- in Routine by Brian Wright
How to Create an Easy 10 minute Morning Routine
An Easy 10 minute morning routine must be useless right?
What’s the point of doing something for only 10 minutes?
- Morning routines require waking up super early
- you need to feel motivated every single time
- and it’s only for certain crazy driven people, right?
Right?
Wrong.
Sometimes life doesn’t afford us the ability to do the full thing, but that’s no reason to quit and not get what you can.
Think of a 10 minute morning routine like the tools on your keychain. You need the big screw driver or the larger knife for big jobs, but for your every day scenario the small swiss army knife with it’s miniature gadgets will due.
A 10 minute morning routine is kinda like that. It’s the micro version of the real thing.
The best thing about a shorter routine, is that they’re easy to do, they don’t hurt your brain when you think about doing them each day, and they offer serious benefits.
A routine of any size gives you control over the rest of your day. OR, you could leave everything up to chance, and continue to get what you’ve always got. Your choice.
Jump to the spots you’re interested in!
9 Rules for the Perfect Routine
Easy 10 minute Morning Routine
Breathing & Visualization (5 mins)
Planning your Day Right (3 mins)
Emotion control and Feeling Good (1 minute)
The Easy 10 minute Morning Routine
It’s a smaller version of the real thing. My personal opinion, is that everyone should optimize their life for their vitality, money and relationships.
That might sound simple, but it’s really not when you think about it. The idea is common sense, but most people’s relationships are jacked up, their money is not what they want it to be, and their lying to themselves about their health. Those are what the numbers say.
A solid morning routine would make sure everything important gets done first. Your exercise, your reading, a serious chunk of your productivity etc…
This is how people with intentions for progress get left behind and stagnate in life.
- They don’t control their mornings,
- don’t control the rest of their day,
- end up mixed up in something that’s not important to them,
- and go to sleep exhausted but having accomplished nothing that really means anything to them.
Your new mantra is “If I can’t do this, at least I can do this.”. You don’t have time for the full thing in the morning, but you still need to take back control of your day, and that start’s when you wake up.
You are the director. No routine, means no director.
» A day without a director means anything goes.
» And anything goes means any results go, even if they’re not the results you want. Remember that.
The 10 minute morning routine, is your EDC keychain routine.
My Morning Routine: How to Be Productive Without Going Insane
Getting It Right The 1st Time!
DIY projects are some of the most rewarding things you can engage in.
But something that requires expert attention shouldn’t be attempted alone.
Stefan James (over at projectlifemastery.com) has created an quality program called Morning Ritual Mastery.
I don’t do the “pushy sales” stuff, so here’s a chance for you to check it out and see if it’s for you.
It’s a 7 step program, that eliminates all the confusion and “trial & error” behind getting your morning routine just perfect.
It also has some tips for creating a masterful and well rounded morning routine that he’s discovered creating his own 7 figure business.
The coolest thing, is that he shows you how to fit everything inside 15, 30, or 60 minute gaps, depending on your own personal needs.
Check Morning Ritual Mastery out here. (I might give you a chance at the end of the post to see it again)
Stretch + Water (1 min)
Benefits of stretching first thing in the morning:
- Increase energy levels
- Removes all the previous day/nights kinks
- Improves brain activity
- Increase circulation
- Increase flexibility
- Controls aches and pains
- Helps the joints in your body withstand the days demands
Benefits of hydrating first thing in the morning:
- Increases your alertness
- Rehydrates you from your 8 hours of sleep without water
- Fights off sickness
- Jumpstarts your metabolism
- Refuels your brain
This is the micro-health part of our easy morning routine. Instead of the hour in the gym, you spend a few minutes getting all the kinks out of you and rehydrating.
5 minutes for Breathing and Visualization
Breathing is something we do all day but never really think about.
Simon Sinek did a TED talk a while ago talking about how controlling your breathing can literally help you control yourself in all circumstances.
A prison in india implemented breathing classes and noticed a decrease in the violent nature of inmates.
Benefits of Controlled Breathing:
- Increased focus and alertness
- Less reactive to stress
- More control over cognitive process
- Increased cognition in general
Sleep is an ignorant state for us to be in. As creatures that are inherently dynamic, having to be immobile for a third of the day is really nothing more than a recharge state.
But when you wake up, you’ve got this weird aura of laziness that surrounds you. You just came back from a crazy dream state, and the whole things been out of your control for hours.
Breathing puts you back in control. Controlled breathing means you’re the director.
I’m not a meditation teacher or a breathing expert, so I don’t teach people this stuff. You can find a basic breathing exercise on youtube if you want one.
Just remember, this part of our routine gives us the most control over our day because it controls us. So we spend most of our time on it.
Do Some Simple Planning (3 mins)
Plan out your day simply. Too much on your list and your brain will revolt. A huge to do list feels heavy. It’s like a dragon you have to slay.
I’m not trying to slay dragons every day.
Keep your list to 5 items or less. If you think it’s impossible to have that little, maybe you need to learn to prioritize and say no more often to people’s “wonderful ideas” about how to spend your time.
Write down three things you HAVE to get done, and two things you’d like to get done. Easy.
Consult your life plan, and pick something off your weekly goals list that will help you move toward your goals.
1 minute to Feel Good & Grateful
Learn to control your emotions & mood. Most of our life is habit. The thoughts we think are habitual; the actions we perform are habitual. One of the main reasons for creating routines is so that behaviors, actions, things we do that are important to us become habits.
You’re not really creating a routine, you’re replacing the routine you’ve got now with a new and better one.
Picture this: A guy named mike has worked at a job he hates for years, doesn’t have a nice family life, wakes up everyday the same time and does the same stuff.
That’s a routine. He might go to sleep dreading having to wake up and start it all over again.
So if mike wakes up and hates the prospect of the day ahead (first of all, what kind of life is that?) he’s in one huge habit loop that is controlling his entire life.
He’s going from waking up,
- to hating life,
- to coming home,
- to hating life at home,
- to going to sleep dreading tomorrow,
- to sleeping, waking,
- self fulfilling prophecy of continuing last nights hating tomorrow which is now today that he hates…
Even if life isn’t that dramatic for you, guiding your emotions to how YOU want to feel rather than how your habit loop tells you to feel is crucial.
You’ll be happier, I promise.
