Benefit from Building a Daily Ritual
Written By: Matt Mignona
Very few people will agree that they wake up to the first sound of their alarm clock. Most of us hit the snooze button several times before we finally get out of the bed. Once you are out of the bed, everything is done in a hurry, and you may end up not taking your breakfast because you are running late. Despite all your efforts, you still make it to work late, you’re stressed, and you end up having a bad day. If you are a victim of this, you will agree that it is because of a lack of a daily routine.
When you start your day with healthy habits and concentrating on what you need and what is important in your life, you will find yourself doing things consciously and even subconsciously without straining or stressing yourself. You will live a fruitful and productive life without struggling so much.
Sustained happiness is only achievable if you take the right actions in life daily. Your actions should be driven and guided by specific practices that will enable you to yield positive results. The actions you take today will either impact your future negatively or positively. Therefore, if you want to be happy at your workplace, have happy relationships, or be happy in anything else, here are four important daily rituals that will guide you to achieve sustained happiness:
Priming Happiness Routine
This is a ritual that puts your mind and body in a positive state. It is a routine that conditions your mind to be in a better position when you wake up in the morning. The priming routine involves healthy habits that, if followed, will enable you to move closer to achieving your daily goals. All you have to do is to follow them to the letter. The following are the priming exercises you must do every morning before having your breakfast and before taking your morning shower:
Celebrate Gratitude
In a layman’s language, gratitude is the ability to feel and express appreciation and thankfulness. When you express thankfulness or gratitude, you improve your emotional, mental, and physical well-being. You appreciate the things you have and the people around you. This gives you a sense of belonging and attachment to people and what you have. Each and every morning, you can experience gratitude by writing down three major things that you are thankful for.
You can also download the Gratitude Log worksheet that will help you keep what you’re grateful for in front of you.
Write Down Your Goals
Setting goals is one thing, and achieving them is another. It is easy to set goals, but it is hard to achieve them. When setting goals, it is vital to set measurable and achievable goals that you can work towards. The most important step in setting up a goal in life is defining the goal. Defining here involves figuring out what you want. By understanding what you want, you will be able to know what you need to do to get to where you want to be or what you want to achieve.
Once you have defined your goals, the next step is to write down your goals. You need to write down the things that inspire you the most, the things you desire the most, or the things that you consider most important in your life. You should think big. Huge tasks or goals will make you ambitious and work hard towards achieving them. When you achieve one of the big goals, you will feel motivated to work harder and achieve more.
It is important to emphasize that you should write your goals in the order of priority; what you prioritize most in your life should come first, and what is not so important to you should come last. This will help you ensure that the most important things are planned for and that you work towards achieving them first.
Your inner strength is determined by how much you believe in yourself. If you believe that you can achieve anything you set your mind and body to, then nothing will defeat you; you can actually achieve anything. Believing in yourself gives you determination and self-esteem. With determination, you will be able to do a lot of things and achieve your goals.
You can download the Plan on a Page worksheet and use it to help you determine your vision, define your goals, create an actionable plan, and keep your goals in front of you.
Recognize What Would Make the Day Complete
Write down three important things you feel will make your day complete once you achieve them. The three things should give you a sense of accomplishment once you do them. Of course, there are many things you can do in a day, but here you just need three that you can successfully complete before going to bed. The point here is that you must understand what success looks like in order for you to truly experience it. Therefore, concentrate on the things that you can control and manage.
The Best Month Ever worksheet can help you find your happiness, and you can download it for free.
Recite Your Affirmations
Your affirmations will open doors for you. It is the first step towards the path to change. If you assert positive things, your thoughts, speech, and actions will also be positive. Positive thinkers are the most influential and most successful people today. Therefore, if you want to change your life and become successful, it is important to change the way you think. Use positive words and act positively. To do this, you can write down a short and powerful statement or phrase that will encourage you and give you power over your subconscious thoughts. It is the subconscious mind that triggers negative thoughts and fear. But if you can control it and allow it to have positive thoughts, then you will lead a stress free life.
Next Steps
Besides the above tips, there are other things you can do to achieve happiness and success in life. Get yourself a notebook that you will use to capture and record every thought, and use it as a reminder to follow your daily routine. This notebook should also be your reminder of what you need to do and what you did not do the previous day. The Happier Mind Journal can help you keep track of your progress and also enable you achieve your goals.
With all said, it is now time to take action. Start by writing down your daily routine. To get you going, here is an example of my routine:
My Daily Routine
3:30am – wake up
3:40am – fill out the Happier Mind Journal and drink black coffee
4:00am – exercise and meditate
5:00am – no breakfast (I fast 16 hours every day)
5:30am – take a shower
6:00am – prepare my daughter for school
6:30am – take my daughter to school
7:30am – get to my work and review the previous day’s activities and performance
7:45am – personal growth time (personal reading, writing, or watching inspirational videos)
8:30am – team meeting
9:00am – work
12:00pm – lunch (bag of veggies, 6-8 oz of clean protein, and an avocado)
12:30pm – personal growth (reading)
1:30pm – work
6:00pm – reflect on the day’s performance and activities
6:30pm – leave the office
7:30pm – arrive at home, family time
8:00pm – start my night routine, which involves giving my daughter a bath, reading her a story, and saying prayers
9:00pm – shower
10:00pm – complete the day’s work and complete the Happier Mind Journal
It is imperative to point out that, for the last three years, I have followed this daily ritual religiously from Monday to Friday. This ritual gives me a purpose and intention for the day. I have never deviated from it, and it guides me in achieving my daily goals and gives me the power to stay focused at all times. If you carefully study my ritual, you will understand that I am focusing on improving six critical areas in my life; family, health, intellect, career, faith, and wealth. Nothing ever interrupts my ritual, and I must say that I plan everything and am always on time for work, dinner, taking my daughter to school, and everything else. I have done this over and over, and now it is a habit. It is a healthy habit that I intend to keep and even teach my kids.
My Morning Ritual Deconstructed
Following my morning rituals and daily routines make me happy and enable me to realize most of my goals in life. The following is a step-by-step deconstruction of my morning ritual:
- Wake up
- Make a cup of coffee
- Go to my quite space and complete my Happier Mind Journal
- Asses my sleep and energy levels
- Write down three things am grateful for
- Write down all my goals
- Select my quote of the day and write it down based on my mood. I can think of a quote or go online and choose one.
- Write down my three desired goals for the day to enable me to work towards achieving them and have a fruitful day.
- Write down my personal development statement
- Finish by writing down an affirmation
Once I am through with this, I exercise, meditate, eat a healthy breakfast, take a shower, and begin my day.
If you want to not only achieve your goals in life but also live a happy and successful life, it is important to have and follow morning rituals and daily routines. They guide you in everything you do and give you a purpose in life. It is like planning your life and putting everything in order. You will never go wrong if you plan and organize your life. Bad habits like lateness, disorganization, and lack of enthusiasm in what you do will be a thing of the past.
I see you start your morning pretty early and go to sleep at 10! Are you ever tired?