#20 : 5 Surefire Ways To Jumpstart Your Day
Have you experienced days where you literally had to drag yourself out of bed in the morning?
For some, the moment you opened your eyes you can't wait to jump out of bed, all fired up and ready to crush your list of To Do's..
but...
for majority of the population, getting out of bed in the morning can be a long arduous process. All you want to do is just to press the snooze button, pull the covers over your head and sleep in.
It needn't have to be this way...
5 Surefire Ways To Jumpstart Your Day
Successful leaders and entrepreneurs from the world over advocate these 5 methods to conquer and seize their day.
* Get up at 5am
Robin Sharma, a famous motivational speaker and self help guru is a huge proponent of this rule.
According to him, the time between 5am to 8am is the Golden Hour where our willpower, mental focus and energy are at its optimum. There's nothing like crushing your never-ending list of To Do's by tackling it first thing in the morning, when the whole world is fast asleep.
* Meditate
Silencing the "monkey mind" can make a huge world of difference to your day. As you gently close your eyes, quieten your mind and focus on your breathing, you inadvertently set your intention and tone for the day. It keeps you focus, contented and more optimistic as you face life's daily challenges.
And here's the good news for men! Meditation is said to boost men's testosterone levels and decrease their cortisol levels resulting in stronger muscles and even helps them to last longer in bed too! (A cheaper alternative to Viagra maybe?)
* Exercise
In Robin Sharma's 20:20:20 rule, he advocate to spend the first 20 minutes of our day exercising and sweating it out. Exercising not only releases dopamine and serotonin levels that makes us feel naturally good and happy, it also helps to boost our metabolic rate. So get out of your house and put your running shoes on. If outdoor exercise if not your kind of thing, you might want to check out Home Workout From Hell (PS: Try at your own risk)
* Fuel Up Your Body
Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. A healthy and wholesome breakfast helps to boost our metabolism rate, keeps our blood sugar levels stable and reduces the tendency to binge in later parts of the day. Eating right also helps to improve our concentration and increase our productivity levels.
While Malaysians love to dig in to the spicy sambal nasi lemak and roti canai for breakfast, these high calories and carb-laden foods could spell serious trouble if consumed daily. Try replacing it with healthier options such as smoothies, breakfast bowls, granola, salads or fresh fruits instead. Still have no idea of what to eat? Try this
* Journaling
I honestly suck at this. Tried journaling in the past and it only lasted me a good two months before the journal was discovered a year later...buried beneath a pile of books.
According to Huff Post, journaling on a daily basis helps to stretch your IQ as there is a positive correlation between language learning and intelligence. As you pen down your thoughts, it indirectly helps to bring you into a state of mindfulness bypassing your frustrations or anxieties and helps you to focus on the now.
Experts have found journaling to be therapeutic and promote healing - emotionally, spiritually and psychologically. When you expressed your thoughts, you are giving yourself the permission to speak your truth and share your story as you see and feel it. Indirectly, you are releasing all the negative and pent up emotions that contributes to stress, anxiety and depression.
Perhaps it's time for me to dust off that journal and start writing again...
Now, if you are determined to make 2018 your year, it's time to buckle up and change.
Change is hard at the beginning, messy in the middle and gorgeous at the end
---Robin Sharma
Just pick one method and do it consistently for 5 consecutive days and see if it sticks. Come back on the 6th day and comment below. I'd love to hear from you.
Good luck!
)
KarinzDailyGrind is determined to kickstart her day with a bang and crush her 2018 goals. When she is not found sipping her must have Kopi-O-Kaw (thick black coffee) at the local coffee shops, she is found buried behind her Macbook and honing her craft in digital marketing.
If you resonate with her posts, do Upvote | Follow | Comment | Resteem. Or DM her on Discord. She promised to chew, not bite.
Maybe im old, i really can just jump start. Getting up is not a problem for me. And often i woke up before the alarm. perhaps it has to do with stress. :(
Or perhaps it could be out of habit. But regardless of what causes you to wake up early, what is more important is what you do when you are awake. It is what you do in your waking moments, day in day out that will change the course of your life.
I do three of these already, get up early, have breakfast and go to the gym to come home and have second breakfast before work haha. it works well. I should do the other two more often. Thanks for the reminder.
You are welcome @insideout. We need reminders like these (me included) to get us up and running towards a more productive day. Else we will end up waking up one day and realised that life has passed us by and we are nowhere near where we aspire to be
That is so true and sad. I can't believe we are already in Feb 2018... slow down PLEASE haha. Time to get up and get productive.
Oh yeah! Crushed it @insideoutlet! You can do it!
Yeapppp ;p I still a loser in this department ...
No worries there is hope :) Just wait for @maverickfoo's latest edition of #MiniRebuke. Guaranteed to jolt anyone into submission mode and surrender :D
I thought you were talking directly to me when you mentioned that the majority of the population had troubles waking up! I will try some of this tips to try and get better at starting my day.... except maybe the one about waking up at 5 a.m since i'm sort of a night owl.
Haha.. I am typing this reply at 6:15 am and trust me @lunaticpandora, coming from a night owl myself, if I can do it you can do it too! I have started to heed my own advice and I found that indeed like what Robin Sharma had advocate, the benefits of waking up at 5am and working during the Golden Hour is simply amazing.
With clarity indeed comes power to accomplish bigger things in life.
So I encourage you to start small with just one method and eventually progressed on to other methods and document how your life has changed. You might just be surprised that it isn't soo hard after all ;)
Good post!
John Lee Dumas, who hosts the Entrepreneur on Fire podcast built his 6-figure business with this as one of his daily habits. He begins work at 7 AM after waking up at 5.30 AM, and finishes up most of his work by 10 AM - which is when most people start their work after getting into their offices, having their rounds of coffee and looking over their to do lists.
Thanks for sharing. I heard of John Lee Dumas but have yet to tune in to his podcast. I will be sure to check it out...
What a wonderful post! Thank you for sharing it with us.
When thinking about it, I pretty much follow all of the advice you gave here but still consider myself "not a morning person" or "a people person" in the morning. Coffee helps :)
Hi @zen-art, I too was not so much of a morning person until I decided to put Robin Sharma's theory to test. It has so far yielded very encouraging results. While coffee certainly helps, perhaps getting a good night's sleep helps. It is better to have 5 hours of deep sleep than to have 8 hours of interrupted sleep.
Thank you so much for this. I've been struggiling like hell the past few days when dragging myself out of bed.
I like the point about exercising first thing in the morning. Sounds like a real good way to get the endorphins firing from the get go. I'll make sure I swing by and let you know how I'm getting on with my new routine.
Thanks for the post, hope you are having a great day!
Awesome @calumam! I highly encouraged you to start exercising if that resonates well with you. There is really nothing like sweating it out, waking up our senses and staying fit before plonking ourselves down at work. Try it for 66 days as Robin Sharma says and I am sure, you will begin to see wonders in your life.
Do come back, tag and update me. I'd love to hear your progress. You have a great day too! :)
It's on! I'm going to take myself for a run tomorrow morning before I start my writing.
Thanks for the encouragement :)
You are welcome! I am all for encouraging myself and others to learn and grow to be the best version of themselves
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Can i have your Kopi-O-Kaw to start my day plsss
LOL..Any time babe!
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