Today I want to share with you the five morning habits that highly productive people use to help them kick-start their day.
To set the tone for a productive day, nothing beats developing consistent morning habits.
Developing a morning routine with effective habits will help you be more organised, more focused, more productive and therefore save you precious time during the day.
If you follow these tips consistently, you'll find yourself achieving greater focus, clarity, higher levels of productivity and therefore better results.
What does your morning routine look like?
Do you plan your day in advance?
Do you start each day with clarity on what you want to achieve?
Do you protect your mornings and find time to focus on what matters most?
What I've discovered is that highly productive people take the time to be intentional about their day and they identify their biggest priorities before starting their day.
They protect their mornings and ensure that their mind and body is in an optimal state to have a productive day.
Here are 5 things you can do to start the day with a productive morning: Habit 1: Reflect and journal (10 min.)
Taking time for self-reflection and journaling in the morning helps you to check in with yourself about how you are feeling at the beginning of the day and lets you explore how you want your day to go.
It’s common to have residue of negative thoughts or stress about situations you have encountered the day before.
Journalling helps you to create awareness on how you are feeling and gives you a fresh perspective on the events.
Ask yourself these questions: “How I am feeling at the moment?”
“How do I want to feel at the end of today?”
"What do I want today to be about?" These questions helps clarify your purpose and intentions for the day.
Habit 2: Remind yourself your goals (2 min.)
It’s easy to live life on auto-pilot and lose sight of your goals when they are not always front and center in your life.
There may be times when other tasks or projects may appear and shift your focus away from your current goals.
That’s why you have to remind yourself of the things you need to focus on.
By reminding yourself each day, you stay focused on your personal goals and you stay accountable for your actions.
Ask yourself these questions (in advance) and remind yourself daily:
“What are my top 3 short-term goals to accomplish this week/month?”
“What are my 3 long-term goals to accomplish this year?”
Habit 3: Plan your day (10 min.)
A productive day starts in the morning by planning out your day.
Daily planning gives you clarity, focus and direction for the day.
Start with writing down your most important tasks for the day, and identify your top 3, and then your top one.
Ask yourself these questions:
"What 3 things do I want to have achieved by the end of today?"
"What one thing do I want to achieve today, even if I achieved nothing else?”
Habit 4: Get moving (10 min.)
Taking time to move in the morning will get your endorphins flowing and give you more energy and motivation for the day.
Physical activity also improves focus and concentration.
The days with morning exercise are associated with better cognition throughout the day, especially when paired with regular breaks during the rest of the day.
As short as a 7 minutes daily workout can do wonders.
Need some inspiration? Check here.
Habit 5: Tackle your biggest priority first (30 min.)
Tackling your biggest priority first, when you have the most energy and focus, sets you up for a productive day. It can be easy to start the day reacting to what the life throws at you by checking email or social media, which can distract you from your most important work.
When you know your priorities for the day, you know which activity to tackle first.
If your priority of the day is a big project instead of a small task, then one option is to set your alarm to 30 minutes and sit down to work on your priority of the day, until the alarm goes.
A short focused work session starts the ball rolling.
Remember “A good beginning is half the work”.
Making progress on something really important to you, boosts confidence and motivation to continue further.
Tackling your biggest priority first also builds momentum to take on other important projects during the day.
Bonus habit: Plan your day the night before
Sometimes the best way to have a productive morning is to plan your day the night before.
When you invest a couple of minutes in the evening getting mentally ready for the following day, it will help you to jump-start your day with meaningful work.
These techniques help me and my clients a lot to have productive mornings and make progress on important goals.
I'm sure they will help you too.
Comments