Morning Routine in the New Year

Thinking this AM about all manner of things. I sipped through half of a cup of coffee in a distracted effort to get the mix right in my mug: a little more coffee, sip, a little more oat milk, sip, a little more coffee, etc. As far as I can tell, the current cup has a little too much oat milk. I’ll get it right next time. But this cup ended up being more like two cups with all the “testing” and I’ve had a little more coffee a little more quickly than I originally intended. Distractions. Even this post is an effect of distraction.

Going into the holiday season last year, I was riding a wave of several months¹ of a handful of solid morning routines. My work schedule changed significantly after Thanksgiving, though, as it does every year, and I found that each aspect of the morning routine slipped away over the course of a week or two. By Christmas, I wasn’t doing any of it.

Like many of us, if I thought about it at all, I assumed I’d get back on track after dead week but I didn’t. And now, even though it’s only been a month since I followed that assumption with a resolution to resume my morning routine, I find I just can’t get up as early as I did last September or October. Sleeping later has its advantages, or at least its advantage: I get more sleep. But the overall routine is a pretty tight schedule most days, and if I don’t stick to the wake-up time, the whole shebang goes out the window. Which is where it’s gone.

So I guess I’m writing this post to account for this shift. Perhaps it’s seasonal? It does correspond to the advance of winter and shorter days so that’s possibly part of the shift. And as frequently noted throughout the productivity/GTD/self-discipline space, it’s often more difficult to restart a routine than start one in the first place. That is, missing a day isn’t too bad, or even missing a few. But a month? I’ll be better off starting an entirely new routine than trying to resume the old one.

🎧: Fluxkit Vancouver (i t s suite but sacred), Darius Jones