Summary

The author outlines a personalized morning routine centered around using specific iPad apps to start the day with focus and productivity after attending to family responsibilities.

Abstract

The article describes a tailored morning routine that the author has refined over a year, which involves a series of activities facilitated by various iPad applications. This routine is engaged in after the morning school run for the author's children and includes checking the news, meditating, journaling, reviewing sleep patterns, reading newsletters and RSS feeds, checking emails, reviewing the calendar, and managing tasks. The author emphasizes the importance of not immediately reaching for a screen upon waking and prioritizes family in the early morning. The apps used, such as Balance for meditation, Day One for journaling, and Things3 for task management, are chosen for their ability to enhance focus and productivity, as well as their user-friendly design. The routine is described as a calming transition into the workday, taking no longer than half an hour, which the author believes is an investment that pays off in increased focus and efficiency during work hours.

Opinions

The author values the repetition of a morning routine for its ability to ease into the day and empower for the tasks ahead.
Meditation is seen as beneficial for concentration and focus, with a study cited to support this claim.
Journaling is considered a way to clear the mind and document personal reflections, rather than for creating publishable content.
Tracking sleep is important for understanding its impact on daily performance, with a nod to sleep expert Matthew Walker's recommendations.
The author prefers a selective approach to email and news consumption in the morning, prioritizing relevance and urgency to maintain productivity.
The choice of apps is influenced by their personalization features, ease of use, and the ability to integrate with the author's lifestyle.
The routine is adaptable, with the author open to trying new apps and adjusting habits as needed.
The author believes that the structured morning routine significantly contributes to a more focused and productive workday.

The app-based morning routine that gets my day off to a perfect start

You don’t have to search far on the internet to find a whole host of articles claiming that to be successful/productive/a millionaire you need to have done a certain number of things before some ungodly hour of the morning.

My morning routine isn’t built off the back of any of that, but I do find the repetition of a series of events eases me into the day and almost empowers me for what is to come.

I’ve been playing around with the routine for a little over a year now and have found a process that is largely based around a series of apps on my iPad that I work through while having a cup of coffee.

There are a couple of other factors to mention here.

Firstly, this doesn’t get done first thing in the morning. That’s partly because I don’t like the idea of reaching for a screen as soon as I wake up, but mostly because I have two young girls and getting them out of the door is the priority most mornings.

Once they’ve been dropped at school though, I like to come back home, grab a cup of coffee, curl up on the sofa and work my through the following.

BBC News

First up, I’ll have a quick glance at the news to see what has happened overnight. Normally, it’s no more than that unless something major catches my attention, in which case, I’ll read through the article.

Balance (Meditation)

There has been a lot written about the benefits of meditation. I’m fairly new to the practice but find that it provides me with better concentration and focus over the course of the day — something that seems to be backed up by a recent study showing that just four weeks of meditation can increase focus by as much as 14%

My app of choice is Balance. They do a great job of personalising every session based on how I’m progressing and are also offering their service free for a year — although you are able to make a donation based on what you see fit.

The sessions tend to be around five minutes long, which is a good length of time for a noobie like me and they calm me down as I transition from the morning rush and into the work day.

Day One (Journaling)

Once I’ve gained a bit of calm and focus, I try to journal for 5 or 10 minutes.

As Tim Ferris says, “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, I’m just caging my monkey mind on paper so I can get on with my day.”

Journaling is a new habit that I’m trying to build up. What I write isn’t any great work of art. It tends to be a quick summary of what happened the day before, things that might be frustrating me and/or something memorable the girls said or did.

I’ve tried journaling in a number of places, but Day One has stuck. As much as I might like to get rid of the susbscription, the app makes it easy for me to dump my thoughts in one place while I build up a habit. It does a good job of inserting additional meta data (like the weather) and allows me to insert images (or any other types of file) without fuss.

The notifications they send you regarding previous journal entries also encourage you to continue adding more stuff.

Apple Health (Sleep)

I have an Apple Health widget set upon my iPad which will have updated by this time to show me the amount of sleep I had the night before. I’ve never really been a great sleeper, so I’m starting to track it since listening to Matthew Walker talking on a Farnham Street podcast.

I’m interested in two things here:

How much sleep I’ve had (this should ideally be between seven to nine hours according to Walker)
My “Sleep Efficiency” — this is the time I’ve spent asleep as part of my total time in bed.

I don’t really “do” anything here. This is just a cursory glance to understand whether I had a good nights sleep and, if not, how I need to factor that into my upcoming day.

Readwise Reader (Newsletters/RSS Feeds)

I’ll then open up Readwise Reader which is where I have my RSS feeds saved. It’s also where I have my newsletters sent. Anything that looks interesting I’ll save for “Later” within the app and anything that isn’t directly relevant will be deleted.

Spark 2.0 (Email)

Now, the transition to work-mode starts properly. I don’t do any emails at this point, but I will open up my email app of choice (currently Spark, but I’m on the lookout for something new if anybody has a suggestion!) and see if anything urgent has come in overnight.

If something can’t wait a few hours, I’ll respond there and then. Otherwise, I find that the first few hours sat at my desk are my most productive time, so I don’t come back to emails until around 11.30 or mid-day.

As with my newsletters and RSS feeds, this initial look will also allow me to delete anything that’s not relevant.

Fantastical (Calendar)

Having had an initial glance at emails, it’s time to open up my Calendar to mentally run through my day. I’m currently a paid subscriber of Fantastical for a number of reasons — the main ones being its calendar groups, NLP input and general design.

Their decision to hike subscription prices will mean that I have my own decision to make at the end of the year as to whether I stay with them.

Things3 (Task manager)

Once I’ve gone through my day, I’ll open my task manager to make sure that what I’m planning to get done is still relevant. If it is, I’ll prioritise my tasks and if it’s not then I’ll push back some tasks until later on in the week.

Things3 has been running my life for over five years now and, while I’ve flirted with a few other apps, I haven’t found anything that beats it in terms of design and easy of use for capturing tasks on the go. You can read in more detail how I use the app cross-device here.

And that’s about it. The whole process doesn’t take any longer than it takes for a good cup of coffee to cool and be drunk (about half an hour).

This has become one of my favourite times of the day and I find that I more than get that time back just by being more focused on what I need to get done while I’m sitting at my desk.

One last thing …

Thank you very much for taking the time to read the article above — I hope you found it useful.

If you did, then you’ll pleased to know that I’ve finally got myself sorted out, socially. You can now find me on Twitter and Mastodon. I’d love to hear about your own morning routines and carry on the the conversation there.