3 Simple Daily Habits for Christian Moms That Can Change Your Whole Year

As busy moms, It’s easy to get bogged down by the daily grind and feel like we’re not making any progress with our homemaking, relationships, or spiritual life. When the idea of setting goals or New Year’s resolutions comes along, it’s common to start with enthusiasm and then abandon ship a month or two into it. We’ve got a LOT of spinning plates, mama!

So, here’s a better idea: focus on just 3 daily habits for moms that are designed for flexibility. These habits are meaningful, achievable, and they will help you make progress in all areas of your life. They can change your whole year! 🙌

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What's Covered:

Why Use These Simple Daily Habits for Moms Over SMART Goals?

You’ve probably heard this advice: don’t make resolutions, but create goals instead! Especially SMART goals.

It’s not bad advice, but I’m just gonna admit right here that I’ve NEVER managed to set and accomplish SMART goals. Ever.

Life as a busy homeschool mom is always changing, and I’ve got the attention span and energy fluctuations to match it. 😆

What I’ve found is that it’s much, much more effective to focus on habits.

Habits are easier to remember “in the moment.”
Habits are more valuable in the long-term.
Habits can be as simple or as comprehensive as you want (I aim for simple).

A couple of years ago I really started focusing on trying to improve things through small changes in habits. I read the book Atomic Habits, which I thought was very helpful. The gold I took away from that book is that small, incremental changes are more achievable and therefore more effective.

But I learned something else in the process, too: general habits / goals are more achievable for me than specific ones. That may seem counter-intuitive (and against what the gurus usually say), but hear me out.

My Top 3 Simple Daily Habits for Christian Moms

As busy Christian moms, we need something more flexible than what people typically pick for habits, goals, or resolutions. We also need to establish habits that help us make progress but can be easily adjusted each day to allow for our crazy busy lives and variations in our ability to focus on tasks.

What are these magical daily habits for moms that actually work? I call them “touch habits.” Every day, I have three main habits I focus on:

Touch the Scripture
Touch my home
Touch a relationship

So, for example, instead of setting my goal for daily habits for mom as “have quiet time each day before the kids get up,” my habit is “touch the Scripture” sometime during the day. If they morning falls apart, as it can often do, I still have flexible ways to meet my daily habit goal.

“Touch” Sounds Weird, But Here’s Why I’m Saying That

Some years ago, I added “touch the laundry” to my daily tasks in my homemaking loop schedule. Doing a load a day was too much to commit to at the time, but I wanted to accomplish *some* kind of laundry-related task each day so that progress was happening.

Some days, touching the laundry was a small thing, like picking up clothes off the laundry room floor, or moving laundry from the washer to the dryer. Other days I went all-in and did a couple of loads, start to finish. Either way, I touched it, and counted it as a success. 😉

And you know what? This approach totally works for me! That’s saying something, for such a domestically challenged person. Laundry keeps moving along and the intentional daily goal of “touching the laundry” has become a true automatic habit.

With that success, I decided to try the “touch the laundry” method and apply it to other areas where I struggled to make daily progress.

Identify 3 Simple Habits that “Touch” the Most Important Areas of Your Life

Here’s the basic process I use:

Decide what your priorities are and/or what areas you are struggling to make progress on.
Based on your priorities, choose one or more “touch habits” to focus on. It’s ok if you start with one. You can always add more later!
(Optional, but helpful) Brainstorm a list of things you can choose from each day if you draw a blank on what to do for your habit.

Let me walk you through how I came up with mine and some things I do to accomplish them.

Overall, these are the priorities I chose:

Grow in faith and devotion to God.
Build thriving, gospel-centered relationships.
Cultivate a home that is welcoming and enjoyable.

So, my daily habit-goals became:

Touch the Scriptures
Touch my home
Touch a relationship

How these things look from day-to-day depends on what we have going on and what my current focus and energy levels are.

Instead of locking myself into a task with specific timing and effort that I may not be able to accomplish each day, I focus on just doing *something* intentional for each one.

The simplicity and flexibility makes it work! Plus, I’ve found that over time, the level of meaningful investment I make in these areas has naturally grown.

Your top 3 areas may be different, but take time to identify them and try out this approach!

Touch the Scripture: Spend Time in Scripture Daily

Making daily habits to read Scripture can be one of the most meaningful and beneficial things a mom can do all year. But, let’s face it, it can be challenging to establish a quiet time habit!

Over the years I’ve had to find creative ways to make time for this most-important activity. You can find a big list of ideas for spending time in God’s Word here.

In the past, slowly meditating on and memorizing one verse at a time (in the middle of the night, while nursing) was about all I could manage for “touch the Scripture.” But it was still incredibly meaningful and useful for this weary mama’s heart and mind! Accepting and adjusting to our season of life is important.

These days, I have more time and energy since my youngest is 6. That, combined with knowing full well how needful I am each day for God’s Word and time in prayer (I’m such a mess on my own) my devotional life looks more like layers upon layers. So even though I already have a couple of regular habits going for prayer and study, I’m currently working on adding a personal evening devotion with a friend on YouVersion where we can share thoughts together. That’s my “touch the Scriptures” right now.

Here are some ideas to put on your “touch the Scriptures” list. Choose one to work on for your habit or bounce around each day as your schedule and energy allow!

Start a daily Bible study/devotional time with your kids.
Read from the Psalms or Proverbs each day.
Choose “One Word” to focus on for the year and read Scriptures and devotions about it.
Go slowly through a book of the Bible, reading a few verses each day and writing out your prayers and thoughts. (I like this journaling Bible.)
Pick a YouVersion reading plan to work through (and don’t worry about falling behind).
Use a Scripture prayer/writing calendar or printable to work through at your own pace.
Choose a verse to pray through and share with your kids today.
Keep a journal where you just curate meaningful Scripture verses that stand out to you, or use the YouVersion app to make photo images of them and scroll through them on occasion.
Find a big list of more busy mama Scripture study ideas here.
And this list of ways to make time for prayer.

Touch Your Home: Homemaking Task That Blesses Your Family

If you’ve heard me speak, you’ve heard me say that my goal is to keep my house clean and tidy enough so that we can go on about the business of family and relationships. Priorities! No Pinterest-perfect home over here. 🙂

Truth be told, I’m not a natural homemaker or housekeeper. It’s been quite the learning curve! But aside from loop scheduling, the “touch my home” habit has been the most impactful addition to my homemaking success.

For this habit, I do one “extra” homemaking task each day to work on. Something that blesses my family by bringing just a little bit more peace, order, and comfort to our home. Often I can tell just by looking around what would be a good task to tackle for that day. But sometimes I need a little help.

Here’s what’s currently on my list of ideas to choose from, for when I just can’t think:

Bake something like banana bread (I always have some bananas in the freezer).
Pick something from the “spring cleaning” loop schedule task list.
Declutter a bin, bag, or basket.
Light candles.
Diffuse some essential oils.
Simmer potpourri (orange slices, cinnamon, cloves, apples, etc.).
Add beauty to something (I have to dig deep for this one, because I’m also not a natural decorator 😆).
Go through a clothes drawer.
Find a new recipe to try.
Pick a room and find a way to add Scripture to it.
Clean or tidy an area that needs it.
Teach a child a new chore / homemaking task.
Invite someone over and plan to get the house company-ready.
Set a timer to tackle a cleaning / decluttering task.
Rotate books on our display bookshelf.

Touch a Relationship: Invest Just a Little Time or Effort Into Nurturing a Relationship

Each day, I find a way to connect with someone I care about or invest in them somehow. It could be my marriage, one of my children, a friend, an extended relative, or even a neighbor or someone in my church.

Again, this can be as simple or involved as you want. Here are some ideas that could be chosen from each day:

Send an encouraging text, email, or card.
Have a child join me on errands.
Pick one family member to especially pray over (such as at mealtimes, or set hourly alarms).
Give a sincere and meaningful compliment.
Pause to start a conversation, asking questions and really listening.
Give a simple gift.
Do an act of service for them (taking care of a task, sharing something special, etc.).
Arrange for a coffee or dinner date.
Be affectionate.

Other Simple Daily Habits for Moms You May Want to Consider

Three habits were plenty for me to focus on for a long time. But you may want to add more or other areas to create “touch habits” for! Here are some ideas to help you brainstorm.

Touch my business – (this is what I’m adding for the new year)
Touch my ministry
Touch my health
Touch my garden
Touch a book (for personal reading)
Touch a hobby
Touch the outdoors

What else can you think of to add to this list?

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If you’re feeling overwhelmed with goals and habits, I hope this has been helpful to you! Get started today by choosing one priority that you’ve been wanting to make progress in and decide on a “touch habit” to focus on. I’m cheering you on!

~ Tauna