Hi, I’m
Amy Pottenger!
I know first hand what it’s like to be running a business while raising kids and cultivating a thriving marriage. It’s a lot.
It’s my mission to use my 15+ years of experience to create a lifeline for entrepreneurial mamas, helping them realize the homes of their dreams.
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Use your Home to Support your Health!
If you have a home, you have a secret weapon. (And home can mean an apartment, a condo or a giant mansion you own or anything in-between.) Your secret weapon? It’s your environment! An environment you can change and influence and use to support your life and the habits you create to make those goals happen.
This month, I’m sharing tips to show you how you can design environments that reinforce healthy habits by focusing on two rooms in your home: Your Kitchen + Primary Bedroom
Kitchen:
Healthy Habit: Eating Healthy, High Frequency Foods
Environment Hack: If you have a goal to eat more fruits and veggies, then put those items right at eye level when you open the fridge. Get clear bins to keep them organized and beautiful, pre-prep those veggies by cutting them up and getting them ready to grab and go so they’re just as easy as reaching for the junk food. Make it look visually appealing so it’s even easier to make a healthy choice on autopilot. Remove any food you don’t want to be eating from your line of sight (I would say remove it completely, but this is sometimes not possible when you live with other people who are not following your healthy eating plan!) So, instead, create specific areas hidden in cabinets or drawers for family members to keep the foods you don’t eat.
Healthy Habit: Healthy weight release/maintenance
Environment Hack: Take a look at your kitchen counters, cupboards, drawers, fridge and freezer. Are they overflowing with clutter and random stuff? What can you release in your kitchen environment that would be supportive to your healthy weight? Maybe it’s certain kinds of food that you don’t want to eat anymore, or cleaning out food that’s past it’s prime from the fridge or pantry. It could be decluttering kitchen gadgets that are never used. Take a look through your kitchen and release the items that are no longer supporting you in your healthy goals. By releasing these items in your kitchen you make room to bring in things that actually serve you now.
Primary Bedroom:
Healthy Habit: Getting a supportive amount of sleep for your body
Environment Hack: Take a look at your bed first, and all the elements that make up a bed that is supportive to your best sleep. Evaluate your mattress, asking questions like “do I wake up with back pain”? “how old is my mattress”? “Do I have any allergies where I should consider a different material for my mattress, pillows or bed linens?” Does the pillow you’re using support your neck and your way of sleeping? (side, back or stomach sleeper) Next consider how everything feels on your skin- your sheets and blankets. Here are some of my favorites (link to cozy earth) Do your current bedlinens reflect a color that makes you feel calm and peaceful or does the color scheme need to change to a more restful one?
Healthy Habit: Winding down at the end of the day
Environment Hack: If you want to reinforce positive sleep patterns, then create a space that is calm, relaxing and conducive to rest! Start with removing any clutter in your bedroom space. Reducing visual clutter is one of the most fast + effective ways to a calming environment. Remember clutter is a visual reminder of delayed decisions, so if you have no clutter to look at it automatically helps clear and relax your mind. Create a solution for any bright lights that might be on before you go to sleep by installing a dimmer for overhead light and adding lamps on dimmers if you don’t already have them. Most of the time the overhead light in my bedroom is off and we use the lamp light for a soft cozy glow.
If you need help creating a home that supports your health, schedule a Design Power Session with me and we can problem solve together on how you can have a home that is truly a catalyst to your success!