Morning Routines

A few years ago I wanted to create a few habits that would grow my strengths and minimize my weaknesses. Habits such as reading, journaling, and continued education. At first, I found creating these habits to be a difficult undertaking as I was trying to do them after work. Something would always come up which would get in the way. Then I discovered the power of a morning routine!

As I tried to figure out how I could make the activities above fit my schedule it dawned on me, "wake up before anyone else!" But I didn't want to get up earlier. I enjoyed staying up late, waking up after 7, and getting to work with just enough time to grab some coffee. Getting up earlier seemed like hell. But getting up later wasn't much better either. Each morning I always felt rushed, and I felt stuck in both my personal life and career. Getting up earlier may not have been something I wanted to do, but I felt like I had to at least give it a try.

Over the next month or two, I set my alarm to go off a little earlier each morning until I was consistently waking up at 6 AM. At first, all I was doing for my morning routine was making breakfast, getting to work by 7, and reading for almost an hour. In a short amount of time, I began to see the benefits of this practice. I felt less anxious and rushed. My mind was not only more clear but being challenged through my reading. I was falling in love with this new routine.

Since then my morning routine has slowly evolved to become much more robust, and I am able to accomplish a lot in a short amount of time. Currently, this is what my morning routine looks like. Wake up at 4:30 (5:30 at the latest on the weekends). Look at my phone for 5-10 minutes to wake up a bit (I know, I know. It is a bad habit, but it helps me). Get to the gym by 5:15 for my workout. Around 6:15 or 6:30 I will meditate for 10 minutes. After I will grab some coffee, read a little scripture out of the Bible, read a short passage on Stoic philosophy, and then quickly read through the paper. I will then write my blog post, and if there is the time I will read a book until 8.

I don't say all that to brag, but rather to make a point on how much can be accomplished during the morning. As a father of five active kids, I was not able to accomplish half of that in a normal day when I would stay up as late as I wanted. It is easy to guard that time in the morning when there is really no one to guard it against. 

I'm not challenging anyone to go to the extremes I have, but what would it look like to take the one thing you have wanted to improve on more than anything and tackle that for a short amount of time first thing each morning? Even if you only got up 30 minutes earlier to do it. I think you will find, as I did, that the mornings are magical and life-changing.