May 11, 2024 3 min read meditation

Do You Have An Effective Morning Routine (Or Are You Following Someone Else’s That’s Not Working For You)?

Want to see my (latest) morning routine?

Feeling calm and centred after my morning routine.

About six years ago, I wrote an irreverent article titled “Why You Should Wake Up At 3 AM To Be A Self-Righteous Asshole: 5 ways to be better than everyone else.”

I had been publishing on Medium for just over a year— on my now-closed publication, Think Queerly. Medium was in its heyday and EVERYONE was there. Many writers broke out and became very successful, especially in the world of personal development.

It was also when everybody was writing about the “best” morning routine that you should be doing, but aren’t.

One author — someone who became highly successful in his niche — wrote (in my opinion) an unforgiving and unsympathetic article about his morning routine. It was so completely over the top that I think he made it up solely to get views and likes — without care for the harm he might have caused.

But I digress! :-)

What’s Your Morning Routine?

How’s it working out for you?

I'll be completely transparent here and admit that I haven't had a structured morning routine for a long time. That is, until last week, the beginning of May, when I started a business development intensive program with my coach.

The first “mission” or lesson in the program was to start a prescribed morning routine that would help ground me and prepare me for the daily work for the next three months.

And the first part of the morning routine is meditation. UGH!

What do you think about mediation?

I’ve had an on/off, love/hate relationship with meditation. Almost 20 years ago, I did a 10-day Vipassana meditation retreat where you sit in meditation for 10 or more hours per day. I wrote about that challenging/enlightening experience in, “The Longest I Ever Sat Still.”

Knowing myself, I thought, “Bloody hell, this will be my first resistance to this new coaching program!”

However, having a structure and a guided meditation from my coach to follow made it easier to start. Of course, I felt great after the mediation, the movement practice, and then the reading that comprised the process.

Previously, I had only been writing in my journal first thing after getting up and, of course, an espresso. But even though it was on my calendar, I didn’t always do it.

What keeps you committed to what you truly want to accomplish?

Sometimes a coaching client has wanted me to make them accountable. I don’t want or need to do that. Instead, I help them get clear about the how and the why of what they would like to accomplish, and I support them in “clearing the path.”

Well, the same is true for me. I needed someone to tell me that I needed to do this — my morning routine — as part of this coaching program.

But I don’t need my coach to keep me accountable. Instead, he’s there to help me “clear the way” — and not to push through, but to find the easiest and most efficient way around the obstacle in my way.

I’ve only been doing my new morning routine for the last six days, but the results are noticeable. I’m feeling better Overall and I’m calmer. I’ve also established a set of 9 commitments that I will be working on over the next 3 months of this program.

Surprisingly, I’ve also started to accept myself more. What I mean is that I’m accepting that I need to take care of myself first and have compassion for my state of mind and being before I can do my best work — whatever that work may be.