5 Morning Habits That Boost Your Writing
Open the gates of creativity.
If you start your day on the wrong foot, your crankiness will get in the way of your creative process.
Creativity is spontaneous. It should not be studied.
But you can follow a routine that gets you in the flow state.
I want to share ideas that help me write my ass off.
Wake up before the sunrise.
I hate rushing through my mornings. Waking up at dawn is my form of luxury.
Working early in the morning is a tried and true method of fitting creative work into busy schedules.
Ernest Hemingway wrote, “every morning as soon after first light as possible.”
Toni Morrison would rise before the dawn, make coffee, and wait to “watch the light come” before getting to work.
Haruki Murakami gets up at 4 a.m. and writes for five or six hours.
Many people wake up early out of obligation, but I find it alluring.
There is magic in waking up earlier while most people are still asleep. Your mind is clear. It is ready to conquer the world.
Sitting in my comfy armchair and watching the sunrise while sipping coffee or taking a walk through the forest while birds are chirping like crazy fuels my mind with creative ideas.
Stress is a creativity killer. When your morning is hectic, your whole day will be out of balance.
Getting up early is an opportunity to get straight to work before myriad demands take hold of your mind.
Being more relaxed and organised in the morning leads to increased productivity throughout the day.
Your morning sets up the success of your day.
Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.
— Benjamin Franklin
Go within.
Chaos and noise are overrated. Silence is a gem.
A few minutes in solitude with your thoughts boost the quality of the relationship with yourself. This habit will reflect on every area of your life, including relationships with others.
No phone. No noise. Ditch worrying or planning.
Meditation is always an investment in your creative process.
According to Psychology Today, meditation is the strongest mental practice that has the power to reset your happiness set point, thus turning you into a more joyful person and literally rewiring major areas in your brain.
And a happy mind is a creative mind, full of ideas.
Meditation increases frontal cortex activity, responsible for focus, calm, and concentration. With enough practice, it can even largen that area of the brain.
When you become present, you get to know yourself: what fuels your creative process, what disrupts your flow.
Philosopher Immanuel Kant would wake up at 5 a.m. and have a cup of tea. After his tea, he’d smoke his pipe and meditate.
As Kasturi Patra brilliantly pointed out in her article, you don’t need to go to the mountains. You need to go within yourself.
Meditate to create.
Meditation is a vital practice to access conscious contact with your highest self.
— Wayne Dyer
A glorious beverage.
Coffee and writing go too well together. Like peanut butter and jelly. You can have them separately, but why?
Many studies show that coffee improves various aspects of brain functions — including memory, mood, vigilance, energy levels, reaction times and general mental function. Caffeine makes us super productive.
I like buying into the concept that coffee opens the floodgates of my creativity. Ideas do not find me out of thin air. They seem to be bubbling from the inside.
Coffee is part of my writing ritual. It sets my mind on the “writing mode” and gives me that spark of ideas.
It is no secret that our brain has a dopamine-driven feedback loop. Coffee makes me feel good. If I combine coffee with writing, then writing also makes me feel good. When I feel good about what I am doing, I perform better.
If your body can handle caffeine, by any means, drink it up.
Writing is the process of turning coffee into ink.
Let your words flow.
Journaling is like a stretch before a proper workout.
After my morning meditation, I open my journal and let the words flow. If I don’t have a notebook at hand, I record my thought on the phone.
Be authentic. Don’t focus on whether you will make your words public. The intention should be to express yourself and get in the state of flow. Turn off any judgment or analytical thinking.
Be playful about your journaling. Overthinking kills creativity and keeps your mind outward rather than inward.
Throw writing rules out the window. Get raw with your feelings and thoughts. Don’t focus on grammar or how the pages make you look. When you get candid about your inner state, you stir powerful emotions. It is an essential step to great writing.
Write down ideas that come to you during the morning silence. It can be poetry, soothing words to minimize the anxiety, a celebration of small wins, or ideas on how to improve your life.
When you give in to the morning flow, you let your Inner Creator speak.
I don’t journal to ‘be productive.’ I don’t do it to find great ideas or to put down prose I can later publish. The pages aren’t intended for anyone but me. It’s the most cost-effective therapy I’ve ever found.
— Tim Ferriss
A little sweat goes a long way.
Creativity means flow.
When my body is stagnant, my mind works harder as well. Exercising helps to keep my mind in check and keep negative thoughts away.
With yoga, I burn the heat on the mat while enjoying it and cherishing every second. I combine the workout with meditation, to anchor my thoughts in the present moment.
Fewer distractions. Less drama. More intuition.
Yoga taught me the power of the mind.
When you struggle with a pose, your power lies in commanding your mind into seeing it through. Just like with writing. When you feel stuck, this is the moment where you persist.
Here is a practice with Adriene to fuel your creativity:
After a workout session, I always pair it with breathwork.
Breathing is right under our noses, yet we forget about it. Many people are shallow breathers. It causes stress and anxiety. Deep breathing fuels your creative process.
You can find the variety of breathing sessions on YouTube which unleash the guidance within.
I end my sweat with a cold shower. It gives me the morning high!
Yoga gets the energy body moving, and the energy body is the source of creativity. When I sit down to write, I am more available to myself and to that creative flow.
— Anne Cushman, a yoga teacher and author of the novel Enlightenment for Idiots
Keep in mind that these tips work for me. You don’t have to be strict with your morning routine. It is supposed to serve you, not frustrate you.
If you are not a morning person, create an evening routine that fuels your creative process. Now and then, ditch the routine and go wild.
After all, creativity is about flexibility!
If you want to build a successful morning routine, make sure you enjoy it.
Thank you for being here, — Kate
