My Morning Routine

Hello, Book Thinkers family. The topic of today's video is morning routines. I have a morning routine that I talk about all the time, so people always ask, what steps do you have in your morning routine, as well as what books or what references can I study so that I can learn a little bit more about the importance of morning routines? So today I'm going to talk about those things. I have a 12-step morning routine. Now it's always changing, but I kick it off every single morning without fail, no matter what, because I know that even if I'm not motivated, if I can start my day off with a bang, then I'll have a accomplish something. No matter what, those activities are compounding over time. So to start, where did I learn about morning routines and what books or resources can you use to study them? There are 3 books that I think you should start with, and I'll talk about the order in which I read them. So The Miracle Morning by Hal Elrod. This is a fantastic resource for anybody who's just starting off with morning routines, who wants to learn about the activities of those people that are successful, what they're doing and why they're doing them. This was the first book that I read. I'll toss that over there. Next was My Morning Routine by Benjamin Spall and Michael Zander. This book is a collection of morning routines from some of the most successful people in the world and why they include those activities in their morning routine. I think it's a great resource. And then last but not least, something I read towards— I think it was the beginning of this year— was The 5 AM Club by Robin Sharma. How do people get astonishing results through their morning routines? This is a great resource. So after reading these books and participating in an accountability group that I have where I track activity with my friends, I thought, geez, I should stack some of these activities in the morning. Well, what activities do I want to accomplish before my workday kicks off and why? So it all starts with activity number 1, waking up in the morning, washing my face, and drinking a bunch of water. That's one thing that a lot of people don't do. They don't drink enough water. So I have this Build Life water bottle. With markers throughout the day. It's 1 gallon, so if I drink this every day, I know I've had enough water. Washing my face— I've always had skin issues. I think that's something that I need to do every single morning, otherwise I'm not going to have a very pretty complexion. So number 2, every single morning I read my daily affirmations. These are things that I want to be part of my active mind. I've actually framed my daily affirmations and they sit right to the right of my desk. So when I sit down at my computer in the morning and I open up my spreadsheet and I start my morning routine, I can read these daily affirmations. I make sure that they're part of my mind. So I'll put that away. Number 3, I post my Instagram schedule and I post it on my Instagram story. And I think that that's a new activity for me. I want to make sure that I'm hitting it every single day. So it's nice. I can just check it off on the box, but posting my morning routine or my routine for every single day has given everybody in the Book Thinkers community a little taste for what I do and why I do it. And it shows that I'm working hard. It holds me externally accountable to everybody else, and I get a lot more work done that way. Number 4, I read a page from The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday. This is one of my favorite books ever, so thank you, Alec Clement. He's the guy that gave me the book. The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday is a collection of 366 meditations on wisdom, perseverance, and the art of living. Every single day, you'll read a passage from one of the great Stoic philosophers like Marcus Marcus Aurelius or Epictetus. There are so many to name, and they've all provided such great wisdom for us to kick off and start our day with. I highly recommend that you check out this book. So after that, I do a Duolingo Spanish lesson. I am learning Spanish. Yo aprendiendo español. And it's difficult for me. Muy difícil. But I'm learning slowly. Aprendiendo despacio. The Duolingo Spanish app has given me a little bit of a fun way to learn Spanish. I don't live in a Spanish-speaking country, I don't have friends that speak Spanish to me every day. So that kind of gets me over that barrier and gets as part of my morning routine. I get a little bit of that Spanish flavor, which is really nice. Step number 6, every single morning I focus on something that I'm grateful for. I have this tattoo on my wrist. You might not be able to see it in the video, but it's just the numbers 1, 2, and 3. And every single day I look down at my wrist and I think of 3 things that I'm grateful for. And then I go onto my computer and using Evernote, which is an online journal platform or mobile journal platform, I journal about something that I'm grateful for, and gratefulness has impacted my life in such a positive way. It's so nice to wake up, be proactive instead of reactive, and start your day off with positivity. That's been huge for my life. Step number seven is always a little interchangeable, but it's just a fun little activity that I like to learn. Right now, I'm focusing on the Rubik's Cube, which is a nice little mental puzzle to figure out in the morning. I'm practicing, and this is how far I can get without. Actually using any directions or anything like that. And it's just, I don't know, it's a fun little activity. I actually included juggling recently in that, so I can now juggle a little bit. I'm still learning, but that's been a fun activity as well. Number 8, this is another fun one. I always like to include something that's a little physical in my morning routine, get the juices flowing in the morning. Right now it's a little bit more passive. I'm in a basketball league and I want to be able to dunk consistently, so every single morning I'm doing 100 calf raises. Kicks off my morning right. It gets me out of the chair. Gets me to do something that it's a little bit more physical. Number nine, I post on Instagram, and usually it's a piece of content like this. It's either a video or a picture, but I want to make sure that every single day I'm providing consistent value as part of my morning routine. I haven't skipped a day now for geez, I think it's been a couple months. So it's nice to be able to check off that box. Number ten is what Gary Vaynerchuk calls the dollar eighty strategy. Every single morning, I search a popular hashtag. Tag in the book community, and I go out there and I provide my 2 cents, or I provide value to other people's posts. Everybody's creating content, but oftentimes we don't get a lot of interaction. So it's nice for me to go out there and give back to the community, answer people's questions, comment on their posts, tell them that they're doing a nice job, just provide some positive, uh, stuff out there in the world for other Instagrammers or people in the community, people on the Book Thinkers page, etc. Number 11, I read a page from Padre Rico, Padre Pobre, which is Rich Dad Poor Dad in Spanish. As I mentioned earlier, I'm trying to learn Spanish, or I'm in the process of learning Spanish. It's very slow, but this is getting me used to seeing words that I'm not learning on my Duolingo app, saying them out loud, reading them out loud. I'm always looking things up, so that's been a nice fun part of the process. And then last but not least, step number 12. I meditate using the app Headspace. That has changed my life. I've been meditating on and off for a couple years now, but since I got this meditation pillow, I now have a dedicated space to meditate every single day. I think I'm 60 days in. The app actually tracks your progress, keeps your streak. I'm 60 days in, and I feel so refreshed when I end my morning routine with meditation, and then I hit the ground running. With my workday. So that's my morning routine. That's what I currently have in it. And I'd like to round out the video by talking a little bit about the compound effect, which has been so important in my life. These small activities, they compound over time. And you and I, we could have one or two activities different, but over time, those small little changes add up to massive changes. They add up to disproportionate outcomes. So I think it's very important to incorporate a morning routine. Even on your worst day, you're still getting things done. before anything can hit the fan and things can go wrong. So I hope you found value in this video. Comment below, tell me about some things that you think I should add into my morning routine. I always love hearing feedback on that. And with that, I hope everybody has a fantastic day. Bye.