Open Thread: What’s Your Morning Routine?
Morning: so full of promise and potential. While the night owls sleep, early birds get out of bed and write about morning routines.
Ryan Carson finishes at least two things from his daily to do list before checking email — that’s part of his strategy for a productive morning. WWD contributing writer Leo Babauta suggests that writers create a morning writing ritual because that gives your writing first priority in your life and provides a peaceful time to do it. Leo’s suggestion reminds me of creativity maven Julia Cameron’s morning pages, uncensored writing that she recommends you do each morning.
Steven Fisher thinks that it’s important to get showered and dressed before starting to work. And Pete Thomas brings a business process management (BPM) perspective to the morning routine, looking for ways to optimize for time and health by doing things like switching out bacon and eggs for fruit, yogurt, and granola. He means that as an introduction to BPM, but if you’re really into systematizing your life, it just might work for you.
Amy J. Kearns spends an hour before work each day checking her email, Facebook, and RSS. I’d do that too if I had a job other than checking email, Facebook, and RSS.
I hop out of bed and right onto the web, getting an immediate start onto my work day while the kids sleep. I do a quick scan of email and RSS and then either edit or write the first post of the day for Web Worker Daily. Only after I’ve completed that job do I have breakfast (often a Pop-Tart, healthy for the soul if not for the body) and read The Denver Post and The Wall Street Journal.
What’s your morning routine?
Related posts:
Breakfast
Then just jump into the work. I am just finding it difficult to work , work and work because sometimes i have so much of work that it goes well beyond my control.
6:45 – Wake up 7:15 – Yoghurt, bread and carrot juice. Read feeds. 7:30 – Take a shower 8:00 – E-mail 8:30 – “Think in the morning” (Make ToDo-list for the day) 8:45 – If time, some more RSS / E-mail 9:00 – Leave for office 9:05 – Arrive at the office two blocks away. Get and organize mail 9:15 – Make tea, turn on computer Start working
Usually try to get exercise, posting on the blog, reading some academic articles and eating a healthy breakfast. It usually proves a challenge.
It’s definitely a challenge to balance being informed, doing the actual job, and staying on top of communications.
I’m really more of a night person. Probably until I have kids at least.
I have my best ideas in the morning and late at night, so I always read my RSS feeds during breakfast and am often writing little notes to myself on email. It isn’t the most productive actually, because then I’m not always in the mood to rush off to work. But it does put me in a good mood!
right now, with no kids in school, its’ 1) wake up around 8, 2) start coffee 3) grab laptop from its location beside the couch 4) read email (much easier with all email accounts) going into gmail 4a) deal with urgent emails at this time if none, then move to 5 5) scan my horoscope (habit) 6) google reader – have about 50 feeds I scan 7) facebook 8) back to email to deal with remaining emails 9) start work
My whole routine usually takes 1 to 1.5 hours before I start work.
I’ve only been trying to get into this recently, since I need to be up earlier.
Breakfast is always the first order of the day: high-fiber cereal with skim milk, banana, and blueberries; a large glass of orange juice (the good stuff). I never read, watch TV or compute during meals, it’s bad manners. Once breakfast is done, I can start my day.
on weekends: strike out 5, 8 & 10 till the end ;o)
I am trying to figure out how to take advantage of ideas like a morning routine when I also do Polyphasic Sleep, which I’ve absolutely loved. Has anyone found a way to combine them well? Productivity for the polyphasic sleeper seems to not always go on the same line as the monophasic sleepers, so I feel lost in a sea of information that just doesn’t apply to me.
I’ve been working on this one for some time and am just getting back to it after a month-long hiatus. Funny how vacation and “freedom” from the routine throws a wrench in the schedule as well as practically negates any productivity.
A morning routine should be put in context. After all, the routine of a 21-year-old single college student is far different from that of a 35-year-old single mom working three jobs.
My morning routine is that of a husband and father of two little munchkins. I work a full-time 8-5 job, go to night school from 5:30-9:15 four nights a week as a pre-med student, train as a triathlete, and try to write a blogzine dedicated to newbie endurance athletes.
Here goes…
05:00 – Wake up and go into meditation session followed by an Early Morning Ritual which is comprised of a few yoga asanas and pranayama exercises.
05:30 – Write. Either for blogzine or book project du jour as a hired gun (I’m called upon to help get certain books back on track if the main author falls behind schedule)
06:30 – Run, bike, or swim
07:15 – Get ready for work
07:30 – Drive to work
08:00 – Start the main job.
hak
7:00am – Alarm sets off, but I switched it off and go back to sleep. 7:15am – I look at the clock, nope – too early for get-up so I go back to sleep. 7:30am – Same as above. 8:00am – Same as above. 8:25am – Same as above, but I get neurotic with each passing minute. 8:26am – Same as above. 8:27am – Same as above. 8:28am – Same as above. 8:29am – Same as above. 8:30am – Oh noes, the dreadful time to get up and so I did. I’m off for shower. 8:45am – Grumbled that I’m very late for work. I made myself some toast. 8:55am – I got dressed, brushed my teeth. 9:05am – Looked at the clock – knowing my work starts at 9am but I’m very late (which doesn’t concern me the slightest because I can finish work late) 9:06am – Drove to work 9:30am – Start work
7.00am : Wake & try not to think of work 7.01am : Think of work and pick up laptop from the floor 7.02am : Check all our feeds are updating ok and we haven’t been blocked 7.03am : Read favourite feeds via our site 7.05am : Check Google Adsense 7.10am : Check Google Analytics 7.15am : Check Google Adwords 7.20am : Check Skype for IMs 7.30am : Check Personal Email 7.45am : Kids up, breakfasted, clothed and dispersed 8.30am : Commute (10 seconds) upstairs to office and the day begins
1- Check mail 2- Break fast 3- Check RSS nXqd
SSS-some things never change
This is exactly what I expected to find out after reading the title . Thanks for informative article
I like this one:
8 Steps at SavageChickens
-Pray God -Brush my teeth -Fix up my room -Workout -Shower -Eat breakfast -Work
[...] Open Thread: What’s Your Morning Routine? Morning: so full of promise and potential. While the night owls sleep, early birds get out of bed and write about […] [...]
[...] Ways to Break Out of the Routine We’ve chatted before about the routines we all have – those comforting autopilot steps that get us through hours each day. But there are [...]