My Morning Routine

“No one who can rise before dawn three hundred sixty days a year fails to make his family rich.” – Malcom Gladwell

I saw this quote about a year ago from Marcus Milione of Minted New York when he shared it on Instagram. As someone who was always a morning person, something didn’t land quite right. While I’ve always been an early riser, I feel like I have left potential untapped in my life over the years. I wasn’t on a trajectory to achieve the promised outcome based on my current input. I naturally do what might be perceived as the hard part, but intentionality was missing. Waking up at 6AM but spending the first hour on my phone wasn’t doing me any good. It was time to take a look at my morning routine!

Alarm

I love my alarm. I realized this just recently when I went out of town. The first day, I slept in without an alarm. It felt like I woke up slowly. I didn’t have the immediate jolt to start my day, and I found myself missing it. It’s probably completely backward. I tried the slow daylight alarm. But at the end of the day, a beep from the old iPhone just gets my attention! I also put it across the room from myself (sorry Karli!). No snooze, no scrolling, at 6:00, my feet are on the ground trying to shut that thing off.

Screen Time

While this technically starts the night before, I have some limits on my phone. My Apple Screen Time app blocks everything on my phone (except a few key apps like messages, weather, notes, etc.) starting at 9 PM. I have no self-control with my phone, so my wife literally has the code so I can’t get around it. This continues until 7:00 AM, so I am guaranteed 1 hour of my morning with no access. I should probably push it longer, but you can experiment with that for yourself. It’s a great hour where I can stay slow and just focus on what I need to do.

Caffeine + Creatine

People are always trying to quit or give up caffeine. Not me! In moderation, I think it can be very useful. It certainly helps wake me up in the morning, and it has shown to be a nice edge in workout performance as well. I wish I liked coffee, but I don’t. Instead, I mix my Optimum Nutrition Amino Energy with Creatine Powder in the morning and sip it when I first wake up. Creatine is one of the most thoroughly researched and safest supplements on the market with great benefits. Can’t go wrong!

Movement

I love going to the gym first thing in the morning. I probably would perform a bit better if I waited until later in the day. But, done is better than perfect in my opinion! When I would wait until the afternoon, all too often I would get caught up in my tasks and end up not going. Whether it’s a run, CrossFit, or just a lifting session, it’s such a great way to start the day. Side note: if you want to know all my eseentials for running (especially when it comes to running in the dark!), check out this blog! If you’re really adamant against it, even just a quick 15-minute walk can work wonders.

Hardest Task of the Day

I love this quote from James Clear, author of Atomic Habits. He said,

“If you want a simple formula for having a good day, then get a workout done and do your most important task before lunch. Knock out those two things by noon and you really feel like you’re ahead of the day.”

While I’m not perfect here, I feel an immense amount of freedom when I get something big done in the morning. Everything after that feels a bit smaller and easier.

This is what works for me, but I would definitely recommend some trial and error to see what works for you! Let me know if you’ve found anything that you can’t live without in the comments!