A Thirty-Minute Gift: Reward Yourself with a New Morning Routine

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Don’t Go Back to Sleep…

What would you do if you woke up 30-minutes early? Before the alarm. Before you NEED to get up? Would you go back to sleep or use it as a gift?

“The breezes at dawn have secrets to tell you.
Don’t go back to sleep!
You must ask for what you really want.
Don’t go back to sleep!”
-          Rumi

I have heard of this quote for years, and if I ever wake up just a little before my alarm I consider staying up, but my Indulger usually gets the better of me and I choose to go back to sleep.

What can you do in thirty minutes that would be worth losing that little catnap? What would be a gift to you? What do you WANT to do with that time?

  • Meditate, exercise, or journal?

  • Take a leisurely shower?

  • Get a “jump on your day”?

  • Spend quality time with someone?

Your morning routine can set your day in motion with joy and ease or panic and chaos. You can be filled with confidence and clarity or anxiety and worry. You can enjoy connection with others or brush them off because you “don’t have time”.

The Perils of the Snooze Button

I set my alarm to wake me up with the radio, rather than a jarring alarm. Softly, slowly, I wake up to the jolly banter of my favorite radio team – Anna and Raven. If I time it right, I can listen to the “Couples Court”, where the radio audience helps to solve a couple’s dilemma (I think of this as research - did you know I coach couples?).

More often than not, this “routine” has turned into a delay tactic; the radio teases me with one entertaining bit after another. I really “should” be getting up and dressed, then going downstairs to say hi to my early-bird husband (who is at his computer by 6:30 am), make my breakfast, and then head to my home office.

I usually get to my first appointment of the day with little time to spare. I start the day feeling disappointed or undisciplined because I didn’t do what I said I would do this time – ease into my day and take a few minutes to gather my thoughts and plan out my morning. I’ve given my Inner Judge the opportunity it needs to berate me once again.

A Better Way to Launch Your Day

Every morning we have a choice – to wake up with the “secrets of the dawn” and use that extra time wisely, or we can let our Indulger keep hitting the snooze button and then suffer from our Judge telling us we screwed up again. Based on my years of coaching, there are at least 50% of my readers who wish they had a better morning routine.

I challenge you to rethink and rework your morning routine, designing it to launch your day with ease and flow. What do you want? What would make your day go more smoothly? What new habit would support you? It takes weeks to develop new habits, so declare what you want, celebrate the intermittent wins, and stick with it. Listen to your Wiser Self – Don’t go back to sleep!

Now if I would just go to bed 30 minutes earlier…