Make your routine work for you
I have a consistent morning routine. The alarm goes off at 5:40am Monday through Friday. The dogs get walked followed by a short workout. Then I shower and get ready for work, which can look many different ways – calm and reflective or chaotic and interrupted. Some days I eat breakfast while reading the news. Other days I eat breakfast while standing up and getting everything pulled together for the day. Until I leave for school drop off, I spend time getting lunches in bags, trash collected, laundry rotated, or kitchen cleaned up. There are many different things happening throughout the 100 minutes from shower to school drop off.
Some days, I can review my inbox. Some days, I do not see a single email until I sit down at my desk at 9:30am. Some days, I sit down ready to face the challenges at work. Others, I sit down looking for a sense of calm.
While I have routine, my routine contains nothing routine when it comes to mindset.
There are a gazillion articles written about successful morning routines. From things entrepreneurs need to do first thing in the morning to the unique routine that was key to a business leader’s success. I am a sucker for those articles. I am always interested in ways I can maximize my energy to get and give the most to each day.
The challenge is whenever I read them, I question when they do anything oriented beyond themselves or the business. I know not everyone has kids. But what about those who struggle to get moving in the morning? Or those that take calls late into the night to accommodate time zone differences and are not going to wake up with excess time before the next round of calls begin?
It feels like those articles target entrepreneurs that have nothing on their plate but their business. And yet, we read them as if they have the holy grail of information about how we can get it all done and done well.
It is not realistic to mimic your morning routine after an entrepreneur who has had success building a business (which is probably not the same structure as yours) with a personal life different from yours.
Let’s build our routines to work for us.
I am not going to tell you the 10 things you need to do in the morning to be a success. I am going to ask you 6 questions to help you determine the type of routine you want that will set you up for success throughout the day.
Do you have a morning routine?
Does your current morning routine meet your needs?
Is there something missing in your routine that you want to add?
Is there something in your routine you no longer want to do (that you can realistically offload because unfortunately eliminating feeding the dogs is probably not going to improve your success)?
Do you have a specific time each day you want to start your day? Do you want to be working by 6am or 10am? Pick a time that will work for your routine.
What time do you need to wake up to include all the necessary and desired activities in your routine so that you can be ready to work at your preferred time?
In working through those questions, write out your current routine and all the steps and then evaluate how much time you need for each of the current and desired activities. Work backwards from when you want to be working and decide when to wake up to ensure you can fit it all in.
Routines and habits can be painful to initiate and build. 5:40am is not my preferred wake up time, but as I worked backwards through my morning and all the things I needed to get done, including exercise, it became clear that it was a sacrifice worth making. Knowing what needs to be done and that I have the right amount of time each day minimizes the panic ending to the morning as we are all racing to work or school.
The next time you read an article about what a successful entrepreneur did as their routine, remind yourself that they mapped out their needs and desires for the morning before choosing their wake-up time. And you can do the same thing.