There are a good number of videos and tutorials on the internet that talk about morning habits everyone should develop or things you should do when you wake up in the morning. How about things you should stop doing in the morning?
You see, imbibing certain habits in the morning to help you become successful is just as important as getting rid of some if you are going to ensure maximum productivity at the end of the day.
From as little as ignoring your alarm clock to skipping breakfast, there are a few habits you should let go of as you take on the new.
In this blog post, we’ll be sharing with you 9 things you should stop doing in the morning.
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Checking through social media and emails
A good number of us are usually tempted to have a 5 minutes scroll across our social media channels.
Unfortunately, we end up spending over 5 minutes on these platforms, which is not a good way to start your day.
Likewise, checking through your email in the morning, we often attempt to “just check through” but eventually find ourselves responding to things that definitely could have waited another 30 minutes, and getting worked up over everything we have to accomplish before having a chance to really wake up.
Julie Morgenstern, author of the book “Never Check Email in the Morning,” says, if you start your morning this way, “You’ll never recover. Those requests and those interruptions and those unexpected surprises and those reminders and problems are endless,” she said. In fact, she advises waiting a full hour before wading into your inbox: “There is very little that cannot wait a minimum of 59 minutes.”
You can start by leaving your phone out of the bedroom. That way, it is far from reach. Perhaps you rely on your phone’s alarm clock to wake up. Now is a good time to consider getting a proper alarm clock.
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Doing your easiest tasks in the morning
It makes sense to tackle your most difficult tasks first since you never know what demands can pop up later on, disrupting your entire plan and messing up your day.
Take down the more challenging tasks while you are still energetic and active (usually in the morning) and deal with simpler ones as the day matures.
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Drinking coffee while preparing for work
If you think you need a cup of coffee first thing in the morning to stay active all day, you might need to have a rethink.
You see, your body naturally produces higher amounts of the stress hormone cortisol, which regulates energy, between 8 a.m. and 9 a.m.
Cortisol (a stress hormone that increases sugar in the bloodstream) levels are at their peak in the bloodstream in the first 30 minutes after waking up, which means you are naturally alert and energetic in the early hours of the day.
Drinking coffee immediately after waking up eventually creates the problem you are trying to avoid. How? The caffeine forces your body to produce less cortisol thereby slowing you down.
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Skipping breakfast
Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. Almost everyone knows that by now. But why is breakfast that important?
Your first meal of the day jump-starts your metabolism and replenishes blood-sugar levels so you can focus and be productive for the rest of the day.
It also keeps blood sugar even through the day, helps to fight daytime cravings, lowers incidents of heart disease, keeps your brain sharp, and helps with concentration and productivity.
Skipping breakfast, however, can affect your energy levels throughout the day. It can also affect your mood. Also, those who skip breakfast often experience a high level of fatigue early in the day and experience memory skills.
Skipping breakfast can also be linked to heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, obesity, and high cholesterol.
Lisa DeFazio, a registered dietitian recommends some easy breakfasts that are perfect for the workday, including fiber-filled oatmeal and protein-packed smoothies.
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Feeling moody or just being in a bad mood
Waking up to the thoughts of the pile of work you have to accomplish for the day can put you in a bad mood. But, try not to think about it.
A good way to avoid feeling this way first thing in the morning is to have a written list of the things you intend to achieve the night before. That way, your mind is organized, and not clouded with thoughts upon thoughts of work that you don’t even know where to start.
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Complaining
Quit complaining. As a matter of fact, this isn’t something you should do in the morning alone, but the entire day. Why? Because no one has ever achieved anything by merely complaining about it.
Oftentimes, we start our day complaining about how we do not want to wake up just yet, how we do not wish to go to work, and the like.
We may not know but these words have a tangible effect on our subconscious mind and if we keep complaining first thing in the morning, we are setting a negative intention for the rest of our day.
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Not meditating
Wikipedia defines meditation as a practice where an individual uses a technique—such as mindfulness or focusing their mind on a particular object, thought, or activity—to train attention and awareness and achieve a mentally clear and emotionally calm state.
One of the benefits of meditation is stress reduction. And less stress translates to less anxiety, which promotes emotional health, enhances self-awareness, lengthens attention span, and may reduce age-related memory loss.
You can start by doing a 5-10 minutes gratitude exercise or any other activity that will force you to pay attention to yourself and the present moment rather than getting lost in your thoughts.
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Ignoring/snoozing your alarm clock
I bet we’ve all done this at some point. We plead with ourselves to get 5 more minutes of sleep and eventually go overboard, say 1 hour extra in some cases.
It might be one of the difficult things to achieve in the morning, but disciplining yourself to wake up when your alarm clock goes on will help you stay calm and refreshed all day.
Most sleep specialists think that snooze alarms are not a good idea.
The reason is that every time you hit snooze and drift back to sleep; you start a new sleep cycle that will be interrupted in a few minutes, anyway. Since that cycle will end before it’s truly finished, chances are you’ll feel even more tired when you wake up for good.
To solve the snoozing alarm problem, you can try getting into bed at a reasonable hour the night before and you won’t need to hit the snooze because you must have gotten an adequate amount of sleep.
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Leaving Your Bed Unmade
There’s a part of your brain that likes achievement, no matter how small it is. When you make your bed, something in you simply feels that you’ve accomplished something, and that boosts your courage to confront other stuff in your day.
10. Worrying about yesterday
Hey! Yesterday is gone. Focus on what’s ahead, not what’s gone. Live in the present so that you’ll be happy and energized.
lastly, learning to make these adjustments to your mornings might take a while, but once achieved, you’ll notice the positive results it will yield.
Thank you.