Josh Sherman
After some recent research I realized that people I consider successful are generally quite scheduled. Not necessarily through their entire day, but at the very least they have a morning routine that occupies the first 90 minutes of their day. I’m going through a bit of a personal growth spurt and figured I should embrace a morning routine.
Before I get into my routine, let’s talk about the recurring elements I noticed in other people’s routines. Breakfast and hygiene are easily the most often mentioned. Fortunately I have those on lock. Exercise was also quite common but had a tendency to also be listed as a shortcoming. I knew I had to be sure I included some sort of work out into my routine.
I found that one of the major themes, which could be applied many different ways, is taking time for one’s self. Reading (often times classic texts), writing (usually the day’s goals or a TODO list) and mediation were often mentioned as ways to take time for yourself. Cool, I’ll try to work at least two of those in.
Outside of the routine itself, I learned that often times people opt to eat the same exact breakfast every day in an effort to remove trivial decisions. It’s in the same vein as wearing the same thing every day. If you don’t have to make a decision on what to wear or what to eat you can make a more important decision later on. I worked this in a bit as well.
So what’s my day look like? Glad you asked! Keep in mind that I am still working on a consistent wake up time. The schedule itself starts at whatever time I get up and going until I am done. With the exception of deliberately timed tasks, nothing is held to a time constraint.
- Wake up, think about how awesome it is to be alive then take a piss and weigh myself.
- Have a glass of lemon water.
- 100 squats which I do as fast as I can. I am working towards being able to do this within 2 minutes. I follow that up with 20 push-ups.
- Take a shower. I am currently experimenting with alternating extreme hot and cold water, 3 minutes and 1 minute respectively. I do either 2 or 3 cycles.
- Dry off, get dressed.
- Make breakfast. I usually grab another glass of lemon water as well. Breakfast consists of 2 eggs scrambled with a small bit of cheese, dried sage and a punch of salt.
- Do a bit of writing while I eat breakfast. Right now I am working my way through the exercises in Become an Idea Machine.
- Clean up from breakfast, bush my teeth then pour my morning coffee. I drink iced coffee that I made prior. I drink one pint glass full with 10 ice cubes. This is important as I’m working on cutting back my coffee intake. I am adding a few extra ice cubes each week to slowly cut back.
- 10-15 minutes of guided meditation (I’m very new to this but loving it).
Then I get to kicking ass and taking names!
I am still working through a few parts of my routine. Exercise in particular is a work in progress as I settle on more of a full body workout that will get my blood flowing. Prior to squats I was biking for a bit, which got old as there are no decent bike trails by my house. The squats themselves are part of a challenge I was reading about, something like do 100 a day for a month. They said you’d notice a difference within 3 days and I sure as shit have!
My shortcoming is that I don’t do any reading as part of my routine. I read here and there through the day but it would definitely be nice to do it as part of my morning routine. As I said, it’s still a work in progress as are some other daily routines I am working on.
Even though I’m still fine tuning things, I’m absolutely loving how I feel afterwards. I am refreshed and inspired and ready to conquer the world!
How do you spend the first part of your day? Do you grab a quick bite and rush to work or do you take some time for yourself? Comment below!
