My answer? Creating a morning routine that is so beautifully designed and choreographed that it will last a lifetime.

Yes, in two focussed hours, you can build a routine that will boost your health, productivity, creativity, relationships, and energy for the rest of your days. As far as investments go, this is as good as it gets.

Today, we’ll dive deeper into this brilliant investment, starting with the following infographic:

Why Bother Building a Morning Routine?

As illustrated below, the choices you make in the morning echo throughout your day. In addition, morning choices tend to be self-sustaining. Good choices make it easier to maintain a consistent sleep pattern that, in turn, makes it easier to make good choices the next morning. In contrast, bad choices lead to erratic sleep schedules and more bad morning choices.

Imagine the difference between a lifetime spent repeating the pattern on the left and a lifetime spent repeating the pattern on the right. Which one do you want in your own life and the lives of those you care about?

The left-hand option? Awesome 🙂 Let’s build it!

3 Steps to a Lifelong Morning Routine

Humans are not robots. We cannot simply decide to establish a good routine, download one from the internet, and live happily ever after.

Instead, we must ensure that executing our morning routine day after day remains a deeply rewarding experience. This requires three steps:

1. Commit. You must desire the rewards promised by a lifelong morning routine enough to invest the effort needed to complete steps 2 & 3.
2. Take the time needed to design a routine that is uniquely you. It should contain some of your favorite things and make it easy for you to get emotionally invested.
3. Choreograph your routine to a morning playlist. This extra step creates an effortless flow between the different elements of your routine.

The first step is where it all begins. The second will make sure your routine doesn’t disintegrate with the first challenge that crosses your path. And the third is the secret ingredient that makes it last a lifetime.

The Foundation: Rediscover Your Rhythm

The first step in a good morning is to wake up refreshed at an hour that allows you to comfortably complete your routine. Such a consistent sleep-wake rhythm is embedded in our genes, but, unfortunately, it often gets disrupted by all the artificial stimuli in our modern environment.

You must rediscover this natural rhythm to build a solid foundation beneath your morning routine. This can be done in three steps:

1. Make sure your latest allowable wake-up time is set in stone. It doesn’t need to be super-early, it only needs to be fixed (weekends included).
2. Build a quickfire wake-up ritual that stimulates all five senses. Repetition of such a ritual at a similar time each morning is just what your Circadian rhythm needs.
3. At night, allow yourself some time to wind down in a space with minimal sensory stimulation. Learn to time this wind-down just right to avoid going to bed when you know you won’t be able to sleep.

Our modern world presents many temptations that disrupt our natural Circadian rhythm. Follow these three steps to rediscover how it feels to be in sync with life, and these temptations will quickly lose their appeal.

The Morning Movement Fun Factor

Exercise is one of the most commonly recommended components of a good morning routine, with good reason. Not only is it good for your health; it’s also great for quickly getting you up to speed and energized for the day.

But none of this will matter if exercise devolves into a huge battle of will every morning. No, you must make sure that your morning movement is fun and convenient. Without these elements, your noble morning exercise ambitions won’t last a month, let alone a lifetime.

Finding such activities is easier than you might think, especially if you smartly integrate them into your choreographed morning playlist. I found five, including gems like bad dancing and double-time yoga. If you think about it, I’m sure you can find some of your own.

The Value of a Good Plan

It gets a lot easier to have a great day if you have a clear sense of where you’re going. That’s why a quick revision of your most important tasks deserves a slot in your morning routine.

But we must be wary here. Planning can easily turn into a tedious chore and, if it does, it threatens the permanence of your routine. That’s why I recommend doing your planning organically throughout the day and in the evening, only to add the final touches each morning.

This natural way of planning requires a system that allows you to easily note down tasks whenever they pop into your head and organize them with minimal effort. For me, this system is Google Tasks.

Accept the World’s Wisdom

Read. The wisdom of the world is at the disposal of anyone who does. And there’s no better time to fit some valuable non-fiction reading into your schedule than the morning.

A quick 10-minute session every morning will bestow upon you the wisdom of about ten great thinkers each year. For me, this turned out to be a lifechanging habit — one I wish I’d started many years ago.

The key to sustaining this precious habit is to read in areas that genuinely interest you. It pays to do your research beforehand to make sure you buy books that will grab your attention. Also, there’s no shame in not finishing a book that fails to live up to expectations.

Discover the Perfect Breakfast

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. A perfect morning meal will deliver you energized and craving-free to your lunch break, helping you stay healthy and get more done.

This is the morning routine element I’ve spent the most time perfecting. And after years of trial and error, I think I’ve finally found the best solution.

My ideal breakfast contains 16 healthy ingredients (mainly nuts, seeds, and berries) that can be combined into a delicious meal in 2 minutes flat.

This blend is a pure joy to eat and boasts the perfect breakfast nutritional profile. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

Taking Things to the Next Level

The points outlined above deserve a place in any good morning routine. But, like most things in life, there’s another level available to enthusiasts.

First, try to incorporate a practice to gradually condition your mind towards a calm and positive space. Journalling and meditation are common candidates. My preference is an advanced form of affirmation training I like to call my Personal Constitution.

Second, I highly recommend taking one or two minutes out of your morning to score how you performed yesterday. This habit is great for keeping you securely on your growth path and helping you to really get to know yourself. I use a spreadsheet called a Graph of Life for this purpose.

Third, consider getting yourself an accountability buddy to maximize your consistency, while simultaneously improving an important relationship. An accountability buddy is someone who will be waiting for your call early in the morning and be disappointed if you don’t show up. If there is someone in your life you know you should be spending more time with but never seem to get to, this is your chance.

Start Simple, Keep Innovating

Try to be as pragmatic as possible when you embark on this journey. Avoid designing an overly complex and time-consuming routine. Start simple, including only the elements you think you’ll enjoy the most.

After your first dabble into morning routine choreography, you may well find it to be surprisingly interesting and engaging. Then, you can ride that natural motivation to experiment with new elements.

If you just go with the flow and keep innovating, it’s only a matter of time before you attain the coveted rank of MORNING MASTER 🙂

Unless otherwise stated, all images were created by Janet Cloete.