Build Your Ideal Evening Routine With These Habits and Activities

Having an evening routine makes your night more relaxing and promotes soft productivity. In fact, they can already determine whether or not you have a good day the following day. And we all want to have good days more than the opposite right?

If that’s the case, setting the right evening routine for you is key. Or even omitting and adding new things to your current one to further improve. 

Whatever your case is, whether your evening routine is non-existent or in need of reconstruction, this short guide on ideal habits and activities has you covered. Happy reading!

What is An Evening Routine?

An evening routine, or nighttime routine, is a list of habits and activities you’d do before getting ready for bed. Ideally, certain things benefit sleep quality and the transition to falling asleep. Especially when we want to catch a lot of those zzzs and wake up feeling our best, we want to ensure our evening routine works in our favor. 

In return, you’re setting yourself up for success and feel a lot more driven and productive for the day ahead of you. You also have something to look forward to when you get home and are less likely to feel dread when getting ready for bed. Your evening routine is your transition to sleep, lessening any fuss or refusal to get much-needed rest.

Habits and Activities To Add To Your Evening Routine

Take the ones that resonate with your lifestyle and try them out!

1 Prepare the things you need for the following day.

No one wants a stress-filled morning; gathering everything you need as soon you wake up can encourage such stress. From outfits or work-related items, you wouldn’t want that on your plate when your brain is still waking up.

Aside from the things above that are best addressed in the evening, making to-do lists, doing bits of your morning chores, and laying out your workout equipment can make your mornings a lot brighter.

2 Set the right mood.

Firstly, in your bedroom—your sanctuary, your place to disconnect and get that much-needed rest after a long day. This can look like dimming the lights, lighting up a scented candle, lowering the temperature of your room, and playing easy and light music like jazz or affirmations. You can also set the right mood in the bathroom with a simple skincare routine (but you can add special things like face masks) and a warm shower or bath.

3 Try journaling.

There are so many ways to do this that tend to people’s interests. Some can do it for 5 minutes or longer, documenting their day and what they learned along the way. Others practice gratitude and highlight their wins for the day. Junk-journaling, which is a more creative take on journaling, is another option when you have knick-knacks on your day that you want to gather and compile in a journal.

4 Do a brain dump.

Quite in line with journaling, but at least here, you can jot down every thought you’ve had that’s circled your brain that day. And give you more mental space for new, better things. Plus, that brain dump may reveal things or tasks that need attending to, making it a part of your priority list the next day. But in other situations, they’re just passing thoughts and writing them frees you from them.

5 Give meditation a try.

Meditation is known to ground and calm you, making it easier to fall asleep. It also makes you more aware of your thoughts and shifts negative ones. A lot of deep breathing and centering is involved, which further soothes you and smooths the transition to sleep.

6 Prioritize relaxation.

Literally, the main theme when creating the ideal evening routine for you. This can look like doing easy stretches before bed, drinking chamomile tea, filling your mind with positive self-talk, and even closing your eyes to breathe. Bonus points if you fall asleep.

7 Read a book.

Instead of relying on your phone for instant gratification and entertainment, a book can be a more insightful source. Plus, it puts less strain on the eyes and improves your focus. There’s still that dopamine spike without the blue light that signals your brain that it’s still daytime. Like no girl, it’s time to sleep; a good book can keep you company.

8 Spend time with loved ones.

Having social time can increase positive emotions, which can then contribute to falling asleep better. So whether it be family, partner, or even roommates, do fun activities with them, like watching a movie or having dinner, to unwind.

9 Try visualization.

If you love daydreaming, you’ll most definitely enjoy imagining all sorts of positive things when you sleep. That’s the definition of visualization, wherein you picture everything you want to do and accomplish, alongside the emotions you want to feel throughout the day. Do this with your eyes closed, and let it also naturally put you to sleep with a smile.

10 Have soft sex.

It’s known that having sex and an orgasm can make you sleep faster and better. It is an exercise, after all, and the efforts put in can naturally make your body crave rest. But in light of the evening routine, keeping it gentle and soft makes you live in the moment more and feel calmer.

Healthline even shares that oxytocin is present during sex, which promotes relaxation and bonding between partners. But while you don’t need a partner and solo play counts, having soft sex in your evening routine makes your night much more exciting and soothing. Besides, having sex toys by your bedside is actually quite the norm. For easy access, obvi!

Things to Avoid In Your Evening Routine

Some habits or activities that don’t belong in your evening routine include:

1. Using electronics an hour before bedtime.
2. Playing loud or crazy music.
3. Consuming more caffeine.
4. Doing intense physical activity.
5. Eating sugary or fatty foods.
6. Exposing yourself to bright lights.
7. Pursuing vices (e.g., drinking alcohol, smoking, getting into drugs, etc.)
8. Staying out too late

Tips On How to Successfully Build Your Evening Routine

Master your evenings and hack your ideal evening routine through this section.

1 Do lots of trial and error.

Especially when you’re adding new things, not everything that interests you at first glance may suit your current lifestyle. Hence, keep an open mind to explore the different options and observe which works and which doesn’t. Don’t force anything either. Exploring different evening activities should be enjoyable and adventurous rather than something frustrating. Mind you, your evening routine is crucial to having great mornings. Or evening routines. Which then leads us to our next point…

2 Make more than one version of an evening routine.

Honey, you’ll be feeling different things daily. And it’s quite possible that the one evening routine you’ve built may not be the right fit for you when you unwind. For example, you’re sick, and you’d rather go straight to bed than read your books with a lit-up candle in the background. In return, you become misaligned and you may mentally feel worse for not following through your plans.

With that in mind, creating more versions after having your usual one can still keep you on track when your mood or body changes and promote productivity in other aspects. Aside from your usual evening routine, build evening routines for when you’re: 

1. Sick
2. Lazy
3. Traveling

Because hey, those things can happen and you want to adjust accordingly rather than skipping the whole ordeal altogether.

3 Keep it within your budget.

Oh, yes. It’s so easy to think and assume that we need to break bank when we want to create our ideal evening routine. Having such a routine is part of self-care, and a lot of influencers have all these extravagant purchases and methods showing their dream routine. However, you don’t have to follow them from top to bottom. Feeling inspired and getting a few ideas are okay, yes, but your evening routine is yours. You call the shots on how much you want to spend and how the flow runs.

For example, instead of following a 12-step skincare routine, you can stick to the basics while playing feel-good music in the background. Whatever your budget or financial standing is, ensure that you don’t go over. Because spending more doesn’t always guarantee maximum pleasure. 

But at the same time, do treat yourself from time to time too! Just make sure your financial boundaries are intact here.

Takeaway

An evening routine will not just make you feel good at night, but it will also make your mornings feel a lot better and more motivating. After all, it’s been said that better mornings start with better evenings. So, if your evening routine is meh or doesn’t exist, it’s time to fix that and take more control of what you do before going to bed. You’ll do your future self a huge favor when you do so while also learning so much about yourself in the present moment.

And with that, we hope this guide serves you well!

For more self-care and self-love guides such as this one, head on over to the Lauvblog here.