Why you can't find a morning routine that you enjoy...+ the solution.
Over the past few months especially, I've trawled through every Pinterest post, listened to and read up on the miracle morning routine, started reading new books, tried learning calligraphy, woken up at ridiculous hours, drunk scary amounts of coffee, and come to the following conclusion: people who aren't morning people cannot do anything worthwhile in the mornings.
I've been forcing myself to try all of these things and failed at every single one of them because I know my energy does not peak first thing in the morning; I know that I need a good couple of hours to come round to real life.
So, the great master solution? Find a time of day when doing these compact routines is useful to you. For me, that's just after work, either side of my evening meal. Because these routines don't necessarily give me energy or make me want to go out and do, they just give me a sense of settling and alignment. And so rather than having a flimsy morning routine and a flimsy evening routine, I combine the two to give me an hour or so of time that is just me time and keeps me grounded.
For those of you that care - my evening routine is as follows:
- Put on my comfy clothes and take off my makeup (nothing complicated, just a smush of Ultrabland from Lush taken off with a warm flannel)
- Brew a tea
- Write today's journal (a good assessment of sorts of the day)
- Take 5 minutes just to jot down any blog ideas from the day (just 5 minutes, no more)
- Something that challenges my perfectionism/creativity - at the minute this is a little typography style sketch
And that's it - nothing more, nothing less.
So what do we do with ourselves in the mornings?
You get some extra sleep, or do a bit of work - honestly, I find the morning the easiest time to write blog posts, hence why I'm writing this at 08:56 - my grammar isn't the greatest at this time of day, but my ideas come easier. Walk the dog, read or watch something that is going to set your day off to a good start - if you know you don't have a lot of energy in the morning, don't challenge yourself to do a huge list of things that include things like going to the gym, etc. Sticking to one thing keeps your to do list unbelievably manageable and leaves your more likely to actually accomplish the thing that you set out to do.
photo: Brighton, England