7 Productive Morning Routines to Keep You Focused at College

A productive morning routine can truly set the tone of performance for the rest of your day. You’ve been tuned in to every detail for some days: Reading a book chapter, trying out a new recipe or maybe working out..

But some days … well, with yesterday’s shirt on and a breath of fresh air for breakfast, you skedaddled from the routine and walked into the college with total frustration. It does happen sometimes.

“It’s not what we do once in a while that shapes our lives. It’s what we do consistently.”

Anthony Robbins

Consistency matters. More than anything, if you really want to thrive in your life. This is why keeping a constant and reliable morning routine matters.

James Clear, wrote in his NYT bestseller, “Atomic habits”, about the concept of “habit stacking”. Where you should not only focus on a couple of habits, but doing them in a defined order, each day , every day .

Eventually, you will be having a solid foundation of well stacked habits. Consistently following such a productive morning routine will lead to a better and productive lifestyle.

But most importantly, you have to discover the right routine works best for you. Here are seven productive morning routines that you can experiment with to see which to adopt.

Great Night Sleep

While this is not technically part of your morning routine, having a great night’s sleep will allow you to accomplish your morning routines more productively. Going to bed early and having a great night’s sleep is sure to enable you to wake up on time and be ready to carry out your morning routines. It is also about self discipline because there will always be temptations to stay up late.

Almost everyone asks the question, “How many hours of sleep needed to be productive all day?”. Well, the most straightforward and most accurate answer is, “It depends!”. It depends on how your body works, It depends on what you do on a daily basis . So, here’s a better question . “How to find out how many hours of sleep do I need to be productive all day?”

In a recent interview, Daniel Kripke talked about perfect sleep durations one might need to be productive . Daniel Kripke is known to be one of the most known experts about sleep. Kripke found in his latest study that “people who sleep between 6.5 hours and 7.5 hours a night are happier and more productive.

Also, he says , “they tend to be interested in productive morning routines because they have the energy”.

You can try out what works best for you. There are so many apps out there to do the job. The sleep cycle is one of the best apps in this category which comes with the “Smart alarm” feature so that you will not be exhausted at the beginning of the day by waking up at the wrong time.

Wake Up at A Specific Time

To build up a productive morning routine, you need to get yourself in the habit of waking up at the same time every morning. Waking up at a specific time every day tells your brain to pay attention. Your body and mind will become accustomed to the time you wake up every day, which makes you ready to greet the day and be productive right from the get-go.

Maybe you did wake up in the morning , but again went to bed because you had nothing planned?! That happens.And eventually, you will not even try to wake up in the morning.

This is why it is vital to know , “What to do”, when you wake up. And that is why waking up at the same time everyday matters. Then you know what to do next , it has planned before.

Set Out Time to Meditate

Successful college students usually have a meditation session as part of their productive morning routines, and you can do so as well. Why is meditation important? It has been proven to reduce stress, strengthen one’s self-awareness and attention span.

You don’t need to spend a long-time meditating. You can simply focus on a specific goal, life motto, or even just your breath, for only about five to ten minutes. Also, you can get an app to help you meditate.

Or, if you find meditating is not your thing , try reading a book . Reading a book concentrates your mind more than anything. Plus, you will have fun with whatever you are reading.

Write Down Your Daily Goals

When you wake up every morning, make it a point of duty to write down your daily goals. Writing down your daily goals makes you more likely to achieve them. Which must be the fundamental principle of your productive morning routine.Make sure your daily goals are attainable and straightforward; most importantly, there should not be 10 goals for one day!. This is because having too many daily goals makes it harder to achieve.

You can use an app like Notion to track your productive morning routine.Keeping and maintaining such database is important to have an idea about the progress you are making throughout.

Assign three goals and make sure that you can achieve them . If you did meet them at the end of the day, bravo. You did more than completing three goals yourself. You kept your consistency. Now you move on to the next day without self-doubt.

You never know what’s around the corner. It could be everything. Or it could be nothing. You keep putting one foot in front of the other, and then one day you look back, and you’ve climbed a mountain

Tom Hiddleston

Simplify Your Decision-Making Process

The willpower and ability of a human to make critical decisions are limited. Therefore, to combat this, you need to do your best to simplify your decision-making process as much as possible during your productive morning routine. The more you make decisions ahead of time, the more streamlined your morning is.

It does not necessarily mean that you should not aim for the stars. But keep your steps comfortable enough to achieve them. Always remember, “Slow and steady wins the game!”

Eat Breakfast and Hydrate

For optimal brain function, you need to drink enough water before starting your day, because the body uses up water while you sleep. Dehydration could affect your focus and, ultimately, your productivity.

Also, studies have shown that breakfast is the most important meal of the day as it helps to promote better memory and concentration. Therefore, to raise your energy level and be productive, you need to eat breakfast and drink water in the morning.

This might be the most essential piece of your productive morning routine as a college student. Although you might not see it that way. So keep focusing on the things that you put in your stomach.

Perfect Timing

Morning routines are meant to improve your efficiency levels. Hence, you should be focused on perfecting it. This is why you need to time yourself doing the activities. The purpose of timing yourself and coming up with a perfect time is to come up with an appropriate waking and work hours that suit you.

Making a perfectly timed and productive morning routine will take time. It all depends on your lifestyle. But, the time you give to build up such a timely method will be worth it.

Conclusion

Having a productive morning routine will certainly help make your day. Building up a morning routine is depending on what you do daily. Once you figure out what’s best for you, your morning routine will help you to thrive in everything you do.

Specifically, planning what you do each morning will allow you to become more successful and have a better chance of succeeding in college.

Image Courtesy – Photo by Gregory Pappas on Unsplash , Coffee vector created by stories – www.freepik.com , Photo by Jess Bailey on Unsplash