Welcome morning people to Goal 4, "Becoming a morning person". Together let’s begin our journey of positivity, mindfulness with one step at a time.
Happy Moment of The Week
As always, let’s take a moment and think about the one thing that brought us the joy, a smile on our face. It can be the smallest thing but if it made you feel good about you, about your life then just close your eyes and experience it again just for a moment.
For me, it happened just yesterday. I woke up early in the morning even when it was a Sunday. I stepped in our living room and my entire living room was lit up by the glory of sun rays. Sun rays were peeking through the blinds, making a pattern on the living room rug. The clean and picked up living room looked so beautiful to me at that moment that I just wanted to soak in that fresh and bright morning.
Now, it’s your turn friends, do let me know your moment of the week in the comments section. I would love to read all your bright and joyful moments.
This fresh start moment gave me the idea for this episode. I love to wake up early and start my day with a lot of time in my hand before all the morning rush starts. What about you all dears? Are you the morning person? If not, do you want to be the one? Like your trusted friend, I am here to give you actual tangible steps to achieve this goal for you.
Find your Why
First of all, the most important thing is to find your why? Why do you want to be a morning person? Is it because you always have to rush out of the door in a hurry for work everyday? Or Do you want to achieve your goal but can’t find time to work on it? Or is it to increase your productivity? Just think, find your why. That is the utmost important thing. You yourself have to trust your why. That is the only way you will follow through all the steps which we are going to discuss now. Because motivation will only help you for the first few steps but it’s your trust and determination on your “why” that will help you achieve your end goal.
So, assuming you have pinpointed your why, let’s discuss the steps to becoming a morning person.
Step 1 - It all starts the night before.
You always need a strong foundation to build a strong building. Same way, you need a good night's sleep if you want to rise bright and shiny the next morning. Those who are mom or dads can relate to this quickly. We work so hard to set a nice bedtime routine for our kids. We set a calm and relaxing bedtime routine for them with a bedtime story or a bath or by helping them calm down and unwind by turning off TV way before the actual bed time. But just pause for a second and think, what is the last thing that we do before our bedtime? Isn’t it watching something on TV or mindlessly scrolling the instagram feed? All those things stimulate our brains so much that it is extremely hard to go to bed with a peaceful mind. I totally understand it is our way to unwind and relax after the tiresome day and you all know, I am all for rewarding yourself and relaxation. But do I want it to cost me my morning? Absolutely not! Can we find the happy middle? How about we plan our bedtime routine? So, let’s get to it. Get a piece of paper and write down all the things you want to do on a daily basis before you go to bed. It can include watching a show, self care, may be reading a book. Now, you have to allocate the time to each item you listed. If it is getting too long, obviously you have cut short some of the things on your list based on your priority. That means you might be able to watch one episode of your favourite show instead of binge watching multiple episodes for the 100th time. You got the idea right? So that’s your step 1.
Step 2 - Reverse Planning
Finally, we are off to a great start or shall I say great end of the day? The question remains, how to decide what time do we need to wake up? Early for someone might be 5.00 for someone else it might be 6.00. So, how to decide what your early is? Here comes Reverse Planning.
Let me explain, consider you are a working professional and have to leave for work at 7.30 am Or you are a stay at home mom or work at home mom, and you want to get some stuff done before the morning chaos starts. This is for all of you. The only thing you need is a pen and paper. By this time, you might have realized, pen and paper are our best friend on this podcast as you will most definitely need them in each one of my episodes. Sorry I went on a tangent here. Anyway, now that you have a pen and paper, list down all the things you want to accomplish before you step out of the house for work. This is our brain
dump so include every minute detail. I strongly recommend to include at least one thing that brings you joy in this list.
After making a list, allocate an approximate amount of time needed to complete each of the activities. Done? Here comes the fun part. Start putting the time in reverse from 7.30 for each item till you reach the first item in your list. That is your “early” friends. Set your alarm to that time and the only thing to do after that is follow the next step .
Step 3 - It is called the 1,2 3 method..
I know a fancy name for the simplest idea ever. Next time the alarm rings, just count 1,2,3 and leap out of the bed, don’t give your brain time to process the alarm and suggest you a thousand ways to convince yourself how you need more sleep. Just count 1, 2, 3 in your mind and get out of the bed, touch your feet on the ground, stand all ready to conquer your morning. Just don’t overthink anything, get up and get out of your room and get going and start your day. I know this might sound hard or even silly to get up like that when all you can think of is the cozy bed and warm blanket but I kid you not when I say this works. Just try, just try to start your day without overprocessing that sound of alarm. You all with me till this step ? Good, then it's time to do some more planning.
Step 4 - Plan something to look forward.
Each day's a new beginning in a way. Every day you have two choices either to continue to sleep with your dreams or wake up and chase them. Plan something that you really love to do as the first thing in the morning. Hydrate yourself, eat something healthy or drink tea/coffee if you like to. Or if you really like to run or do any form of exercise, do that as the first thing in the morning. If you reward yourself, your body and mind will remember waking up as a joyful experience. It is more likely to turn into a habit if you love what you do in the morning.
Step 5 - Start slow
If you are thinking that okay Madhura this all sounds great but I simply can’t get out of the bed at 5.00, what can I do? I suggest you start slow. No need to go all cold turkey. What you can do is set an alarm 15 minutes earlier than your usual wake up time, try that for a week. If you are comfortable waking up 15 minutes earlier and still think you don’t have enough time for all your planned things in the morning, set an alarm for earlier time. Change your wake up time gradually. Instead of being hard on yourself for a few days and then giving up altogether later, it is always better to take it slow. Remember slow and steady wins the race.
Step 6 : Give yourself grace
It is okay to stumble on this journey. It is okay to fail a few times, don’t beat yourself for it. The important thing is not to give up. There is nothing positive about bashing yourself. It is a journey towards the better is what we are interested in. I want you all to enjoy this process and not beat yourself for not getting there on day 1. I want all of us to look forward to waking up to a bright and fun filled morning. I want us to find joy in the small things that we planned to do as first thing in the morning. I want you to wake up to a thought that something amazing is about to happen today.
Recap
I am sure that you will feel much much better once you make these changes and start getting up early. To recap the episode, please follow these steps to be a morning person
Step 1: It all starts the night before.
Step 2: Reverse Planning
step 3 : It is called the 1,2 3 method..
Step 4: Plan something to look forward to.
Step 5 : Start slow
Step 6 : Give yourself grace
Okay, now it is time for some action items, so this week, I want you to plan your night time routine and start waking up at least 15 minutes earlier this week. Remember, I am always here to help and support you. Feel free to let me know if you struggle in any way to follow any of these steps. We will work through this together.
On this note, I am always there to support, guide and walk a path towards a better version of us today and everyday. Let’s create our own cup of sunshine together..