How to Practice Serenity and Feel Better
The term serenity is understood as the quality of that which is serene, calm, peaceful… Serene is a word that comes from the Latin locution serenus, which translates as “clear” or “clean”. Therefore, practicing serenity starts from the base of habits, actions, or routines that provide mental and physical calm. If you believe that your life urgently demands it, today we’re going to provide you with 10 tips to practice serenity.
There’s no magic recipe for practicing serenity. However, some general habits can represent a positive change in your day to day life. They’re of great help to counteract the effects of stress, tension, and anxiety, as well as to mitigate a person’s general discontent. Let’s take a look at what you can do and what scientists have to say.
10 Ways to Practice Serenity in order to Feel Better
Some experts suggest four variables to achieve serenity: A search for meaning, harmony, positivity, and lifestyle. People who manage to create a balance among themselves experience an increase in their calm, peace, and tranquility. Other specialists indicate that serenity can only be understood in regard to other concepts such as:
- Detachment
- Meditation
- Sentence
- Coping
- Empathy
- Full attention
- Forgiveness
- Acceptance
Although there have been attempts to design a serenity scale, the truth is that it’s a highly subjective practice. Indeed, what’s relaxing or serene for one person may not be for another. Still, here are 10 ways to practice serenity that take all of these variables into account.
1. Follow a daily routine
Although at first glance it may appear to be a limiting or monotonous practice, actually following a daily routine will allow you to assume patterns that allow you to calm the storm of responsibilities or desires in your mind. Certainly, when you don’t have an agenda for how to act, it’s natural for stress or anxiety to flood every aspect of your day. We’ve gathered some ideas in this regard:
- Have a schedule for going to sleep and waking up
- Design a time range to eat
- Plan in advance what you’ll do the next day
- Determine the time of the week for the responsibilities you must tend to
What at first seems trivial, in practice, is a great life change. Organizing the different aspects of life avoids the accumulation of responsibilities and the neglect of problems, and it also promotes the enjoyment of your free time. Indeed, if you learn to organize yourself during your day, in the end, you’ll have more free time for leisure, peace, and relaxation.
2. Practice gratitude
A study published in the Clinical Psychology Review in 2010 found a positive relationship between gratitude and psychological well-being. Other research published in The Journal of Positive Psychology suggests that these attitudes predict hope and happiness. Despite these relationships, very few people practice gratitude in their day-to-day lives.
This doesn’t translate into saying thank you all the time–this is just the most superficial (and least important) manifestation. True gratitude consists in acknowledging the effort of others who do things for us, whether they’re small or big. When you do this, you value those around you more, which in turn leads you to value yourself for having them.
3. Get enough sleep
Bad sleep habits can lead to disorders, such as insomnia. This and others are associated with a variety of complications, including stress, anxiety, poor performance, lack of concentration, and irritability. All these are enemies of serenity, so if you want to practice serenity, you must make sure you sleep at least 8 hours without interruption.
The lack of nightly rest can cause what’s known as sleep debts. That is, the permanent consequences of the cumulative effect of the hours that are lost or that are omitted at the time of sleep. For this reason, we’ve mentioned the organization of your sleep schedules when implementing a daily routine.
4. Exercise regularly
As regular exercise translates into different benefits in your psychological and physical health, you can’t leave it out if you want to practice serenity. You don’t need to do intense exercise, as even in small doses, you’ll be able to feel its effects. As a reference, you can take into account the recommendations of the World Health Organization (WHO): 300 minutes of moderate activity per week.
5. Define your ideals and principles
Defining your ideals and principles is one of the ways to achieve self-knowledge. That is, the knowledge you have of yourself about your attitudes, capacities, abilities, skills, experiences, and ideals. You can’t get very far in life wrapped up in a lack of definition, or at least the path will be much lighter and clearer when you know who you are and what you represent.
6. Be organized
Where you live has a bigger impact on your well-being than you might imagine. If you live immersed in disorder, then your ideas and your work will also be disordered. On the contrary, if you maintain a minimum organization of your things, this feeling of calm, harmony, and stability will have a direct impact on you. Try to keep your home clean and organized and you’ll see how your mood and personality will be much more serene.
7. Spend time with the people you love
So far, we’ve only alluded to individual changes. Practicing serenity doesn’t imply isolating yourself, as one of the best ways to encourage it is by sharing time with your loved ones. Include space in your agenda to spend time with friends, family, and colleagues, and if possible, try to make it a regular habit. Their company translates into laughter and fun, two variables that contribute to your serenity.
8. Control your stress levels
Stress levels are controlled through habits such as yoga, meditation, breathing exercises, and occasional hobbies that you find relaxing. Knitting, painting, and writing are perhaps the most common, although, at this point, you’re free to find or include the one you prefer most. Stress has a direct impact on your physical and psychological health, and on its own can be the catalyst for disease.
9. Do one thing at a time
This is a habit that has a direct impact on your serenity, as well as being a consequence of being organized. Multitasking is a recipe for disaster, as it often results in frustration, heartbreak, and tension. Dedicate yourself to doing only one thing at a time, especially when it’s something that demands your attention.
10. Stay away from the pessimistic news
The last tip we want to give you in order to practice serenity is to reduce your interaction with pessimistic news. Sometimes it seems that you only find on the media and social networks the bad side of life, the world, and society. Receiving only this side of things has an impact on your mood, so it’s best to put a limit on what type of information and negative content you absorb in your day.
As is natural, the recommendations that we’ve given are only referential. As we pointed out at the beginning, practicing serenity is something that’s very subjective. In the company of these tips, assimilate other habits that you believe have an impact on your psychological well-being. Everything that offers you calm and tranquility is welcome when you want to practice serenity.
- Connors, G. J., Toscova, R. T., & Tonigan, J. S. Serenity. 1999.
- Floody, D. R. (2014). Serenity and inner peace: Positive perspectives. In Personal Peacefulness Springer, New York, NY. 2014; 107-133.
- Roberts, K. T., & Aspy, C. B. Development of the serenity scale. Journal of Nursing Measurement. 1993.
- Witvliet, C. V., Richie, F. J., Root Luna, L. M., & Van Tongeren, D. R. Gratitude predicts hope and happiness: A two-study assessment of traits and states. The Journal of Positive Psychology. 2019; 14(3): 271-282.
- Wood, A. M., Froh, J. J., & Geraghty, A. W. Gratitude and well-being: A review and theoretical integration. Clinical psychology review. 2010; 30(7): 890-905.
