in the trail. They are also opening more trail past Alabonson and there is a natural bird sanctuary off of the trail. I love riding around, seeing new things, and feeling like I’m not in the middle of one of the country’s largest cities!

  13. These are all really great resets! Vacation time is such a wonderful pause to stop and reflect on what you need to do to increase happiness/comfort in our lives. My fiance and I are going away next weekend so I’m looking forward to some similar reflection time.
    Good on you for making a goal to get away from your phone! I made a very intentional effort last year to not check social media first thing in the morning, and instead spend the time taking my pup for an extra long walk. She loves that we have extra time together, and it makes me feel like a good fur-mama when we both come home smiling :)
    My goal at the moment is to decrease my attachment to running as my only form of exercise. I have deliberately moved to a new gym with lots of classes so I can change things up for my body, and I’m only allowing myself three short runs a week (about the amount I find leads to enjoyment rather than obsession). Your post on exercise addiction really hit home for me so I’m shaking up my routine!

  14. one of my goals for this year is to be more intentional in my use of technology – not checking my phone right when I wake up (though that’s really hard!), and relaxing with a good book or watching something on Netflix instead of getting sucked into the Facebook / Buzzfeed vortex! I’m also hoping to get more adventurous with food (I tend to eat the same things over and over, just out of habit) – even if it’s just trying a different pastry at my favorite bakery, or perhaps some new flavors of tea :)

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  16. I love this and definitely want to stop checking my phone/ipad from later evening through the morning.  Right now I get into bed with my phone and am mindlessly on it until I fall asleep–social media; you tube, etc..  The problem is, I do not like to read in bed either.  For some reason it makes me anxious and gets my brain revved up rather than calmed down.  Any ideas on what to do in bed for a few minutes to calm down rather than a smart phone or a book?  

    Thanks for this post.  I tought it was great!

  17. Pingback: 3 Vacation reflections / things I want to change. – Yeah…Immaeatthat

  18. Pingback: 3 Vacation reflections / things I want to change. – immaEATthat

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