I have been thinking about rituals lately, partly because I am travelling and mine have gone out the window, and I am feeling it. At home, my morning starts with coffee - not just drinking it but the whole process of making it, the grinding, the pull of the espresso, the frothing of the milk. There is something in that sequence that settles me. While I wait, I send good morning messages to the people I love who don’t live with me, which sounds small but feels like a genuine tending to connection before the day takes over. Then I dress and head out for a twenty-minute walk. Sometimes I go quietly, sometimes with music, sometimes on a phone call. The walk does something specific for me beyond clearing my head - my balance nerve is damaged, so the walking is genuinely recalibrating my body, something it needs. I also use that time to feel into the neighbourhood, to notice what is there and let it register. I love where I live and like to notice what’s happening. Who is out walking, a new book in the street library, a new flower in bloom. Even the weather - what will the day bring. Back home I do The Class, a workout set to music. I am still learning to move to music in a way that feels natural rather than thought through, learning to just lean into the rhythm. The insight connection for me is that none of this is about productivity. These rituals are how I arrive at myself before anything else is asked of me. There are days when this doesn’t go to (sometimes there are life interruptions with the girls) 😌. When travel takes them away there is a kind of static that sits underneath everything, and I am very much looking forward to the reset. What does your morning look like?

I’m heading off on a two week adventure. Travel always shifts something for me: the pace changes, the familiar drops away, and attention seems to wake up on its own. New places tend to invite noticing without effort: different sounds; different light; the small disorientation of not quite knowing where you are. I’m always reminded that curiosity doesn’t have to be manufactured. Often it’s already there, waiting for us to loosen our grip on the familiar. I’m looking forward to seeing what I notice along the way, and what quietly rearranges itself. While I’m away, I find myself wondering about curiosity. Where does it show up most naturally for you? And how do you tend to cultivate it in the middle of ordinary life?