The Power of a Morning Routine

“Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise.” – Benjamin Franklin

 Introduction

If anyone had told me 10 years ago that I would ever be a morning person, I would honestly have questioned their sanity. However, this has changed over the years as I slowly fell in love with all things wellness and with my continuous goal to achieve optimum health. The first part of this journey was to create (and fall in love with) a morning routine.

An effective morning routine can significantly boost not just your cognitive functioning, but also allow you to create mental space that embraces the celebrations and challenges of the day.

Spending time to create a customised and effective morning routine can make all the difference in being productive, achieving your goals, feeling organised, and best of all, doing all of this with confidence. Multiple studies have shown that establishing routines filled with healthy habits is a great way to move more efficiently through your day while expending less mental energy and willpower in the process, ultimately keeping you more motivated in the long run.

 These are the habits that I try to follow each day in order to operate at peak mental performance.

 Wake Up Early

This one’s kind of crucial. I have a lot to get done in my morning routine, so I typically wake up at 5:30am during the week. I move this up a bit later to about 7am to give me some sleep-in time on the weekends. I’m not going to lie—it was definitely hard to get used to this, but I can assure you that the benefits exponentially outweigh hitting the snooze button. There are some things that you can do that make this process easier:

·      Go to bed at a reasonable time, aiming for at least 8 hours sleep.

·      Do not drink any caffeine in the evening to allow your body to naturally fall into it’s rest cycle.

·      Do not drink too much fluid before going to bed to prevent unnecessary trips to the toilet.

·      Have an alarm that wakes you up at the right part of your sleep cycle. I use a great app called Sleep Cycle.

·      Sunrise alarm clocks can also be effective since they tap into the body's innate biorhythms. I use both.

 Meditation

Mindfulness meditation can improve your focus and executive function, the higher-level thinking required for effective and flexible problem-solving. These practices also decrease rumination, a type of negative thinking that acts like a brain-energy vampire, especially in the morning. The good news is, you don’t need to do it for very long at all to reap the benefits. A study conducted using U.S. Marines as volunteers showed that just 12 minutes a day was enough to increase mental resilience (Jha et al, 2010)!

 Breath work

No need for caffeine; morning breath work makes you feel like you have had a double espresso. The breath work I do is the Wim Hoff method, which involves taking 30 inhalations and 30 exhalations, followed by holding your breath as long as possible. He has loads of tutorial videos online, as well as a fantastic app you can download, which I use daily.

Known benefits of breath work include stress reduction, faster recovery from physical exertion, better quality of sleep, improved sports performance, enhanced creativity, and more focus and mental clarity. A study completed by Kox et al (2014) injected Wim Hof practitioners with an endotoxin. Results showed that participants were able to control their sympathetic nervous system and immune responses, allowing their bodies to recover faster. This shows that this breathing method could boost your immune system, and help you manage your stress responses.

Five-Minute Journal

The 5 Minute Journal is a simple, structured, curated guide that only takes 5 minutes of your day to cultivate mindfulness. It can help you shift your mind to a state of optimism and focus on the good things in life while you’re working on becoming the best version of yourself.

Exercise

Physical activity is a natural remedy for stress. During exercise, your brain produces more endorphins, the “feel-good” neurotransmitters, giving you that giddy sense of satisfaction after a good session of moving your body. Research also suggests that exercise enhances hippocampal or neural plasticity and the birth of new neurons (neurogenesis). I find that I have more overall energy in the morning which makes exercise easier—I know there would likely be some excuse I would come up with if I was to try and fit exercise into another part of my day.  

Learning

After reading The 5 am Club (Sharma, 2018) (which I would highly recommend everybody read), I added this component to my routine. I make the most of my brain working at its optimum; I also find that I retain information effectively. I typically do this by either listening to an audio book or podcast, or reading a book for 20 minutes. 

Summary

Whether you have 5 spare minutes or multiple hours each morning, a good routine helps you to operate at peak performance. My advice would be to start slowly, introducing one activity at a time for maximum long-term success. Gradually increase the healthy habits as you feel comfortable. Be kind to yourself throughout the process.

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References

Jha, A., Stanley, E., Kiyonga, A. and Wong, L., 2010. Examining the Protective Effects of Mindfulness Training on Working Memory Capacity and Affective Experience. [online] Amishi.com. Available at: <http://www.amishi.com/lab/wp-content/uploads/jha_stanley_etal_emotion_2010.pdf> [Accessed 10 February 2021].

Kox, M., van Eijk, L., Zwaag, J., van den Wildenberg, J., Sweep, F., van der Hoeven, J. and Pickkers, P., 2014. Voluntary activation of the sympathetic nervous system and attenuation of the innate immune response in humans. PNAS. [Accessed 10 February 2021].

Sharma, R. (2018). The 5am Club. Harper Thorsons: London.