Good ideas for a happy, rainy day

Rain can be depressing, and it is widely known that sunshine is so much better for your health. We are not in the position to change the weather conditions, but we may organize our own day.

So, if you do not know what to do on this gloomy day, you should read the following lines and pick the ideas you like to make this day a great one.

When it is raining on your day off, time seems to stop. There seem to be entire hours, days, weeks, years ahead, right?

Then, why don’t you want to slowly start off your day? I know, you want to make the most of your day! You are like me; or, more generally, society. Here’s the big BUT. You probably have stress during your working days, even though you love your job or at least you find it decent. There, you always must give your best! You always must be present mentally! You must perform well! You must get better at what you are doing! You must get into a higher position! WHAT?! NO! STOP!!! Take a break. Breathe deeply, and then think about it again. Can this be healthy? Do you really want to keep going like that? I do not know about your body, but mine is giving me signs when pressure becomes too much. When this happens though, it is usually too late to pause. Do you want to know what my body does to me when it surrenders? It gives me headaches, makes me feel anxious, dizzy, gives me the urge to vomit because it makes my stomach recoil, my shoulders and neck tense, my back hurting. Those are just a ‘few’ signs. Eventually, it will make you sick. It makes you sick when you never halt. You might have a break down; a burnout. This is something I want to avoid. You do, too – hopefully. I would like to point something out: It is not your body who is making you sick and it is no other person; it is you and only you.

Now, you know why you should have a slow start into your day. How would you do that? I do not know, but I can tell you what I did. I woke up around 7:30 pm (my alarm clock was set for noon) and felt entirely tired. That’s why I decided not to get up just then. I tried to fall asleep again, but my mind was awake already. So, I got to the point where I was tired, but not about to go back to sleep. I did not want to get up, either. The reason was tiredness (not laziness). I wanted to do me good while lying in bed and put on some music. I searched for morning awake music / happy morning etc. At the beginning, the music was smooth. Then, when I couldn’t stay in bed anymore (the society thing), I put on a faster song (Tik Tok by Kesha) to start me going.

I was hungry and stepped into the kitchen. Here is the next idea for you on a rainy day (after chilling longer in bed with wake-up music): Cook yourself your favorite breakfast you usually do not have time for (society) or do not take the time for (your decision). It is YOUR day today! The rain is depressing enough, so do not even dare to think about calories this morning. F*** of your shape in this moment! Put your shame aside and cook your waffles with lots of cream, sugar and berries or make those pancakes with normal flower instead of whole wheat! I am being a little bit contradictory now. You would not even notice if I did not tell you, but let me be honest: I did try to eat healthy and I did try to meet my calorie demand this morning. BUT I might aim for something else than most of you. I want to gain weight and now I do not care if it’s through unhealthy fat or clean food, even though I do prefer the latter, because you will not have any bad conscience at all ha-ha. BUT let me tell you: Even though my food was decent / healthy enough, I cooked a meal that I really enjoyed and that I normally do not make when I work. I made scrambled eggs and had two slices of rice and chickpea crispbread with it. The meal was accompanied by a coffee and after I had finished that, I ate a banana as desert. Making breakfast this morning took me longer than on a working day or maybe on a sunny day (because of the society; because you need to get out of the house as early as you can to get a nice tan, right?), but it was worth it.

I also wanted to start the day with good spirits. How did I do that? Well, a good friend once suggested a person to me. Her name is Louise Hay and you might have heard of her already. She does morning & evening meditations, positive affirmations, and a lot more. If you are interested in her work, search for her on YouTube. I have listened to her three times at the most, but I do know that it cannot damage me. I am not a person who is able to sit still for a very long time; usually. I am not hyperactive, but I like to be on the go. Even though, it might be the best way to do it, I could never stay in bed for half an hour after waking up and do meditation. Well, maybe I could. If I tried daily… Anyways, during I was enjoying my breakfast for quite some time, I listened to one of the morning mediations by Louise Hay and I guess I felt comfortable and slightly inspired. If you have not noticed, meditation is another suggestion to spend a rainy day.

After breakfast, I usually go to the bathroom before I put on clothes. That’s what I did this morning, too. Talking about outfits, when was the last time you did laundry? Is it possible that it has been a while, because there had been sunny days and gatherings, or was there just not enough time? If your answer is ‘yes’, you know what I will recommend you in a minute. Exactly! Do laundry! It does not cost you much time and personally, I would not want to do laundry on a sunny day. That would be a waste of time! I would wait until the evening when the sun would be down. Do you see the problem? You will be able to do only one machine, because you must sleep early to be ready for work the next morning. Or you possibly would have a headache because of too much sun and beers. Even though you hate doing laundry (it is not my favorite thing to do, either), a rainy day is the perfect time to do it!

While walking through your house, flat or apartment to reach the washing machine, did you look around? I did not have to look around, since I had already known that something that could make me more comfortable here is missing. How about your living situation? Do you want to hang up any pictures in your bedroom? Do you already have suitable frames? Would you like to put a new vanity table in your bedroom? Is your living room very spacious, but still quite empty? Is there a couch missing? Would you like to get new flowers (or anything) that refresh(s) the room? Or, let me think in other terms: Is there anything that needs to be cleaned? Kitchen? Bathroom? As you probably already assume, some of the ideas have been in my head for quite some time. I might put a fauteuil in my room at some point, but today I do not want to go to any furniture stores (maybe you do). I want to get flowers and a vase to bring some color into our living room and this is what I will do later. For my wardrobe, I will buy hangers on the same go (oh my gosh, I have been wanting to do it for several months now. I have so many pieces of clothes! Plus, it’s been on my nerves for quite some time until now). About cleaning areas: I’ve just made a mess hanging up my clothes. A classic: I had forgotten to empty my pockets.

Oh god, I have so many ideas! Now, there is some anxiety that I will not be able to do it all today. I know, I could save some stuff for other rainy days, but I am so inspired right now.

The next thought might not be for everyone. It is mostly for those who bring their own food to work; maybe especially those who are working shifts (so do I). If you have read earlier posts written by me, you know that I have big goals when it comes to gym and my body. This means that I must eat a lot and preferably lean food. On my job, there are few opportunities to have big meals or meals that could meet my demand of proteins and/or other nutrients. Consequently, I must prepare my meals ahead. I just do not take the time to do so on a regular basis, even though I find cooking okay. The best day to prepare meals is today! Or, if it is sunny when you read this, on a rainy day. No regret standing in the kitchen for 2-3 hours then. Maybe you do not like cooking, but you will be motivated by the thought of all the delicious meals you will have at your work site. Then, cooking will not feel like a command anymore.

This brings me to the next proposal: Go grocery shopping. I know it is necessary sometimes; no matter if it is sunny or cloudy outside. However, I am happier to go on a gloomy day than on a day with a clear sky. I have not been grocery shopping for quite some time and since I am running out of eggs, I should at least go and get me some fruits for my “Müsli”. There is also the stuff to buy that I have mentioned earlier. Then, I do not have enough leggings to go to gym. I know, that’s horrible, right? You shouldn’t be washing your pairs of leggings every second day because you train that often! Plus, I was given a gift card for a sports store about a year ago. Today, I have no excuse to let go this opportunity. My point is: Go shopping on a rainy day! It doesn’t matter if you need something or not. If you do not, you could also be doing window shopping without buying anything!

Have you gotten tired after reading so much about activities on a rainy day? Well, I do not care! I make you continue reading. My next inspiration is exactly for when you get tired. Have you been suggested any good movies, operas, or books lately? If you are curious about them, today is the day. Watch that movie! Read that book! Start your series marathon! There is no better time than on a rainy day. It is even better doing it during the day than at night, since you might have to go to work the next morning. Tired? Then follow my recommendation right now and when you want to continue reading my article, do it! You have the entire time in this world. Keep that in mind. It is your day off. There is more leisure time to come.

If you think this is being lazy, how about you get productive? You could start or continue a project. I do not know what you like and maybe, you do not know, either. Therefore, I tell you what being productive means to me. For me, it is writing texts. I either think of themes to write about on my blog or I do short stories. I like writing so much once I have ideas for the articles or stories. If this is nothing for you, then why don’t you write a gratitude journal? You could also think of all the compliments people made to you within the past week and then jot them down for you somewhere. Or, do you maybe have dreams? If so, start remembering and registering them.

You could also do a scrap book. In my case, it would be a photo album. I hope you have read my blog posts about Panama. It was an 18-days-trip and I came back at the end of April. My small project is to design a photo album about those days. This would be the perfect choice for a rainy day; remembering sunny days and good times. It will take up most of my day, I suppose. Do you want to know why? Yes? No? I will tell you. There are pictures around everywhere. I took pictures with my canon camera, with the Iphone, I received pictures via my mobile, email and Instagram and I am pretty sure I will find more posted on Facebook. As you probably can imagine, it will take up time to collect them all, sort them out, make a choice of the best prints and design the photo album. Since the easiest way to do this is sitting at a desk and because most of the pictures remind me of good vibes, it is a perfect task to shine some light on this dark day.

I have another solution to a bad mood on rainy days. Earlier, I had talked about the pace of today’s society; today’s world. I had also explained to you why sometimes it is important to come to a halt on your day off. Some months ago, on a rainy day like this, I was feeling very sad. I was new in town, had a new job and no friends near me. After days of doing nothing except for pitying myself (when I did not have to work), I decided to change something. Therefore, I was trying to find activities that I could do on my own. It was also a time when I felt like I did not know what doings make me happy. I thought back to my childhood asking myself what I liked back then. I remembered that I was quite creative: I copied Pokémon and other cartoons, invented stories, headlines and was going to be an inventor. Since I remembered that among all those things I liked to color a lot, I went out and got myself a coloring book. The title was eye-catching as hell: Stress releasing. I bought it and now I have an activity for rainy (and sunny) days that should help me to relax at the same time. It can’t be that bad, right? If you agree, try it the next rainy day!

Do you need more ideas? There you have two: Update your music on your iphone, ipod, laptop or anything the like. We all know that downloading songs and name them needs a lot of time and patience. Talking about me now, I really want to download the latest reggaetón and latin songs. Then, I need good playlists for working out at gym and go running. How about you? Do you need to do something similar? It could be relaxing songs or audible books as well…No matter what, but do it!

Here is a more personal thought. Since I’ve been working a lot with my laptop today, I noticed that I really must buy a new one. If not, I continue being annoyed (you might know already that I am very impatient). So, I will buy a new one (my flat mate suggested one to me that meets my needs). Here is what I must do first: Going through my laptop, save important things to my hard disk and delete all the unnecessary stuff on this machine.

Wow, how fast my day passed! It is a good time to stop throwing thoughts at you now, because, ironically, the sun starts to come out now; almost at 5 pm.

Maybe, on another day, I’ll tell you what infinite possibilities you will have on sunny days 😊.

Sorry, but here, the sun has vanished again, which leads me to yet another plan: Why not studying that language you have always wanted to learn? Now the time has come! Start with all your dreams you can easily execute on a rainy day!

These were my last words; well, not quite. However, I would like to come to an end now.

Please, let me know what YOU are doing on rainy days if it is nothing from the above. I am also wondering if you like my suggestions or if you totally disagree. All opinions and comments regarding the written are welcome. I would be happy to have a discussion here.