mornings are reserved for souls only

my routine of moving from soul to body in the mornings

My eyes snap open, it’s 5:28 am. I am so much of a morning person that sometimes it seems like my body is awake before my brain is. When my eyes snap open at 4:18 am, however, I am less enamoured by this.

I make my way to the bathroom and brush my teeth, I always avoid my reflection, I’m not sure why. Perhaps I’ll see something I don’t like. I know my skin can sometimes look like the popcorn ceiling of my childhood bedroom in these ill-placed harsh bathroom lights. Perhaps I want to feel more like a soul rather than a body first thing in the morning. No perception of beauty or emotions is needed right now, only the urge to feel at one with the waking world and my surroundings. I finish brushing my teeth and turn off the light.

The living room always has a chill in the air at this time of year. The windows have been crying all night and leave a layer of water near the window sill that looks like tiny translucent mountains. I take a tea towel and dry the remnants of their tears. I’ve come to learn recently that a house needs comforting too. I scrubbed my bathroom tiles yesterday, on hand and knee, and now I enter and it feels like I can breathe a little easier. I think the room can breathe a little easier too. We both smile every time I enter now. I walk over to my bookshelf to retrieve the long-stemmed lighter and wake up the short and tall candles on my dining table.

I light a tealight too and place it inside a glass candle holder my mother gave me. Every time I look at it I think of her. I made her a blanket and on the phone she told me when she uses it, it makes her think of me. Sometimes I want to get rid of all my material possessions but I think the emotional ties you sever run deeper than you remember. I pour some crystals around the glass candle holder and close my eyes. I welcome the sun that hides behind the dark early morning sky by stretching my limbs, and I try to reach the very edges of pink and orange hues that peak above the trees. I bend my body by the hips and hang low, feeling the gentle pulling of muscles in my calves and hamstrings. I take deep breaths and picture my lungs as two cups I am filling with water, letting the water rise from the very bottom all the way to the top. I am becoming a body again.

I head over to the dining table to clean out my head. I take the ink from my pen and transform it into dust particles I am brushing away from my mind. I clean out my ruminations and sticky thoughts and make space for gratitude instead. My home needs looking after and so does the home that lives within me. I don’t want to live in a home that is unclean and never gets taken care of so why wouldn’t I take care of the little home inside me too?

Once I have woken up alongside the world outside of my window, I start my day. I kiss my partner good morning, I reply to messages from my friends, I log into my work laptop, I make myself and him a cup of tea, I think about my mother, I make a to-do list. I am a body once more with love to give, emotions to share, food to consume and inspiration to find.

an october sky with a little squiggle (2024)

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Hello lovely readers, thank you for reading today’s little lyrical essay. I am obsessed with mornings and I’ll probably never stop writing about them. I hope you’re also saving some time for yourselves in the mornings. If you liked this post, you’ll probably like last week’s too which you can read here.

Also fun fact, this month marks a year of this newsletter! I can’t thank you enough for subscribing and reading my little posts whenever you can, it truly means the world to me. I’m so appreciative of all of you for sticking around while I try to find out what on earth I’m talking about here and also for those of you have have just joined, thank you so so much. I’ve never felt more like myself than I have writing for you this past year.

I hope finding quiet is a special place for you, and I’ll keep trying every week to make it even more special. I have some ideas in the works for this quiet space we’ve made together which I hope you’ll love. More to come but still much of the same.

Have a lovely week, I’ll see you soon <3