My Morning Routine

Habit 0: ‘Twas the Night Before…

Each night, I do three things to prepare for the following morning:

1. I tidy up the living room and kitchen, the rooms I will come down to and in which I’ll begin my day

2. I set up to make my tea (not really a setup, just have the pieces out on the counter)

3. I fill a water bottle up, add lemon juice and some salt

4. I set my clothes on the floor next to my bedroom door

I like to have a clean room to walk into each day for obvious reasons. Clutter is a distraction that I can’t afford during my one, guaranteed hour of non-work alone time.

In terms of tea, I just get out the bottle I use for steeping it, the tea leaves themselves, and a mug to drink from. Pretty easy preparation.

My water bottle is 32 ounces, and I fill it with warm water, a pinch of salt, and a splash of lemon juice. I then set it next to my supplement cabinet for quick access. Again, not rocket science.

Last, I get out clothes for the next day and set them on the floor next to my bedroom door so I can grab them and get on with my morning fast.

Evening prep, done. Remember, a good morning routine begins the night before.

Habit 1: Wake Up

This may seem like an obvious first step to a morning routine, but if any politicians are reading this, I want to be sure I’m not moving too fast for them.

Actually, what I really want to share is how I wake up. I wake up at 6:00, which is not the time that my wife wakes up. She is a light sleeper, and I sleep each and every night like a grizzly bear in January.

I needed a way to wake up that would actually work, but also not disturb my wife. I know I married up so I have to be careful. Enter the Pavlok Shock Clock 2. You put this thing on your wrist and can set it to vibrate, beep, or, most importantly, shock you.

I set mine to vibrate and shock me multiple times and at painful frequencies until I get it off of me. You can even set it to not stop until you do jumping jacks I think, but my wife would definitely notice, and be disturbed by, me doing jumping jacks at the foot of our bed at 6:00 in the morning.

All of this to say, this was the best (and only) money I spent related to my morning routine.

Habit 2: Take Supplements

My first order of business is taking my supplements. Or at least most of them. I’ll detail these in another post, but suffice it to say, I am down to just a few.

I take a multivitamin, acetyl l-carnitine, and a probiotic first thing every day, using my salt/lemon water prepared the night before. I hold off on my fish oil because of the fat and calories – I more or less fast until lunch time.

Habit 3: Make Tea

Lately, I’ve been drinking yerba mate in the morning. My understanding is that mate appears to have some real weight loss benefits (like, actually studied and researched, not “here, try this magic pill”), which has been a goal of mine the last six months or so.

When I reach my goal weight, I’ll go back to strictly coffee which I find to be an order of magnitude more enjoyable than tea.

For the record, I just steep the mate in my Soma brew bottle. I don’t go the traditional method of brewing. Don’t judge – I only have one hour to myself, I’ve got to get moving!

As I understand it, mate is supposed to steep for between four and 10 minutes. I just use hot water from my sink so my guess is a little longer at this lower temperature is probably ok. Which is good, because what I do while the tea steeps takes 15 minutes…

Habit 4: Meditation/Mindfulness

I don’t like the term “meditation” but that doesn’t change the fact that what I do is basically meditate. I prefer to call it “mindfulness” training because 1) that is my real goal and 2) meditation sounds more like the practice of a Buddhist monk that could walk on hot coals. I am not a Buddhist monk and cannot walk on hot coals.

My mindfulness work consists of laying down on my couch, putting on my headphones and following along to a 15-minute guided meditation using Brain.fm. Brain.fm is a relatively inexpensive subscription, but I also use the other tracks that they offer for background noise when I’m working and reading. The Brain.fm team claims there is some cool audio technology and science behind their music/sounds, too.

So I lay there on the couch, usually focusing on my breath to the soothing sound of a British person reminding me to focus on my breath. These reminders are crucial because 75% of my meditation involves me thinking about things. But that is exactly the point – to bring my mind back to the present when it begins to wander.

Once my mindfulness work is over, my morning routine then moves toward my books…

Habit 5: Read the Bible

I’m a man of faith so starting my day out with one chapter of the Bible has been a long-time goal. I’d like to say it is a habit, but that is still a work in progress.

My preferred method of reading the Bible is “straight through.” If I read Leviticus 4 yesterday, today I am reading Leviticus 5. Plain and simple. My preferred Bible, for the record, is the Crossway ESV Study Bible. Since I don’t understand big words almost ever, I use the notes at the bottom to tell me what I just read in the scripture.

If you’re not going to read the Bible, I suggest you start with some kind of motivational kind of reading. Something short and sweet, just to get your mind in the right place.

Then I move onto my journal.

Habit 6: Write in My Journal

I have about 10 notebooks going at any one time, separated out by topic – business, songwriting, journaling, book notes, etc.

You’d think that a guy like me would love to journal. But I don’t. Instead, I love the idea of looking back 50 years from now and having snapshots of my days as a young, devilishly handsome and wildly intelligent man.

To be clear, this is different than the “journal” I keep of my daily memories.

My journal time lasts about three minutes and goes like this:

1. I write 1-3 sentences about either yesterday or what I’m up to today

2. I write out five affirmations, the same ones every day

So, last week when my best friend got married, I wrote:

Today, Blake is getting married. I am so grateful to be a part of this special celebration. I pray that he and Whitney will be blessed in their marriage.

—

I am capable of doing anything I set my mind to

I am focused and strive toward my goals each day

I make decisions based on my goals, not temptation or fear

I take action to overcome doubt

I lead a life worthy of being lived

See? Short and sweet. But now someday when I look back on that day, I’ll remember what was top of mind and will also see the affirmations that I felt I needed at the time. I got the latter idea from Scott Adam’s book How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big (one of the best I’ve ever read) and Jon Acuff’s Soundtracks, which I recently shared my notes of here.

Once I finish that, it’s time to get my lazy butt off the couch…

Habit 7: Party in the Hot Tub!

…and into my hot tub for a party! I am fortunate to have a hot tub, so I know this isn’t for everyone. When I say that I “party” in there, what I really should say is that I have a “fiesta” because what I actually do is sit in the hot tub for 15 minutes and do Pimsleur’s Spanish lessons on Audible.

While I’m at it, I stretch a bit. I find this to be a great way to kill a lot of birds with a single, 15-minute stone.

I’m outside, breathing in fresh air. Good thing to do. Check.

I’m in a hot tub, relaxing. I could start the day a lot worse. Check.

I’m practicing my Spanish, one of my “4th Decade Goals.” Check.

And I’m getting my body stretched and warmed up for the day. Check.

That’s a hard 15 minutes to beat. It’s also a great way to end the sort of “priming” part of my morning routine. Even if you don’t have a hot tub, find a room to go through a stretching routine and knock out some of this time. It’s a good habit to have, especially if you’re like me and are about as flexible as a flagpole.

Habit 8: Start Coffee 

I probably made it sound before like I drink mate as a replacement for coffee. That is not really true. I make a full pot each morning in my basement office.

Once I’ve dried off from the hot tub, I kick this baby on. There is nothing like walking back into my basement to get to work and smelling the wonderful aroma of freshly brewed, gourmet coffee (read: classic Folgers in my Mr. Coffee machine).

If I die young, caffeine did it.

Habit 9: Shower and Get Ready

Once I’ve kicked off the coffee, I do a quick rinse off in the shower. It is my final wake up call.

All of this is done in my basement because I have a shower there and why bother electrocuting myself with my wrist alarm if I’m just going to wake my wife up with a shower anyway?

Finally, it’s time to take care of the other stuff. Brushing my teeth, getting dressed, all the essentials.

Right here, I’m at about one hour. But if you’re curious how I kick off my NOT alone time in the morning, please read on…

Habit 10: Walk With the Kids

Every morning that it isn’t raining or blistering hot or painfully cold, I take the kids on a walk. This usually starts somewhere between 7:20 and 7:40 for me, depending on how long it takes for my daughter, Kennedy, to find the motivation to get out of bed. We are always home by 8:00 for me to start my workday.

The kids are at ages where I’m pushing the double stroller with my six-month-old while my daughter rides around on her pink scooter. We used to just do about a quarter mile in 40 minutes because Kennedy would stop to pick up worms on the sidewalk and throw them in the grass. Our neighborhood has a disproportionately high number of worms relative to other parts of the developed world, so it was a major slowdown.

She is gradually getting over her concern for worms dying on the sidewalk so I’m pushing us to do a mile each day. Kennedy usually makes it about a half mile on her scooter and then she’s in the stroller next to Walker.

It’s not a bad workout, and getting some sunlight in the early hours of the day is a good thing for alertness, and regulating your circadian rhythm. If you’re a work-from-homer or just looking to kick off the day better with your family, let me encourage you to get out the door for even just 10 or 15 minutes. It’s a tradition I’ve grown to love.

And that is my morning routine. It might seem like a lot of “to-dos,” but trust me when I tell you it is manageable. As a guy that used to do the 5:00am-wakeup-workout-then-get-into-the-office-at-6:30, I can vouch that this new routine feels like a much healthier pace for life.

I don’t get to brag about how much suffering I endure “before you even roll over in your bed,” but hey, I’m not competing with you or anyone else. This routine gives me energy and a sense of accomplishment, and that is good enough for me.