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How To Romanticize Your Life

If you read this month’s “(mid) Month Ahead”,

you know I’ve really been struggling to get into much of anything (work, goals, plans, workouts) this year. The burn out is real and so is the lack of motivation. I don’t know what the answer is but I can tell you, making New Years goals ain’t it (at least for now).

One thing I did have a revelation about, though, is how mundane I’ve let everything become. Between pandemic habits (aka things like how I got use to just plopping in front of the tv every night because everything was locked down and there was nothing else to do and nowhere to go) and getting busier with work, I realized that I’ve somehow stopped making things nice and making time for nice things. I’ve stopped putting the life in life and making life art. If you know me, you know that is very much not me. I’m usually very much of the mentality that life is short, time is precious and it’s important to savor and enjoy every moment you’re lucky enough to blessed with. But somewhere in the midst of everything, that slowly slipped away, so slowly, in fact, that I didn’t really even realize it until I stepped away from work over the holidays.

So I’ve decided, instead of focusing on making goals (which wasn’t really working for me right now anyways), to focus on enjoying my life again. Or, romanticizing my life, as the kids say these days.

What exactly does romanticizing your life mean anyways? Well, it means to embrace and enjoy the every day moments, to make the mundane special, to make the ordinary extraordinary, to have gumption and live with conviction, to make living itself art, to have main character energy (another thing the kids say these days).

I have a funny feeling that as soon as I start romanticizing my own life again, I’ll start feeling like myself again and maybe just maybe I’ll be able to get back into things again. But in the mean time, I’ll be coming up with new ways to romanticize my life instead of coming up with new goals.

35 ways to romanticize your life

Get back into a proper morning routine
Make coffee special (i.e. make a latte) and actually take time to savor it
Pause to listen to the birds
Make a new playlist, a soundtrack to romanticize your life to
Light the fancy candle (don’t save it for a special occasion)
Open the nice wine
Wear the fancy outfit, even if you aren’t going anywhere
Spend an afternoon at a coffee shop, reading
Spritz pillows with a relaxing scent before going to sleep at night
Get a new hand cream, body cream and/or chap stick just because it comes in aesthetically pleasing packaging
Get a new toothbrush that’s pretty
Put dish soap in a pretty container
Plate meals, yes, all of them
Add a garnish to meals, just because
Get a lovely scented laundry detergent for sheets and towels
Get a fun new ring dish
Pick up a stack of magazines to browse through
Have a croissant on a Tuesday just because
Make useful things pretty (i.e. keep dish soap in a pretty bottle, have nice matches, get a pretty tube of toothpaste, etc.)
Go for a drive, just because
Take more every day photos, to remember your life, and less styled photos to document your life
Buy a new face mask
Buy a pretty new set of pajamas
Spend an afternoon getting lost in a bookstore
Make a list of favorite inspirational quotes; keep them somewhere where you can be reminded of them often
Treat yourself to fresh flowers
Go for a walk in a new neighborhood
Pause to watch the sunset
Spend some time soaking up the sun
Plant a garden
Watch an old movie
Find a new recipe to make from a favorite cookbook
Don’t save all your treats for the weekend or a special occasion or a rainy day
Print and frame a favorite photo you’ve taken to display in your home
Get.a fancy chocolate bar. Eat the fancy chocolate bar. Just do it.