Tuesday morning coffee: The power of routine

Good morning. It’s Tuesday, and I’m sitting in my favorite spot with my coffee, watching the morning sun start to light up the day.

I’ve been thinking about routines lately – not the rigid, productivity-hack kind, but the gentle, grounding kind. The kind that reminds you who you are when life gets chaotic.

For me, that’s this: coffee in hand, a few quiet moments before the workday begins. Some mornings I journal. Some mornings I plan. Some mornings I just sit and breathe. But the coffee? That’s constant. That’s the anchor.

This week, I’m working on a few projects:

One of them is rebuilding the word stacks section of the Coffee & Words website. Back in January, I spent countless hours creating these stackable mug combinations – ways that words could tell complete stories when stacked together. “Coffee + And + Words.” “Dream + Believe + Achieve.” “Wake + Sip + Smile.”

Each mug features what I call Word Story Style definitions: dictionary-format entries that include pronunciation, origin, and meanings crafted to inspire. When you stack them, they create sentences. Stories you can hold in your hands.

The website went dark during what I now call my Purple Rain year – a season of chaos that required survival mode. But this week, I’m bringing it back to life. Recreating the stacks. Rebuilding the structure. Reclaiming what I started.

I’m also launching a community newspaper (exciting and nerve-wracking!), reclaiming my balcony as a creative space (it’s got a beautiful water view that I’ve been neglecting), and thinking about income streams – how we build multiple small sources of revenue so we’re never completely dependent on one thing.

But it all starts here. With coffee. With words. With the practice of showing up for yourself before you show up for anything else.

What does YOUR morning routine look like? Do you have a ritual that grounds you?

Here’s to coffee, words, and the small practices that hold us steady.

Tracy