This time of year can feel bittersweet. We are saying a sad farewell to lazy summer days, and looking contemplatively forward to the cozy charm of fall. While circumstances may look different depending on the season of life you’re in, there is great merit in embracing change in the fall, with a good life reset.
I’ve spent my life hearing about spring cleaning, but personally, I find autumn to be an opportune time for a life reset. I write a lot about home decor for fall, making new month resolutions, and becoming the person you want to be. But all of this seems to come alive as the weather begins to shift. It’s as if the autumn signals to my inner self that change is on the horizon, and it – is – good!
Embrace Change with Hope
For many, cooler months often signal seasonal depression. The decreased sunlight, time and opportunity to be outdoors, and often a busier more hectic schedule, lead to burnout and fatigue. However, I believe each day gives us an opportunity to embrace change with hope. This leads to our first gentle life reset.
Reset Number One: Practice Gratitude Every Day
It has been studied over and over how gratitude is good for the soul. Even at our deepest, darkest times, finding one single thing to be grateful for can have outstanding benefits to our mood. When changes come in the fall, whether it’s school calendars, extracurricular overload, work demands, or end of year strategies – (or all of the above) – shifting your mindset to view change with hope and gratitude will have a positive impact on your life. The daily pause journal from Jean Stoffer is an amazing resource. Reset number one is to practice gratitude every day.
Find Time for Rest
The Swedes have a tradition called fika, or simply, a coffee break with friends or family – usually accompanied by a sweet treat. The word fika literally translates to ‘coffee and cake,” but the meaning behind it is so much more. The culture in Sweden is for people to embrace fika every day when possible. It is considered a time to rest, reset, and embrace relationship.
The Danish culture has a similar concept called hygge. Basically, hygge is taking time away from the daily rush of life to be with people you care about to relax and enjoy quiet pleasures. Some of the unspoken rules of hygge include atmosphere, presence, pleasure, gratitude and comfort. Often these things are associated with candle light, coziness, and, again, a warm beverage. Comfort is the goal, and time to rest, reset, and embrace relationship, again, is what it’s all about.
Reset Number Two: Practice Quiet Reconnection
As schedules often grow hectic and unwieldy during the autumn months, finding time for rest is essential to a life reset. I am not naive in thinking everyone everywhere can take an hour out of their day to have these daily coffee breaks. And certainly eating all those sweet treats will have its own compound effect. However, finding a few moments each day to rest in the quiet – to reconnect with a friend or with ourselves – to practice a mindset reset are essential to our mental health and wellbeing.
Hal Elrod, the author of The Miracle Morning, makes silence part of his daily routine. When I first started practicing the miracle morning routine for myself, I quickly found that quiet was my greatest reset. It became a gift I gave myself every single day.
Realistically, I enjoy my morning coffee before dawn in the dark with a candle glowing. However, there are days that do not allow that luxury. So I practice silence in the shower – focused on my breathing instead of allowing my mind to run away with me. Or, I will take a short walk outdoors to breath some fresh air and soak up a little sunshine. Occasionally, I step away from my desk and text or phone a friend. When I was working full time, I often signaled the end of my workday by setting a ten-minute timer, lying on my bed, and listening to rain or waterfall sounds.
When we don’t make intentional time for rest and reconnection, we feel isolated, burnt out, and overwhelmed. So, reset number two is to practice quiet reconnection every day.
Reset Healthy Habits
Autumn changes everything. It isn’t just temperatures and routines that change, it’s basically every aspect of life that experiences some kind of change. Our wardrobes change, our diets change (I’m looking at you coffee and cake!), our exercise routines change, our routines changes. With all of this change happening, it’s easy to lose sight of healthy habits. Which leads us to our third gentle reset.
Reset Number Three: Prioritize Self Care
This life rest is so important, and goes along with the two resets already talked about. While gratitude and rest are vital to a good life reset, prioritizing self care is also equally important. During busy, hectic seasons of life, remembering and prioritizing self care can literally make or break us. Each person’s self care looks different depending on their needs.
Personally, when life gets extremely busy and hectic, to me, self care looks like a good Sunday reset. I don’t feel like I can function when my home surroundings are in chaos. For others, self care looks like a manicure. I have friends who practice self care through exercise. Still, others practice self care through social engagements. The point is to find what recharges you, and work that into your week.
Maybe self care is a skin care routine, or lunch with a friend. Possibly self care is organizing your fall wardrobe or scheduling a hair appointment. Whatever energizes you, decreases stress, and refills your cup is self care. You cannot fill someone else’s cup when yours has run dry. That’s why reset number three is to prioritize self care.
Define Core Values
In the business world, core values have taken center stage within the last decade. Businesses determine their core values, define them, and then set out to embody them. If corporate settings are embracing this practice, it might be a good idea to do this on a personal basis, as well. That leads us to our last gentle reset.
Reset Number Four: Evaluate Your Purpose
A good life reset cannot be fully completed without a little introspection and self-evaluation. I’ve written a whole article on The Person You Want to Be. It comes with a free printable e-journal and yearly companion planner if you’re interested in that sort of thing.
Evaluating your purpose – or defining your core values, if you will – is basically an opportunity to decide how to realign your life. There is a saying, “act like the person you want to be.” I am fully convinced you cannot do that if you have not defined who that person is. If you want to be a healthy and fit person, you have to know that first, so you can act like and prioritize that choice. Rather, if you want to be a peaceful person, you first must know that, and then work those practices into your schedule. Likewise, if you want to be a helpful person, you must know that, and then define opportunities for outreach or areas in which to volunteer.
It starts with what I call the ‘hard work of thinking.’ If you don’t think about, evaluate and define who you want to be, you will never fully grow into that person.
Embracing Life Reset in Fall
Fall has no magical, mystical significance. It’s more an overall feeling and expectation of change that encourages us to embrace life with new focus and outlook. These four gentle changes can be extraordinarily powerful when combined into one life reset. Even if you only adopt one or two of these practices, you are sure to find renewed hope, reconnection, rest and realignment when you embrace change and focus on a good life reset.
