“Write it on your heart that every day is the best day in the year. He is rich who owns the day, and no one owns the day who allows it to be invaded with fret and anxiety. Finish every day and be done with it. You have done what you could.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson
Devote the same amount of time and energy to your Morning Routine AND Evening Routine. They’re both equally critical to achieving your goals.
Reserve the first and last part of your day for activities that support your mental health (meditation, reading, journaling, walking, yoga stretching, etc.)
⭐️ It’s crucial to balance rigid discipline with flexible wiggle room. Too much order is fragile. Have minimal structure in terms of routines over the course of your day to accommodate unexpected surprises.
Evening Routine
Morning routines start with evening routines the night before: If you want to win the day, you have to win the morning, but in reality, to win the morning, you have to win the evening first. 1
Morning Routine
Your best work is going to be done anywhere from 4 to 6 hours after your temperature minimum. 2
The Paradox of Morning Routines — You Don’t Need to Follow an Extensive Morning Routine for a Productive Morning
- Instead of encouraging you to start meaningful activities that set you up for success, excessive morning routines merely create a sense of busyness that disguises as productivity—while also exhausting you.
- In many cases, they serve as nothing more than a form of procrastination. Most people don’t need another “to-do list” in their mornings, but a list of what NOT to do. A morning routine, no matter how simple, is still a task. Your morning routine is the reason you’re losing your productivity as you waste your most productive hours doing it.
Do the opposite
Rather than squandering this prime mental state on activities meant to prepare you for optimal flow, the easiest flow state you can experience ever, leverage these golden moments for the most important task.
- The “One-Priority-Only” (Reverse / Inverse) Morning Routine
- Dive straight into the highest-priority task right after waking up
- Do your normal morning routine (yoga, meditation, etc.)
- “Whenever I see another entrepreneur who’s obsessive about their routines things like if I don’t have my morning routine I’m a mess or I can’t even function I am so grateful because it just shows how weak they are.” — Alex Hormozi
- Alex Hormozi’s Morning Routine
- Wake up
- Drink coffee
- Get to work
- When designing your morning routine, always keep asking yourself: “How quickly can I get to work after waking?”
- Alex Hormozi’s Morning Routine
Why?
Every morning, you naturally wake up in a flow zone—your brain operates at theta or delta wave levels—ideal for deep focus. Additionally, the light cognitive load in the morning makes it easier to focus instantly.
The only Thing You Need for a Productive Morning
The key to a productive morning is preparation the night before. Your to-do list should be ready before you sleep—waiting until morning to plan means you’re already too late. Today’s to-do list is for tomorrow.
- Spend 10-15 minutes writing down and setting up everything for the top 2-3 priority tasks the night before (at the end of your workday), in order to remove the friction for getting started on the ONE THING for the next morning.
- A little planning, preparation, and visualization is a small nightly habit that pays major dividends.
By making your to-do list the night before, you can wake up and get right to work immediately without thinking too much. Morning is for action, not decision-making. Decision fatigue will stop you from getting into the flow state as you’ll have to decide what to do rather than diving in head first.
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