6 Healthy Habits You Can Start Doing Today

First off, congratulations to us for passing the 1-week mark of staying home! Fortunately (or unfortunately), we have 3 more weeks to go. Though this is a challenging time for all of us, we have a choice whether to just sit at home and do nothing or, we can turn it around by making use of all the free time we have on our hands and doing something productive.

I’m sure we all choose the latter — so here are some tips I have on Healthy Habits we can incorporate in our lives starting TODAY!

1. Develop your own morning routine

I believe what we do in our mornings sets up the tone for the rest of our day. That being said, developing a good morning routine is beneficial not just on setting a productive tone to your day, but also gives you something to look forward to when you wake up.

Each morning routine is personal and different for all depending on your priorities, and how much time you have. I’d like to share mine to give you an idea how to develop yours:

For my normal days (before this community quarantine and when I had work by 7:30am), my perfect morning routine would look something like this:

• Wake up around 4:30 or earlier
• Brush my teeth
• Pray
• Put on workout clothes
• Walk to the gym
• Spend around an hour working out
• Make breakfast when I get home — typically oatmeal or a smoothie
• Shower and get ready for work
• Drive to work
• As soon as I get to work, I make a coffee
• Start my day reading the news and writing my to do list

In contrast to my morning routine now, here´s how it looks like:

• Wake up (anytime between 8 to 10am) and make my bed
• Brush my teeth
• Pray
• Go down to the kitchen, make a coffee
• Go to the patio, read my Bible
• Finally, make my breakfast

Now that I listed my typical morning routine vs my morning routine now, I actually am so thankful for all the time I have on my hands to have a slower paced morning. 🙂

2. Start everyday with a prayer and reading the Bible

This one is pretty self-explanatory but it should be the thing that should remain constant, however your morning routine looks like. Before doing anything else, make sure to spend some time with God.

I also suggest to read the Bible, because it´s how God communicates with us. You will learn so many practical things and God can even give you a direction via his words in the Bible. If you haven´t read your Bible before, I suggest starting with Matthew, Mark, Luke and John where you can learn about God´s life here on Earth.

3. Make a plan

If you want your day to be as productive as it can be, you´ve got to have a plan. I suggest spending time in the morning to write down all the things you want to accomplish during the day, and you can even go to the extent of planning your whole week and month.

You may use a notebook (bullet journaling is really nice) or if you’re a digital freak like me, you can download apps to help your productivity. Here are some of my favorites:

• Google Calendar – free calendar app. You can make several calendars: personal, one to share with your team, one to share with your family, etc
• Todoist or Any.Do – free daily to-do apps
• Moleskine Journey – paid productivity app. It has integration with google calendar, daily to dos and habits you want to track.

4. Incorporate a workout or any physical activity

Now that we have so much time on our hands, we shouldn´t have an excuse not to workout. This time especially. that there is a virus going around, we should exercise and make sure to boost our immune system.

Any physical activity like walking around the park, or lifting weights is enough, as long as you SWEAT! But if you want a more intense workout, then here are some of the workout apps I love:

Free Apps:

• Nike Run – a great app if you want to train in running, whether you´re a beginner or an athlete
• Anytime Fitness Workouts – a free app whether you are a member or not

• YouTube – there are thousands of free workout videos in YouTube, whether you want HIIT workouts, targetted workouts (for arms, abs, legs, etc), or even Yoga and Pilates sessions

Paid Apps:

• Sweat – a community workout app with several programs you can choose from
• Freeletics – a peronal traning app with different daily workouts

5. Dedicate at least an hour to learning

“Never stop learning” is one of my personal mottos. Learning doesn’t stop in school — we can learn everyday if we find a way how. My personal favorite way is having a coffee with a mentor, but since I can’t do that daily, I choose any of the following:

• Reading books
• Listening to podcast
• Signing up for online courses

For books, please refer to my previous blogpost, My Top 4 Favorite Books

Here are other books I love:

• Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari
• The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin
• Elon Musk by Ashlee Vance
• Girl, Stop Apologizing by Rachel Hollis

Also, PSA! Scribt (a reading app) is offering 1 month free 😊 Simply download the app and sign up.

Podcasts I love:

• How I Built This – different entrepreneurs talk about how they built their businesses (Instagram, Airbnb, Steve Maddens and many more)
• Unfiltered Faith
• I love you so much podcast
• Mood with Lauren Elizabeth

Online Courses:

• iTunes University (free courses from Harvard, Stanford, etc)
• Skillshare (free for 1 month)
• Masterclass (paid)

6. Put down your phone

This is so easy yet so difficult to do since “our whole life is on our phones”. Well, one of the ways I manage to decrease my phone use is by uninstalling work and social media apps. I installed those on my iPad instead, which I don’t have all the time, so that means I’m not working or on social media all the time.

Another tip is that I don’t charge it during the night, so that I have to charge it during the day — meaning I have no choice but to leave it.

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I hope these tips are helpful! I wish us all to be productive and come out of this quarantine healthier and more refreshed. ☺️

Have a great day!

All photo sources: Pinterest

My Top 4 Favorite Books I Highly Urge You to Read (on Life, Leadership, Marketing)

Reading not only keeps you away from distrations and negative noises around, it also exercises one of the most beautiful parts of our body — our BRAIN. And what better way to exercise our brain than learning from the greatest minds of the past, present and future.

Perhaps its true that those who like to read also like to write, and those who like to write like to share.

With that, I present to you my top 4 favorite books that I highly highly urge you to read:

1. Bible

If there is one book I recommend you to read (over and over again), it’s the Bible. It is the only book that is complete with ALL the lessons you will ever need in life, may it be about faith, leadership, making decisions and many more.

I have this very old Bible I had since I was 12 or 13. It still has all the highlights and notes I made and it’s so nice to look back at it and read how I understood it at that time. Now, I have switched to reading a digital Bible (I think I started when I was 20), and to tell you, everytime you re-read, you learn something new. It’s amazing how a single passage can speak differently to you each time you read it. Having a digital Bible is also better in my opinion because I have it with me everywhere I go, and that includes all the notes and bookmarks that I have. Anytime I’m feeling down or nervous or anxious, I just pull up my notes and read all the passages I have saved that gives me comfort. 🙂

For those looking into downloading a bible app, I suggest the following apps:

• NIV Bible by Tecarta – my main bible app that I use since you can sign in and save all your notes and highlights
• Refresh by Tecarta – great for daily devotions, with focused topics and scriptures
• She Reads Truth – lovely interface and easy to read

All are available in the App Store or Google Play.

2. How Google Works by Eric Schmidt and Jonathan Rosenberg

If you are my family or friend, you have probably heard me rave about this book at one point. It truly is one of my favorite reads because this book gives me so many insights on how to manage and lead people. Among all the companies, Google, in my opinion, has one of the best tactics in employee culture.

In this book, Eric (Google ex-CEO) and Jonathan (former SVP of Products) takes us inside Google and you will discover topics such as:

• HR strategies and how to attract the best talents
• How to interview
• Establishing a company culture
• Why each leader should only have a maximum team of 7
• How a programmer can be the next company’s CEO
• and many more!

I’d like to thank my aunt, Tita Cit for recommending this book to me years ago. I have both hardcopy, kindle version and audible version of this book (obsessed??). I even buy copies of this book for my friends and family, and if we’re truly truly close, I’ll even let you borrow my copy that has all my notes and highlights!

If you’re interested, WHICH YOU SHOULD BE BY NOW, you can buy the kindle version here:

https://www.amazon.com/How-Google-Works-Eric-Schmidt/dp/1455582328

3. The 1-Page Marketing Plan by Allen Dib

If you’re working with me, you are probably well-aware of this book. They say the best way to learn is to teach and I have definitely given many workshops on the lessons I learned.

Marketing is my true passion in life (I am a marketing graduate and will practice marketing forever). If any of you reading are the same, then I highly suggest you to read this book. Allen Dib teaches about the 9 key essentials you need in your marketing plan:

• Selecting your target market
• Craftung your key message
• Reaching prospects
• Capturing leads
• Nurturing keads
• Sales conversion
• Delivering world-class experience
• Increasing customer lifetime value
• Orchestrating referrals

I can’t tell you how many highlights and notes I have on this book that I will keep going back to, probably until I am old and still launching a new product. Here’s an except of some of my notes:

Trivia: After I read this book, I immediately emailed the author, Allen, and you can imagine my surprise– he responded! Now, we are official pen-pals, writing back and forth questions and tips on marketing.

You can purchase this book here:

https://www.amazon.com/1-Page-Marketing-Plan-Customers-Money-ebook/dp/B01B35M3SM/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=Allen+dib&qid=1584590440&s=books&sr=1-1

4. Manage Your Day-To-Day: Build Your Routine, Find Your Focus & Sharpen Your Creative Mind (Multiple Authors)

This is a book I find very interestesting, since each chapter is written by a different author. From Seth Godin, Gretchen Rubin (author of Happiness Project, another awesome book I recommend) to Tony Schwartz, each author gives us a bit of their brain.

The book is basically divided into the 3 main categories in the title, with interesting sub topics such as:

• Scheduling Time for Creative Thinking
• Learning to Create Amidst Chaos
• Using Social Media Mindfully
• Reclaming our Self-Respect
• Training Your Mind to Be Ready for Insight
• Letting Go of Perfectionism
• Getting Unstuck
• …and many more!

What’s also great about this book is that it’s such an easy read — each chapter is only composed of 5 or so pages of deep insight. If you are a creative, I especially urge you to read this one.

Buy this book here:

https://www.amazon.com/Manage-Your-Day-Day-Creative-ebook/dp/B00B77UE4W/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=Managing+your+day-to-day&qid=1584590688&s=books&sr=1-1

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If you’ve read any of these books before or if I urged you to read any of them, please let me know in my DMs or comment below! ☺️

A personal reflection on the current pandemic (and why we ought not to worry)

A busy New York pedestrian (Source: Daily Mail UK)

Disclaimer: Long post ahead

It’s been a while since I wrote my last blog post (as usual, I got busy with work) but now I am currently at home, really with nothing to do and I thought, well now I have no reason not to write a blog post.

Everyday, I read the news and it gets worse and worse. I remember about a month ago, when the Philippines wasn’t in panic yet and the rest of the world are starting to like China, Korea, Japan, etc and I thought to myself, why are we so relaxed? Of course it’s because we have that mentality “wala pa naman eh” (“it’s not here yet anyway”). Well now it’s here, and perhaps we can take a moment to reflect.