How to build a routine that makes you successful
If you want to achieve success, you have to build a morning routine.
I used to live a life of routines once. Unfortunately, those were the wrong ones.
I lost a lot of friends, a girlfriend, and some months of school weren’t that good because of that until I understood what I was doing wrong.
“You will never change your life until you change something you do daily. The secret of your success is found in your daily routine.” ― John C. Maxwell
Nowadays, routines are mistaken for wasted time. Our society marks down routines as the evil of society, the stillness of mental progression. We always feel like we need new things, new feelings, new events, and choices, but this is consuming.
Having a life without routines means that every morning you have to spend time deciding what are you going to do. It means that you have to decide if you are in the mood of doing something, or not. It means that if lack motivation it will be nearly impossible to force yourself into working for whatever you want to accomplish.
That day, you might skip. And the day after. And the day after that again. Until the dream fails. The project crumbles down. And you stop working on it definitely, without even knowing how you got there.
After a while, you will realize it is too late to start it over again. Starting something requires commitment, and commitment requires hard work. But this time your motivation is lacking, because you feel the pain of failure, so you delay one more time, and it’s over.
Routines VS No Routines
“Successful people do whatever it takes to get the job done, whether or not they feel like it.” ― Jeff Olson, The Slight Edge
What I had to understand, two years ago, is that routines make the days easier, and allow you to focus on productivity, instead of motivation. Motivation is not something you can control: you can influence it, but that’s all.
How do you influence your motivation?
You start working.
And how do you start working if you don’t feel like it?
Exactly! You follow a routine.
If you don’t have any routines, when you wake up you have to find motivation. Some days, hopefully most of them, you will succeed in doing that. Some other days, you won’t.
On the contrary, when you have a routine, you know exactly how to reach your peak state. You are aware that motivation is not controllable, but you know how to influence it. It is your brain that does it for you because you trained it for that.
So you wake up and you start on autopilot. Your body works alone, without the need for your intervention. You practice healthy habits, for an hour or two, and then you are good to go.
When your routine is over you feel like the time to work has come, and you are in the right mindset to do it. You reached that peak state that you needed to work properly, and you start with the right attitude. That is the moment you stop autopiloting, and start facing up the journey of the day.
How much does it take to build a routine
“The journey starts with a single step — not with thinking about taking a step.” ― Jeff Olson, The Slight Edge
If you don’t have any routines, or you have bad ones as I did, you need to start building from the ground.
Building routines is not that easy, it requires patience and hard work.
The first time I tried to build myself up from the ashes, I overdid. I was voracious of self-improvement. I read one book per week on the topic and tried to apply to my life all the changes I read about. I wanted to be a better person as soon as possible, and I failed miserably.
Building routines requires time, usually a little bit more than you think. This is because routines are composed of a few habits, chained up in a defined row that never changes, and habits are difficult to master.
A study from Phillippa Lally (European Journal of Social Psychology) analyzing 96 people proved how, on average, it takes 66 days to build a new habit. It takes that much time to make your brain stick to an activity, and perform it constantly. Thus, if routines are made of different habits, it will take even more time to develop a complete routine.
Also, another important thing you have to keep in mind is the chain reaction. Routines are not made of habits performed in a casual order: each habit has to trigger the next one in an orderly fashion. Basically, your brain has to recognize a pattern in what you are doing. Don’t make your routine a random list of things you have to do daily, make it ordered.
The importance of not rushing and of sticking
“Don’t overdo it. If you’re doing a strong lip, keep the eyes simple, and the other way around.” ― Nina Agdal
At the moment, you may be eager to develop a routine as fast as possible, still, there are two last things to discuss: doing and overdoing.
You can develop two/three habits at a time, but remember to not overdo it. Trying to develop more will make you burn out, especially if you are not used to it as I was.
Start with a single step, start with a single habit, or maybe two. Chain them, and start practicing them every morning.
Experiment. If you started something, but you are not enjoying it, don’t keep it. What you want to achieve is the peak state, you cannot allow yourself to practice things that you don’t enjoy.
Finally, when you feel like you found a chain of habits that works for you, make it an actual routine. Stick to it for those 66 days.
The first week or two will be easy, but then you will feel the tendency of skipping. You have to stick to it, force yourself into it until it becomes part of you.
Even in the hardest periods, you have to remember why you are building a routine. Routines will make your dreams come true. They will make you work on those dreams even if you are not in the mood. They will make you act, they will make you move, and finally succeed.
You have to remember that doing something is always better than doing nothing.
Lastly, if you want to read more about the argument, Thomas Oppong wrote about building systems, which practically are routines, on the following article. I found it really inspiring.
Now you have everything you need to build your routine and start reaching that peak state, constantly, everyday.
