Is Your Morning Routine Serving You?

Your alarm goes off; you hit snooze two more times until it’s the last possible minute to get up, or you will be late. You stumble to the coffee maker to grab your coffee, skipping breakfast. You tell yourself you will grab a healthy lunch later to eat at your desk. You stand in front of your closet door or clean clothes hamper (yes, I know what this is), trying to decide what to wear and what you have going on today. What day is it anyway? After you pull together an outfit and hope you remembered to put mascara on both eyes, you look around for your purse, your keys, your coffee mug, frantically getting out the door just in the nick of time… praying there are no red lights on your route this morning.

This was my morning routine for years when I worked my office job and even when I first started out as a small business owner. Many times, I would end up booked solid and start my day frantic with no time to make a healthy breakfast or lunch, so I grabbed convenient, fast food that certainly wasn’t doing my body any favours.

Does this sound at all familiar?

This morning routine was NOT serving me, and if you could relate to this at all, it likely isn’t serving you either.

We can set ourselves up to stay on track with our health and wellness goals (whatever they look like to you) by doing even 15-20 minutes of prepping the night before… our evening routine!

Creating an evening routine can stop decision fatigue. Decision fatigue is when we need to make decisions all day every day and finally, we don’t have the capacity to make another decision. Our reasoning starts to fade into the background, and we start to make lazy decisions or we avoid decisions (cough..finances) which have a negative impact.

Yuck… nobody needs that!

I like to explain it like this… You have limited decisions in a day that would be good quality decisions. If you need to decide if you are wearing a black shirt or a green shirt, having toast or a fruit bowl for breakfast, do you take a salad or a sandwich for lunch, should you make chicken, pork, or beef for dinner and just pick up take-out…? You have used 10 decisions right there, and you haven't even made it out the door for the day. I sure hope your job doesn't require you to make decisions! (winky face)

If we are constantly having to make decisions all day every day, eventually we get decision fatigue. By the time you get home from work, if someone asks for your opinion or what’s for dinner, you are liable to explode.

An article in Forbes magazine mentions the following:

“You’ll see I wear only gray or blue suits,” [Obama] said. “I’m trying to pare down decisions. I don’t want to make decisions about what I’m eating or wearing. Because I have too many other decisions to make.” President Obama mentions research that shows the simple act of making decisions degrades one’s ability to make further decisions. Steve Jobs is another person. He only wore a black turtleneck, blue jeans, and New Balance runners every day for this very reason. He wanted to save his decisions for more important ones.

Now, I am not saying to wear the same outfit every day, but there are some benefits to your decision-making to simplify your wardrobe by putting in some personal guidelines. These are like little rules… if this then that. No decision is required.

If you implement a few routines throughout your day using this method, it will help you not be so mentally exhausted. We start by creating an evening routine and some personal guidelines to work within. This helps us to create a wonderful morning routine that starts our day with a smile on our faces.

EVENING ROUTINE

Things you can add to your evening routine that will help to set up your morning routine to have you more relaxed and grounded to start your day:

Pick your clothes for the next day

Think about what is on your calendar and what you are doing the next day. What type of outfits will work well for the tasks of your day? Are there specific clothes you need to have ready like your gym clothes or runners?

Meal planning

Something that helps to keep your health and wellness goals on track is planning the night before to be sure that you have the food that is in your meal plan (whatever one you follow, ask me about healthy meal planning) and don’t forget your water intake needs.

Take out or plan dinner for the following night. What will you make for breakfast and lunch the following day? Cut and divide: fruits and veggies into daily breakfasts, snacks, or lunch items. If you are taking out the carrots to peel a few, peel a few more and prep your week. Roast a whole chicken that can be used for lunches or a 2nd meal made into something different like a casserole. So many great recipes out there for chicken leftovers. You can “pack a lunch” for those who work outside the home, or if you are at home working or tending to the kids during the day, you can still prepare your lunch ahead of time and keep it in the fridge or out where you can grab it throughout the day. Have a few snack foods on hand at all times that are on your eating plan and a healthy option for you to keep your body and brain fueled and running during the day. This keeps you on track.

Tidy your kitchen

Make sure to put away dinner dishes and run a load of dishes before bed so you always have clean dishes when you wake up. Put away the jar of peanut butter or whatever things have been left out on the counters from the day before. Take the things out of your kitchen that don’t belong in there. Figure out if you have a “hot spot” in your kitchen. A hot spot is a place in any room where once one thing is placed there, EVERYTHING gets placed there. Set a timer for 5 minutes each night and go put those things away. It stops the magnetic clutter effect.

Down-time/Self-care

Everyone needs downtime to relax and help their hormones stay regulated for sleep and waking cycles. This can be as easy as a skincare routine at night before bed or a hot bath with essential oils. Keeping yourself away from electronics is another great self-care habit to instill to bring on a good night’s sleep.

These 4 things will help you to create a calm morning. It is possible!

Good evening routines will flow into calm morning routines.

If you are looking for help with your evening or morning routines, you can book a personal wellness session with me, and we will get you set up and ready to conquer your day with ease, joy, and graceful flow.

Enjoy your evening tonight!

Samantha Ross

Holistic Wellness Coach