Have you ever come across someone that just always seems like they have everything figured out? They wake up early and seem excited to start the day. I know in the past I’ve found myself envious of this type of person and wondering how they got so lucky. Well here’s what they’re not telling you.
The majority of people don’t just wake up with a smile on their face and a good day laid out in front of them. Sometimes good days don’t always come naturally and we have to work a little bit harder to have them. We have to learn what works for us and implement new tasks or habits into our routines to get us on this track.
Over the past year, I have put lots of time into figuring out what routine works for me to channel this energy. Through lots of trial and error, I have discovered 5 simple tasks that work best for me. So, here are the 5 non-negotiable things I do every morning to set myself up for success.
Making My Bed
The first thing I do every single day is make my bed. No exceptions; not if I’m late, in a rush, sick, or even hung over. People often disregard the importance of this task, as it seems so simple and small, however, I believe that is exactly why it needs to be done. I think that making my bed as soon as I wake up is the perfect way to start my day because, within the first 5 minutes, I have already accomplished something. This accomplishment now sets me up for the rest of the day and gets the momentum moving.
An Enjoyable Breakfast
Breakfast is personally my favourite meal of the day. I used to view this time of morning as a task; something to just get through in order to get on with the day. By finding meals that I thoroughly enjoy, I found myself starting to look forward to mornings and the breakfasts I would get to indulge in, as well as the chance to fuel my body and give myself energy for the day. This improved my mornings because I get to wake up with a feeling of excitement and something to look forward to even if I don’t have anything else planned for the rest of the day. Some of my favourite breakfast meals that I have on rotation are oatmeal, yogurt bowls, pancakes, waffles, avocado toast, and eggs.
Daily Movement
Every morning I make sure to get my body moving in some way. Normally for me, this includes a trip to the gym or a long walk. Some mornings are more rushed than others and there isn’t always time for a long, hard workout. However, a workout doesn’t need to be long and strenuous for it to be good. I believe that the best workout is the one that allows someone to be consistent. This could be something like participating in a sport, going for a quick walk, yoga, etc. When I am short on time I often find myself just shortening my walks a bit or following along a 10-minute YouTube video. When I started implementing this step into my day consistently, I began to notice the difference in my mood and how much happier I was throughout the day. Getting some movement first thing leaves me feeling energized for the rest of the day, along with a sense of accomplishment and pride within myself.
Getting Ready
Over this past year I have become a firm believer in the “look good, feel good” mindset. In my personal experience, it is hard to have a bad day when I am confident and comfortable with the way I look, and vice versa. I have a hard time enjoying my day when I don’t like my outfit, my hair isn’t sitting right, and my confidence is low. This doesn’t mean that I spend hours getting ready every day or I’m always dressed up because realistically I don’t always have the time or energy for all of that. However, I will still take the necessary steps to making myself feel put together. This can be as simple as washing my hair, putting on some lip gloss, or even just throwing on some jewelry. The goal of this point is to get ready in a way that makes me feel like my most comfortable and confident version of myself for the particular day at hand.
Deciding to Have a Good Day
My favourite and possibly most important step is deciding what kind of day I want to have. This is a lot easier said than done, as bad days would never happen if you could just decide not to have them. However, I think this step helps to improve my mindset and create a positive outlook on the day. If I wake up dreading the day and tell myself that it is going to suck, it probably will because that is what I’m expecting from it. With this mindset, I tend to subconsciously seek out and notice only the negatives in the day. Tricking myself into believing I’m going to have a good day has, in turn, made me have good days. Instead of noticing the negatives, my expectations for the day are higher and I’m expecting more positive things to occur, so those are the experiences I find myself seeking out and noticing more. My favourite way to do this is to grab a journal and write about the current day as if it has already happened. However, I write it out exactly as I want it to go (my ideal day). Ex) If I have a presentation that I’m nervous about, I might write something along the lines of “I was nervous leading up to my presentation today, but once it started I felt super comfortable and it ended up going super well. I made a great impression and the professor loved it”. This tends to ease my nerves and makes me feel more confident going into an uncomfortable situation as such. Since I have told myself that it already happened and went well, I expect this outcome to be true. I like to go into deep detail when I do this and touch on every aspect of the day, from morning to night. When I’m done with the writing, I go about my day trying to follow along to what I wrote to the best of my abilities. Sometimes things don’t always go as planned and I go off track a bit, but overall I have found that my number of good days has drastically improved when I do this.