By: Eileen Guo
What do successful people do that we don’t? For one thing, they wake up very early. They go through a course of their daily morning schedule to get them prepped and ready for another day.
By waking up early, you get an advantage to starting your day off right. Clearing your mind and busy schedule in the morning, sets you up for success throughout the rest of the day. Curious about how to make the most out of your morning? Here are 6 things successful people do before 9 a.m., and how you can incorporate these into your morning routines.
- Get Physical
You’ve probably heard of the phrase “healthy body, healthy mind.” It’s extremely important to take care of your physical needs before the work day starts. Typically, early on in the day is the best time to exercise: maybe go on a walk with your dog, or early run or bike ride. Not only will it make you feel good, but studies also show that exercise can also improve brain functioning, to maybe make you smarter at work or school.
- Eat Something
If you’re a busy person, chances are, eating a healthy breakfast is the last thing on your mind. But in terms of the day’s productivity, skipping breakfast can be a big mistake. If you don’t eat something, chances are you’ll be buying something from the vending machines and gorging on Hot Cheetos at 10:30. How productive will you be after that, and how clearly will you be thinking after that? If you want to be thinking and performing at your best, make time in the morning to eat a healthy breakfast.
- Take Care of the Necessary Stuff
Walking the dog. Packing your school lunch. Everyone has things that they have to do. To get a head start in your day, get the necessary things done as soon as possible. When you wake up early in the morning, you have time to attend to these daily tasks that take up valuable mind space during the day. If you take care of these things early in the morning and focus on work, your day will become much more effective.
- Cross Off the Most Annoying To-Do List Item
Everyone procrastinates on one thing or another. Start the day right and get at least one of those hard to tackle tasks off of your to-do list. In the morning, you’re at your most energized and refreshed, and best prepared to take on a difficult task or project. Not only will you have the sense of accomplishment at having completed that task, but it won’t be a task that causes stress all day.
- Learn Something
To truly be successful in the long run, you must make a lifelong commitment to learning. There is never a point at which you’ve learned “enough”. Learning keeps the mind elastic and allows you to remain nimble in your work.
Every day, make a point of spending some time in the morning, learning something. This might be by reading the newspaper, learning a new skill, or it might be by listening to podcasts relevant to your work. It might be a self-imposed study routine on a certain sector of your business. There are many ways to continue educating yourself, because you never know what might give you your next great idea.
- Make a Plan
Be realistic in mapping out your day: don’t set a mile-long to-do list that you’ll never be able to complete, or schedule yourself in such a way that you’ll be running from thing to thing and getting stressed out. Leave some room for breaks. Consider this plan like a road map, as if you’re on a cross-country trip. Plans are not meant to be quick sprints in your life, but more like a marathon. Create a structure that you can easily follow, and have the freedom to veer off the course if needed.
