Three things successful people do every morning

Posted on 12/08/2015 by Jess O'Connor

Picture this: it’s 6am. Your alarm clock is ringing. You hit the snooze button. Is it really time to get up? You begin to feel stressed, thinking about everything you need to achieve today. You hit the snooze button again. By the time you finally get out of bed, you’re running late. You quickly shower, get dressed and eat breakfast as you rush out the door. The day flies by, and you can’t quite shake the feeling that you’re ‘behind’. Before you know it, you’re back in bed, ready to fall asleep and do it all over again tomorrow. You set your alarm for 6am…

Does this sound familiar?

Most of us lead incredibly busy, fast-paced lives, and as a result everything feels rushed – even waking up and eating breakfast! Do you sometimes get to the end of the day and feel as though you’ve barely had a moment to yourself? If yes, it might be time to change your morning routine.

According to the experts, what you do in the first few hours after waking can determine whether you are going to have a great day or a not-so-great day.

“Your first ritual that you do during the day is the highest leveraged ritual, by far, because it has the effect of setting your mind, and setting the context, for the rest of your day,” says Eben Pagan, a self-made millionaire and entrepreneur.

So what can you do to change your morning routine for the better? We have collected some of the most common morning habits of successful people .

1. Wake early

Most highly successful people wake early, almost without exception. What they do first thing in the morning varies widely. Some might take it easy and read a few chapters of a book, while others will start work right away. The point is to embrace early starts and use this time to do something that will leave you feeling happy, centred and ready to start the day.

One early riser is Michelle Obama. The First Lady spoke about her morning routine in an interview with O Magazine in 2009. She gets up early to fit in exercise, as it’s incredibly important to her own sense of wellbeing.

“I just started thinking, if I had to get up to go to work, I’d get up and go to work. If I had to get up to take care of my kids, I’d get up to do that. But when it comes to yourself, then it’s suddenly, ‘Oh, I can’t get up at 4.30’. So I had to change that. If I don’t exercise, I won’t feel good. I’ll get depressed,” she said.

2. Morning Pages

Another morning habit of successful people is writing three pages in a journal almost immediately upon waking. This habit was made famous by Julia Cameron, author of ‘The Artist’s Way’.

According to Julia, the point of Morning Pages is to help ‘clear your mind’ so you can focus on the tasks ahead. She writes on her website:

“They are about anything and everything that crosses your mind – and they are for your eyes only. Morning pages provoke, clarify, comfort, cajole, prioritize and synchronize the day at hand. Do not over-think Morning Pages: just put three pages of anything on the page… and then do three more pages tomorrow.”

One really great thing about Morning Pages is you can do it while still tucked up in bed! Keep your journal on your bedside table and write a few sentences on waking. This is a much better habit than lying in bed checking Instagram or hitting the snooze button.

3. Make the bed

Okay, so you’ve woken up early, written some Morning Pages: now what? According to Charles Duhigg, author of The Power of Habit, setting yourself up for success each day can be as simple as making your bed.

“Making your bed every morning is correlated with better productivity, a greater sense of well-being, and stronger skills at sticking with a budget,” writes Duhigg.

“It’s not that… a tidy bed causes better grades or less frivolous spending. But somehow those initial shifts start chain reactions that help other good habits take hold.”

What Duhigg is getting at is the power of creating positive habits. His argument is: if you can train yourself to make your bed every day, no matter what, then surely you can train yourself to introduce other positive habits.

“If you believe you can change – if you make it a habit – the change becomes real.”

Want more info?

Like the sound of creating a better morning routine? Here are links to some more helpful articles on this topic:

• Buffer: The Daily Routines of 7 Famous Entrepreneurs and How to Design Your Own Master Routine
• Huffington Post: 14 Ideas to Create a Soul-Nourishing Morning Routine
• Zen Habits: 10 Benefits of Rising Early, and How to Do It

 

Posted in Study From Home Tips | Tagged Morning Routine, productivity |