We’ve all done it at one point or another: you snooze your alarm (or simply sleep through it) and the first thing you do in bed is scroll through Facebook. Then you get ready in a rush only to leave the house feeling tired and stressed. We guarantee everyone goes through this sooner or later. This week we sat down with Tom Foxley from The Alpha Movement Podcast to talk you through the benefits of having a positive morning routine so you don’t have to feel rushed every monring.
Creating a Habit
By repeatedly snoozing your alarm you’re only feeding a cycle of negativity. The more you experience a negative beginning to your day, the more likely you are to repeat it. You’re hard-wiring the process and making it harder and harder to break. This is why it feels so difficult to not look at your phone in the morning.
The good news is that the converse also applies: make just one small, positive change to your day, and then repeat it. You’ll be strengthening the neural pathways that the action requires, which only makes you more likely to do it again in the future. You’ll find that in the first two or three days, you’ll be over your initial fears and on the way for constructive change. You’ll start getting up earlier, doing something positive in the mornings and, best of all, feeling great.
Resisting a Morning Routine
You’re, unfortunately, also likely to encounter resistance at some point when trying to change old habits – just think about the number of times you’ve started a new healthy habit only to abandon it along the way. Resistance is part of our primal brain and craves comfort and safety. It’s what got us humans to this point in evolution, but it’s also what’s limiting you as a man. It’s what will stop you from jumping into your new morning routine because it feels unsafe – perhaps even daunting. So when it comes to your mornings (and any pursuit of self-improvement), use resistance as a weather vane – it will point you in the direction of success.
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Three Reasons Why a Morning Routine is Good for You
Tomorrow, as the saying goes, is a new day. So it fits that we hit that day with positivity from the very beginning. A morning routine does three things:
- It gives you a sense that time is abundant. Having an hour or two set aside first thing allows you to think clearly and experience what the Stoics call ‘ataraxia’ – a state of serene calmness. Just wake up 10 minutes earlier tomorrow and you’ll already feel better.
- It allows you to get stuff done. Want to read more? Start a sideline business? Spend more time with your loved ones? A morning routine gives you the time to do all of this.
- It reinforces positivity. When we don’t have a set routine, we inevitably experience a series of failures every morning: missed alarms, poor nutrition, cut-short training sessions, etc. By having a mental checklist to follow, we feel like we’ve already accomplished something. This positivity feeds into the rest of our lives.
Now that you know it’s important to have a positive morning routine, stay tuned for our next blog post to see how you can make the most out of it. If you want to hear how Tom Foxley structures his mornings (and in the process, eliminates anxiety, fear and procrastination), you can listen to his podcast episode here: www.alphamovement.co/morningroutines
Are you ready to jump-start your mornings? Let us know how you get on Twitter and Facebook.