Why Are Morning Routines Healthy?
Do you have a morning routine promoting healthy living, or are you struggling in morning fog each day? We writers have a job that takes a lot of mental energy. We take the abstract images and concepts in our heads and put them into words coherent enough for readers to understand.
Not every human has this knack, and even writers must practice to use this gift of communication well.
To use the mental acuity we demand from our body’s brain, we must take care of ourselves mentally, emotionally, physically, and even spiritually. So what better way to start off our day than with a morning routine meant to help you live a healthy life.
I’ve done research into the practices of healthy, successful, and productive people, and have found many common denominators to their individual successes tied to real studies done by psychologists.
Below I’ve listed out five common points of a healthy morning routine. These can be done in the order most useful and convenient to yourself. As you read, think about the ways you could implement these steps in your morning.
1. Get In Your Healthy Headspace
What’s the first thing you say to yourself when your alarm goes off? Five more minutes?
When you remember your to-do list, what emotion pops into your head? Dread?
What does your body feel like when you get out of bed? Achy and tired?
It’s important to start the day off with the right emotions and self-talk. When I started experimenting with these types of self-talk exercises, I thought it was a little silly.
What would really change if I told myself in the morning I would confront and move past my negative self-talk today?
Why do I want to tell myself I feel great today when I feel like going back to bed for another eight hours?
Well, what we tell ourselves makes a huge impact on your mind. If you’re anything like myself, you tell yourself a lot of lies throughout the day. Stuff like I can’t do this. Or we cling onto how bad our bodies are feeling instead of focusing on how great we could make them feel today.
When you begin flipping around your thoughts, it’s surprising how much your mood and productivity level can change.
Adding time in the morning to ponder the day’s potential helps me get past the snooze button and on my feet with a little more spring in my step, and I believe it can help you, too.
Having a regular writing routine is important, but it’s equally important to give yourself breaks and to prioritize self-care. Using this workbook, you’ll be able to create a healthier, more balanced life while continuing to make progress on your writing goals. Self-care isn’t a luxury—it’s a necessity—and this workbook will help you get the most out of your creative process.
Send it!
2. Fuel Up
Next it’s time to take care of our bodies. First thing in the morning you should be drinking a glass of water. This comes even before breakfast.
Drinking water in the morning helps you feel energized, and will actually help your digestion throughout the day.
Put a water bottle or cup of water by your bed at night so it’s easy to hydrate in the morning.
After water comes breakfast. Skipping breakfast is unhealthy for you.
Whether you prepare your breakfast the night before, cook for yourself, or buy yogurt at the store, be sure to eat something nutritional. Think of protein, a fruit or vegetable, and some carbs for extra energy.
Now, I’m no nutritionalist so am not an expert on what foods to eat in the morning. But basically don’t eat sugar laden pancakes every morning, it’s just not healthy.
3. Wake Up, Brain
My mind is fuzzy in the morning, so the next step in my morning routine is one of my favorites.
You want to wake up your mind with some reading, journaling, and devotion.
Reading: Reading will help you set your day off right and bright. Whether fiction or non-fiction, I find value in both to sit down and read for a half hour or so.
Journaling + Goals: Every successful person will say you need to have your goals at the forefront of your mind. For me, journaling in prose helps me get out any bad feelings or dwell on good feelings and thoughts, and then writing out my goals helps me remember what I’m working toward and what to make a priority today.
Devotion: If I don’t align my mind with what is truly important in the world, my head goes all over the place for the rest of the day. I always set away some time in the morning to read my Bible and pray before getting into the nitty gritty to-do list.
Bonus: The three points above are often hard for me to do once the day starts rolling, so setting aside time in the morning to do these things helps. Keep this in mind for other hard to complete tasks.
Related Resource: “How to Use Journaling to Boost Your Writing Success”
4. Energize Your Body
Next, writing is a sedentary activity, so get your blood pumping in the morning with some exercise, and cool down with a nice stretch.
You don’t need to go to the gym, or take a run. Maybe take a walk, garden, or dance. For more intense workouts try planks, push ups, crunches, bicycle crunches, and squats.
While exercising is not always pleasant, it does help you feel better after five hours of sitting at a desk.
And don’t forget to stretch! If you exercise without stretching, your muscles will get tight and then you’ll have other problems.
Try to take forty-five minutes every two-three days to exercise.
Want to stop procrastinating? This free workbook will help you to:
- Identify your fears.
- Consider the effect that these fears have on your life.
- Develop a strategy to confront these fears and overcome them.
- Learn how to move forward despite your fears to make your writing dreams a reality.
5. Get Ready For the Day
Take a shower, groom, put on some nice clothes, and feel good about yourself. I’ve found when you dress nice you show up to your job (writing), with a little more intention and confidence.
Then look at all you accomplished in such a little time! Your day is off to a great start.
What’s Your First Healthy Morning Routine Step?
You don’t need to implement all of these steps of a morning routine at once. Something like this is best taken with baby steps and built upon.
With that in mind, pick one thing, perhaps drinking water in the morning, and try it. Once drinking water in the morning becomes a habit, pick another habit.
If you’d rather go on autopilot and not worry about planning your morning routine, there are apps out there to help you keep healthy habits.
Right now I’m using the Fabulous app. What I like about this app is that it’s encouraging, challenging, and they explain the reasoning and psychology behind the habits you are practicing. (I love learning about psychology. ?)
Finally, don’t expect to see a positive difference overnight. It takes repetition of a routine to see its effect on your day, so be patient and keep working. Then one day you’ll look back and wonder why you didn’t start a morning routine sooner.
Keep storytelling,
Sarah
Before you go, here are a couple additional blog posts to help you live a healthy and energized writing life.
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S.J. Siedenburg is a thriller & fantasy novelist, an editor, and a bibliophile with a passion for stories and helping writers finish their novels. She’s the author of the guidebooks Character Presentation, Before the First Draft, and the How to Write a Novel online course. Six of her short stories have been published through writing contests. Sarah lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband and their Cavalier King Charles Spaniel.
“The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” —John 1:5