The most successful people on this planet advocate having a morning ritual and waking up as early as 5am.
Morning ‘rituals’ turn us off because it has a joyless, going-through-the-motions connotation to it. And waking up early is painful enough.
Morning routines and rituals are usually for adults, but they can be tweaked for your children as well.
Morning rituals are great because..
They give us the much-needed alone time before distractions start entering our day.
Rituals make us look forward to getting out of bed in the morning.
We have the luxury of having more time to accomplish our tasks for the day.
It instills discipline in children and teens
I had the experience of waking up at 530am one morning and wasn’t able to go back to sleep. Boy, I’ve never felt so accomplished in my life.
I made a smoothie, savoured it in the quiet of the morning, did light exercises, enjoyed the sunrise, took a hot shower, managed to meditate for 10 minutes and by 730am, I was fresh and in front of my laptop – ready to start cracking on work.
Needless to say, I completed so many things that day before lunch came around.
Everyone’s family situation is unique,thus, my morning ritual might not work for you.
Below is a list to help you and your family get started.
10 Ideas for an Effective Morning Ritual
(This is helpful for adults, but rituals can be created for your children as well!)
- Don’t be afraid to tweak your ritual as time passes to suit your needs.
- Incorporate the activities you love in your morning ritual. As time goes, different things will make you happy in the morning and thus, tweaking is essential.
- Don’t plan on having the ‘perfect’ ritual. Everybody’s morning ritual is unique to his or her own liking. Your ritual should make you feel happy and enthused instead of filling you with dread.
- Include light exercises to get your endorphins and blood pumping to give you a better mood.
- Be patient. It takes 44 days to form a habit, thus, don’t be tempted to give up on a morning ritual too soon.
- Go for a walk or jog in nature in the morning to give you perspective.
- Begin your day with a beloved beverage of choice to enthuse you into getting out of bed – be it a self-concocted hazelnut latte, a banana smoothie, a cappuccino, fragrant tea..you get the idea.
- Some people journal or write in their gratitude journals in the mornings. It’s not my favourite morning activity personally, but it might work for you.
- Some meditate to clear their minds in the morning.
- Enjoy the sunrise
All the best!