The Morning Routine for Professional Results

Summary

If you're starting a morning routine from scratch or revamping it for the 50th time, this is for you. The first key to building your optimal morning ritual is to realize this routine is built for YOU, not the other way around. Don't waste time thinking there is a "perfect" routine that you can copy and paste. You will need to put thought into your routine, test multiple iterations, and constantly be checking in with it to see if it's performing the way you want it. Do not fall in the trap of thinking a specific routine will produce the same results for you as someone else. There are best practices (and I'll share mine with you) but at the end of the day if some part of the routine is not producing, change it!

With that in mind here's my recommended template if you're just starting out or starting over: Begin your day with movement. Then read and meditate or pray, then get inspired.

Movement
Starting your day with exercise not only knocks it off your list first thing in the morning, it makes you overcome a mental challenge first thing in the morning. When you start your day with pushing through a physical challenge, you're showing your brain that you are in charge. You control what you'll do today, not your feelings. Rolling out of bed and exercising first thing sets the tone that today is a day for getting stuff done. No sitting in your bed scrolling through social media or your inbox!

Reading and Meditation/Prayer
I recommend reading a book, inspirational text, or inspiring quotes in the morning. Getting yourself immersed in a fascinating topic will switch your brain on so it's ready to start the day. It's also an opportunity for skill building or deepening your knowledge. You could read books about your career field or area of expertise. Note this is not a time to catch up on the latest headlines. News websites, like social media, optimize for dopamine hits. Don't fall into the trap of scrolling at this hour. Instead good deep.

Additionally take some time to pray or meditate. This will help you start the day by focusing on others. Starting my day with a service mindset is key to motivation. By reminding yourself of the important contribution you want to make to other people you will feel more energized!

Get Inspired
This part of your morning routine is all about setting the tone of the day. The key is you come out of these 10-20 minutes feeling energized, feeling like the best version of yourself, and ready to grab the day by the horns. Optimize for that. What you do during this time are things that help you be

• Emotionally engaged in your goals
• Confident about your ability to make an impact today by utilizing your current skills
• Focused on showing up as the best version of yourself today

This could look like engaging in positive self talk out loud. It could be reviewing your goals on your vision wall. It could be journaling how to optimizing today for joy. Again it's less important what you do. The crucial part is how you feel coming out of this time.

One last encouragement as you craft your morning routine: Keep it fun! Remember just because your morning routine is a critical part of your day doesn't mean you have to be serious the whole time. So read a book you actually look forward to reading! Take a moment to connect with your spouse! Laugh! Sing out loud! Cultivate joy in your morning and it will follow you the rest of your day.

Full Transcript:

all right let's talk about morning routines whether you're starting from scratch or you're revamping your current morning routine this video will give you some best practices to implement a high quality high impact morning routine that will get you excited about work stoked about the projects you're working on and just feeling more alive in the morning because I don't know about you but I've been in a situation where I've started my day and I've kind of slid into my chair at my desk and you know I'm feeling kind of flat and down not really excited about what I'm working on and I checked the clock and I started work five minutes ago and I'm like oh I got this whole day ahead of me of work and I'm not feeling it and I get it and I'm sure you've been there once or twice yourself if not that's you right now so let's talk about how to build a morning routine that actually helps you to engage with the day with intention and gets you excited and helps you to enjoy it more as well and the first thing we've got to understand about morning routines is that they don't have to look a certain way I think so many people shoot themselves in the foot by looking at it from a perfectionist as a perfectionistic standpoint they think that morning routines are something you craft and you look at it and you build and you slowly construct and then you release it and you start it and it just runs perfectly for the rest of your life that's a really unhelpful perspective instead think of your morning routine as a layered stack where you start with one simple act in the morning of intention that sets you up for a great day and once you've done that for 30 days and you've reflected on it every week and made sure it's it's working for you you add another layer and you add another layer a morning routine is a habit and any any good habit requires stacking to make sure that it's sustainable and that it's actually helping you so don't fall in the Trap of thinking that morning routines are something you have to get perfect for from the get-go they are crafted over time they are perfected through doing not perfected through planning okay so with that let's talk about my best practices for morning routine what I like about the different aspects of the morning routines that I've tried over the years and what I've worked with with clients to help them as well and the first thing about a morning routine the first thing is movement the second thing is reading and prayer or meditation the third thing is getting inspired so let's talk about move-in movement getting going exercising doing something physical at the beginning of the day this is the first and potentially most important aspect of a morning routine and this is why movements first of all get your exercise in at the first top of the day it helps you to get that exercise done which we all need in our lives but also it helps you to overcome a mental barrier you see we can all start our day with a tone of sort of laid back lackadaisly sort of going through the motions reacting according to how we kind of feel how we rolled out of the bed that morning or we can start our day by telling our brain this is what I'm doing this is important to me so I'm going to make it happen we act our way into feeling instead of feeling our way into acting right that's what movement does it tells your brain hey I know it sucks to kind of roll out of bed at 6 15 and run two miles but I'm gonna do it because I'm in charge of what today is about and that's a really really different tone than sitting in your bed for 15 minutes scrolling through social media first thing in the morning or checking in your your feeds or your emails first thing when you get to your desk that tone is is unhelpful it really doesn't set you up for a win and it doesn't get you excited about the day so instead start your day with movement get your exercise out of the way and overcome a mental barrier a challenge first thing in the morning that'll be so helpful I also like to end this with the the movement part of the routine with a cold shower and no not everybody loves that but I really found it to be helpful in terms of feeling good there's all sorts of research about the slow release of dopamine and I would recommend you at least try a cold shower for a month okay second part of the morning routine is reading and meditation slash prayer so this this is super helpful in terms of reading because I don't know about you but I'm a little foggy in the morning I'm not always like keyed in cognitively first thing um so what reading does it helps me to get centered to to focus on something and to turn on that um learning and um thinking side of my brain so I pick up a book and I'm a man of Faith as well so I'll read some scripture I'll also read a book that I'm I'm going through right now that helps me develop a skill or helps me to um you know learn something new in the area of my expertise and personal development professional results and so I look forward to that I also meditate and pray so there's a million videos out there about how to meditate and pray but you know the benefits briefly I'll put them here is is meditation helps you bring you into the moment now it reduces anxiety it helps you to to not feel worried about the day or stressed about the things you have to get done but again tell your brain that hey today is about now today is about feeling the moment today is not about just rolling with the emotions I woke up with and prayer for me it really helps me to focus on other people It Centers my heart in the right place on service first thing in the morning service is of course one of our highest callings as human beings and if we can focus on others at the beginning of our day and the contribution we want to make at the beginning of the day we set that tone that today is not just about me and what I want but I'm here for something greater so that's the second portion of the morning routine the third piece we got Movement we got prayer meditation reading the third piece is getting inspired and this is so exciting this is the fun part so we get to roll into um your office or or wherever you want to do it and get excited about the project you're working on so look at those goals that you have for the year for the next five years for a week whatever those goals are you're working towards read them write them down think about how exciting it is to be able to accomplish them if you have any phrases that really resonate with you in terms of being sort of mantras or truths or sayings that you need to hear in that particular time in your life say those out loud I have phrases that help speak against the specific untruths that that would otherwise hold me back that I just say over myself every morning and I encourage you to do that because is that those phrases that connect with you really help you to wash away that that negative self-talk that would otherwise bring you down in your day and those phrases you'll know them when you hear them they're the truths that you need to hear in that season of your life that you're in right now and you have to say those and again out loud because that tells your brain that this is true this is real this is this is concrete so read those out loud look at your projects be someone who who just reads something important that you wrote at the beginning of the day so every year I write a Manifesto for what I want the year to look like what I want for my family what I want for my business what I want for my personal life I would encourage you to write something like that and read it every morning get inspired by the things you're moving towards by the kind of person you want to be that that Manifesto for the year can describe who you want to be this year how you want to show up in in the world and that's going to be really powerful for setting the tone again in the day by reading those inspirational long-term perspective things if you don't know how to do that I have a really good exercise called the North Star exercise which helps you to craft specific words that you want to show up as today so these words will clarify for you the kind of person you want to be on a day-to-day basis and this is the moment to pull those words out and to read them out loud again and set that intention for the person you want to be today so getting inspired that's the last piece and the the final thing I'll leave you with so that that's that's what I'd recommend for a morning routine those are those are the major pieces the final thing I'd leave you with is make sure it's fun make sure that you look forward to your morning routine when I go to bed I get excited I told my wife this I'm like I can't wait for my morning routine tomorrow because I I think it's exciting to get up and to exercise to overcome that challenge I look forward to reading the book that helps me get more um skills in My Chosen area of expertise and I really do look forward to reading my my Manifesto my my words that describe who I want to be my phrases that describe who I am and the truth about who I am so whatever gets you excited about a morning routine put that in there first you know put that as the first layer because really really if you want a routine to be sustainable in the morning don't let it be a drag just because it's an important piece of your day doesn't mean it needs to be serious the whole time so loosen up have some fun with it shift it every week adjust it to make sure that it remains fun and and fresh and I guarantee you soon enough you'll start having a morning routine that gets you fired up for your day fired up for your goals and really connected to the day in a whole new way so I wish you the best luck with implementing that