I don’t feel like doing anything after my morning routine. Please help!

[playdoh]

So first thing in the morning I do about 25 minutes of mindfulness meditation, followed by about an 8 minute grounding meditation, then a “light” meditation for my chakras and stuff which includes prayer (affirmations), gratitude journal, play some brain training cognition games, take my vitamins, drink tall glass of water, go for a 20 minute jog, then a cold shower. This takes me about 3 hours. Then I eat! I’m pretty exhausted by the time I even go eat. Then after preparing my food, cleaning and all I definitely don’t feel like doing anything. 

I forgot to mention before my morning mindfulness meditation I recently start doing about 30 minutes of subconscious journaling and a few times a week I’m doing a 1 hour online eft sessions which both help tremendously. I could easily take 5 hours to do all this. I want to do so much stuff, projects, businesses, etc. I have very little motivation to do anything after 
my morning routine. Even cleaning my room and staying organized is a struggle. 

To be fair in the last 4 months I have improved tremendously and am “doing” a lot more, but I think it’s going to take more doing, more action! I feel my morning routine is necessary, if I don’t do mindfulness meditation I get monkey mind, if I don’t ground I feel ungrounded, I want my prayers to be a requirement every morning! Also running, game changer for me, feel like it wakes my brain, body and mind up. At night time I don’t have motivation to do much, I just want to wind down for bed. I’ve been doing this routine for several years now but sometimes it’s a push and boring!  Any tips or advice please? Thanks!

 

[Razard86]

Your only issue is you are being too hard on yourself. Based on this post seems you are doing amazing. Please be more kind to yourself. Be the friend you are to others...to yourself. Don't deny yourself the love you show others. 

[r0ckyreed]

My mate, the whole point of a morning routine is to energize you for the rest of the day. You don’t need to be doing a 3 hour morning routine. If you fill your morning with a bunch of tasks, your gonna burnout. 

For me personally, I don’t even have a morning routine per se. I tend to follow my inspiration rather than some rigid routine. Doing something different each day makes new neural connections and activates and engages different parts of the brain than if you are doing same thing each day. If you did 100 push-ups everyday, you wouldn’t grow after a certain point. You have to vary it up and work on different facets. 

It’s not about how long you meditate, it is about how deep you go. Learn how to meditate deeply in a 10 minute period. 

Here’s the key thing: Your morning routine should be simple to energize you to get your tasks done. I feel like you use such an extensive routine as a way to procrastinate or prolong doing the tasks required that day.

Shorten your routine to 30 minutes. Then tackle the hell out of your main project that day. You attentional capacity and mental resources are limited each day. Use your mind when it is fresh rather than using your prime attention on tasks not required.

Can you be energized for the day in less than 30 minutes? 15 minutes? Why 3 hours? 

I said it all here. Again, your working memory and attention are limited each day. Use your mind when it is fresh.
 

$$$$Again, the whole purpose of a morning ritual is to give you the energy and motivation/inspiration for the rest of the day. If your morning ritual is making you tired, you are doing something wrong.$$$$

Edit: Watch The movie series Rocky. 
 

You think Rocky Balboa’s morning ritual takes him long? Keep it simple. Rocky just eats eggs, stretches and goes for a quick run. 
 

Good luck.

Edited June 8, 2022 by r0ckyreed

[gettoefl]

take a daily nap or two, even mid-morning, nothing is more energizing, you become more productive not less

[playdoh]

14 hours ago, Razard86 said:

Your only issue is you are being too hard on yourself. Based on this post seems you are doing amazing. Please be more kind to yourself. Be the friend you are to others...to yourself. Don't deny yourself the love you show others. 

Thank you!! ? Always a good reminder 

[playdoh]

14 hours ago, r0ckyreed said:

My mate, the whole point of a morning routine is to energize you for the rest of the day. You don’t need to be doing a 3 hour morning routine. If you fill your morning with a bunch of tasks, your gonna burnout. 

For me personally, I don’t even have a morning routine per se. I tend to follow my inspiration rather than some rigid routine. Doing something different each day makes new neural connections and activates and engages different parts of the brain than if you are doing same thing each day. If you did 100 push-ups everyday, you wouldn’t grow after a certain point. You have to vary it up and work on different facets. 

It’s not about how long you meditate, it is about how deep you go. Learn how to meditate deeply in a 10 minute period. 

Here’s the key thing: Your morning routine should be simple to energize you to get your tasks done. I feel like you use such an extensive routine as a way to procrastinate or prolong doing the tasks required that day.

Shorten your routine to 30 minutes. Then tackle the hell out of your main project that day. You attentional capacity and mental resources are limited each day. Use your mind when it is fresh rather than using your prime attention on tasks not required.

Can you be energized for the day in less than 30 minutes? 15 minutes? Why 3 hours? 

I said it all here. Again, your working memory and attention are limited each day. Use your mind when it is fresh.
 

$$$$Again, the whole purpose of a morning ritual is to give you the energy and motivation/inspiration for the rest of the day. If your morning ritual is making you tired, you are doing something wrong.$$$$

Edit: Watch The movie series Rocky. 
 

You think Rocky Balboa’s morning ritual takes him long? Keep it simple. Rocky just eats eggs, stretches and goes for a quick run. 
 

Good luck.

Thanks!! ??  So much wisdom in this post! Dunno if I can cut it down to 30 minutes yet but maybe 40 minutes to an hour. If I add running to my morning routine it’ll definitely take upwards of an hour. 

I have a question for you about running please! Running gives me all day energy but sometimes right after running I feel it takes away from my attentional capacity and mental resources as you say and right afterwards I don’t feel like doing anything that requires a high amount of focus or attention. Do you think so?

[r0ckyreed]

3 hours ago, playdoh said:

Running gives me all day energy but sometimes right after running I feel it takes away from my attentional capacity and mental resources as you say and right afterwards I don’t feel like doing anything that requires a high amount of focus or attention. Do you think so?

Keep it simple. Wake up, eat food, drink water, and then follow whatever lights you up in that moment. If you are grinding through some routine, your mind is gonna be soft.

Be creative with your life. Keep it simple. Try doing something completely different. Try not going by routine but go by inspiration for one week. See how your life changes if you go by inspiration instead of grinding. Keep it simple. Do what works. Don’t do what doesn’t work.

Discipline means to be a disciple to what you love. Do what you love and you will have energy guaranteed. If not, then there is something physiologically/psychologically wrong or you don’t really love what you are doing.

Running and working out gives me energy. Here is the counterintuitive move, to gain energy, you first have to expend energy. If you are working out your body but not your mind, then that is a problem. 

 

 

Edited June 8, 2022 by r0ckyreed

[Space]

@playdoh Yea you're trying to do too much at once. 

 Cut out a bunch of things by prioritising what is most important and useful for you right now.

If you really need to do all that stuff you've listed, space some of it out into the rest of the day. 

You say you want to do other projects, businesses etc, so why is this not a priority? Have a simple 30-60 minute morning routine, and then get to work on your other projects. 

I'd suggest trying to time block. Use google calendar or something similar and block out periods of work, meditation, etc.

Just don't be spending hours and hours on personal development stuff. It's not necessary.

What is the most important thing in your life? That should be a priority and should be given the most amount of hours per day.

 

[Fernanda]

My mourning routine in not having a routine for the first 2 hours of the day. I just do what I feel like, it's been a self love practice for me. I noticed that each day we are different. I'm much more spontaneous. 

[Epikur]

21 hours ago, playdoh said:

Thanks!! ??  So much wisdom in this post! Dunno if I can cut it down to 30 minutes yet but maybe 40 minutes to an hour. If I add running to my morning routine it’ll definitely take upwards of an hour. 

I have a question for you about running please! Running gives me all day energy but sometimes right after running I feel it takes away from my attentional capacity and mental resources as you say and right afterwards I don’t feel like doing anything that requires a high amount of focus or attention. Do you think so?

I was in that boad for a long time. What you are doing is procrastination but a useful one. Sport is easier than mental work as we are monkeys. What works better for me is doing minute tasks. That way you do micro routines and switch to real work and than back. The switching takes energy but it is better than getting lost in your routines. 

I do 30 per cent of my exercise in the morning and the rest in the evening. Get rid of the physical energy in the evening. Use micro exercises to feel awake. 

Real work in the morning is extremely important it trains the brain to do real work. That makes everything else much easier. Eat the frog. Start small with 1 minute work, 1 minute meditation, 1 minute exercise etc.

I am still not good at it but I am much better than when I did the 3 hour routines. I loved doing them but it holds you back.

If the monkey mind is stronger than change location go to a library or so to cage the monkey. Like Odysseus with the sirens.

 

Edited June 9, 2022 by Epikur

[kag101]

do you work or study?

[playdoh]

13 hours ago, kag101 said:

do you work or study?

Why do you ask?

[kag101]

On 12/06/2022 at 3:11 PM, playdoh said:

Why do you ask?

because if the only thing you have in your life is your morning routine, then it's natural that your energy falls after you're done with it

hobbies can also help

[lisindel]

Have you tried exercise?

[ZenAlex]

3 hour morning routine? lol. 

I'm guess you don't have a job or wake up at like 5am.

I'd suggest trying to cut it down a bit. Like maybe Jog, shower, meditation, breakfast?

[T_i_m]

this self-help thing really messes people up

[playdoh]

Just want to say to everyone thank you sooo much ?❤️❤️ Really helping. I’m still soaking it up! 

For a few days I went to just following my inspiration first thing when I woke up and went out and bought a redbull which I usually don’t drink! While those few days following my inspiration were great in a sense, felt more inspirations starting to come up and more excitement, I have to admit without a meditation practice a lot of monkey mind came up, more worrying and incessant non stop chatter. Silence really does bring us bliss. Been debating both ends, silence and doing with joy! Oh what a journey. 

[Aaron p]

I do 20 minutes body building workout most mornings then regular temperature shower. A good physical exorcism drives all of the energy up and forward. It's incredible what short intensive morning workouts do for your daily energetic drive. 

Edited June 22, 2022 by Aaron p

[flowboy]

@playdoh I used to have a 3 hour morning routine for a long time. 
It was a long sequence of helpful practices which I accumulated over a long time, and gotten to believe I needed.

Then I was forced to admit that I almost never did it properly without skipping or running over time, and even when I did, it was quite demanding and drained me of most of my willpower I could have used on something that actually moves the boat forward.

Whether you’re a morning person or not, willpower is freshest right after you get up.

I paid my coach 10K to tell me that I was wasting the best part of the day procrastinating and trying to feel “ready”, and that in fact the most successful people he knew just wake up and get started on the most important task within 20 minutes. (Luckily he helped me in lots of other ways too, was well worth it)

But in a sense, that one tip actually was worth the 10K. I wasn’t making any progress and losing out on years of potential results, whilst I was doing all this stuff in the morning to try to “get ready”.

Here’s what I do now:

- Wake up 6:00, make bed

- Jump in river

- Get started on most crucial task 6:20

The stuff I did at the start of the day, I now do in the late afternoon.

Save yourself 10.000 euros and drop the belief that you need any of these things to do what you really want to do.

I didn’t want to accept it either.

On 08/06/2022 at 4:32 AM, playdoh said:

if I don’t do mindfulness meditation I get monkey mind

Then do your task with monkey mind

On 08/06/2022 at 4:32 AM, playdoh said:

if I don’t ground I feel ungrounded

Then do your task ungrounded

Having the most important gnarly thing done already is a greater energiser than all your current morning routine practices combined.

[Sine]

9 hours ago, flowboy said:

@playdoh I used to have a 3 hour morning routine for a long time. 
It was a long sequence of helpful practices which I accumulated over a long time, and gotten to believe I needed.

Then I was forced to admit that I almost never did it properly without skipping or running over time, and even when I did, it was quite demanding and drained me of most of my willpower I could have used on something that actually moves the boat forward.

Whether you’re a morning person or not, willpower is freshest right after you get up.

I paid my coach 10K to tell me that I was wasting the best part of the day procrastinating and trying to feel “ready”, and that in fact the most successful people he knew just wake up and get started on the most important task within 20 minutes. (Luckily he helped me in lots of other ways too, was well worth it)

But in a sense, that one tip actually was worth the 10K. I wasn’t making any progress and losing out on years of potential results, whilst I was doing all this stuff in the morning to try to “get ready”.

Here’s what I do now:

- Wake up 6:00, make bed

- Jump in river

- Get started on most crucial task 6:20

The stuff I did at the start of the day, I now do in the late afternoon.

Save yourself 10.000 euros and drop the belief that you need any of these things to do what you really want to do.

I didn’t want to accept it either.

Then do your task with monkey mind

Then do your task ungrounded

Having the most important gnarly thing done already is a greater energiser than all your current morning routine practices combined.

This is so good advice I'm gonna try this because I have the same problem