In today’s workforce, the early bird almost always catches the worm. Working for yourself does mean you have the freedom to work whenever it’s convenient for you, but there’s no secret that business thrives during those 9-5 hours regardless.
If you’re a night owl, you may find it difficult to reach others during their normal business working hours, or you could even risk an unexpected responsibility or commitment taking over your evenings.
This is why it’s best to be productive and knock out as much as possible earlier in the day. Don’t really consider yourself to be a morning person? Here’s how you can become one.
Develop a Morning Routine That Motivates You
A solid morning routine gets you motivated and energized to perform well for the day. If you’re not a typical morning person, you can ease into loving mornings by creating the right routine to start your day.
Choose activities that are meaningful to you, effective, and practically get you excited to jump out the bed. For example, preparing a delicious cup of coffee or tea while you read for 5 minutes might sound appealing to you. That accomplished feeling of knocking out your daily workout before 8 am may also be motivating.
Find the right combination of morning rituals to look forward to easing you into the habit of becoming an early riser.
Avoid Hitting Snooze
Hitting snooze multiple times doesn’t do anyone favors. To avoid ignoring your alarm in the morning, consider downloading a smart alarm app.
There are apps that prompt you to solve a math problem before hitting snooze in the morning. This helps your brain and body activate quicker so you can get up at the right time.
Also, don’t forget to start going to sleep earlier so you can be well rested when your alarm goes off. Once you ignore snoozing your alarm for 1-2 weeks, you’ll find it much easier to wake up early and embrace mornings.
Make a Morning Commitment
Sometimes, making a commitment to someone is easier to stick to than when you make commitments to yourself. When you have someone else depending on you and holding you accountable, it makes it difficult to think of letting them down.
Making an early morning commitment to someone can help you fight through any obstacles and train yourself to become a morning person.
I used to wake up pretty early and while I loved it, I then slowly started shifting back to sleeping in and starting my day later. My sister recently asked me to take her to track practice a few mornings a week at 5:20 so that commitment has been helping me get back into the routine of becoming an early riser.
Your commitment can be something as simple as choosing an accountability buddy and emailing or texting each other when you wake up and start your morning routine each day.
Start Looking Forward to Breakfast
Teens can probably get away with waking up at the last minute and running out the door without grabbing breakfast, but the older you get, the more your body craves food for daily fuel.
Start working breakfast back into your schedule and plan out a nutritious, protein-packed meal to look forward to in the morning to start your day. Once you start eating and moving, there will be little desire to get back in bed and you’ll get a more efficient start to your day.
Training yourself to become a morning person is all about creating a habit and consistency which is why anyone can do it. The first 2 weeks might be tough but after that, it will become second nature and your productivity will soar as a result.
Do you consider yourself a morning person or not? How does it affect your work life?
Choncé Maddox
Choncé Maddox is a professional writer who recently left her job in the web design industry to produce killer content and manage her own writing business full time. She is passionate about helping entrepreneurs be more productive and create a life they love by doing fulfilling work. On the side, she runs a podcast and blogs about getting out of debt at MyDebtEpiphany.com.