My 30 day journey into a new routine
“No one who rises before dawn 360 days a year fails to make his family rich.”
Chinese proverb
Have you ever felt like there’s so many things you want to do, but you can’t manage to find the time? Maybe you want to learn French? Or read that book that’s been on your nightstand since forever. Or you want to learn a new skill, maybe learn how to dance salsa or how to cook that special Italian dish. All of us have some things in the back of our mind, personal projects let’s say, that we want accomplish. But it never seems to happen. Not enough time…Or not enough energy after coming home from work to stay focused and do something useful. At least for most of us. I’m certainly one of those people. Or at least I was. I always had a ton of things I wanted to do, but nothing ever really happened.
So, I decided to try something new. I needed a routine. I had read books about time management, about self-discipline and self-motivation, but none of the habits I tried to implement in my daily life ever seemed to stick for longer than a week or so. Sporadically there were some short periods of time where I could really motivate myself to fully commit myself to one goal. For example when I learned Spanish before moving to Mexico or when I became fluent in Portuguese in 100 days in the summer of 2016. But those goals had a timeframe, which made it easier. So after moving to Mexico or after the 100 days Portuguese mission I fell back into my old habits. Everything I do always seems to be black or white. Either I’m fully committing to a certain goal, or I’m doing nothing at all. Only extremes, no golden mean. So again, I needed a routine.
I started keeping track of how I was spending my 24 hours a day. Usually I slept between 6 and 8 hours and worked between 9 and 12 hours. That meant that on any given day I had between 4 and 9 hours of spare time that I could be spending on working towards becoming a better me. Was I using those hours in a useful way? Not at all. I woke up a half hour before work, rushing to arrive in time. After work I went home, tired after a day of scuba diving, usually spending the evening watching Netflix or Youtube, going to the bar or just being lazy in my room. So many hours lost, so many opportunities vanished into thin air.
I started thinking how to get those lost hours back. It couldn’t be in the evening. I never exactly know what time I arrive home after work and didn’t want my routine to be something I started doing at 5pm one day and the next at 8pm. What I needed had to be a routine, something fixed. I also realized that there would be days where I would really be too exhausted to do anything at night or days where I had “social obligations”. So it had to be early in the morning. I would have to wake up while everyone else was still sleeping, slowly working on myself and becoming a better me. For me, work usually starts at 6:45 or 7, very sporadically as early as 5:30am. So what time would I have to wake up?
I wanted to be sure to have some real time before work on any given day, even when work started super early. I played around with the time of getting out of bed for a few days and quickly realized that the best time to wake up was 3:30am. So for the past 30 days I have set my alarm at 3:30am and you wouldn’t believe how amazing it has been so far. Every day I have been awake, achieving my goals, while everyone around me was still sleeping. I’ve had days where I woke up, read for an hour, went running, arriving on top of a hill at 5:30am, watching the sunrise, ran back home and studied for another hour before having breakfast, taking a shower and going to work at 7am. On average I win 3 hours a day, 21 hours a week. That’s a whole extra day, almost 2 if you count the time you spend sleeping!
In the past 30 days I’ve:
- read 5 fiction books
- read 3 nonfiction books to widen my knowledge
- studied around 500 new words in Indonesian
- made a ton of progress understanding, reading and speaking Indonesian
- Brushed up on my Portuguese skills, listening to podcasts and talking to native speakers
- edited 200-300 pictures
- started running again
- started getting in better shape, doing workouts at home every day
But probably most important of all, I’ve made my bed and cleaned my room every single morning. This might seem like a small thing, but when you start the day winning, it’s so easy to end it winning. Spending 3 hours a day becoming the best version of myself in the morning has made it so easy to implement a short evening routine every night as well. In the afternoon or before going to bed I always review the vocabulary I’ve learned the past 5 days, I listen to 1 podcast and I do a small workout. It doesn’t take me longer than 30 minutes but I feel like it completes the routine. It optimizes my efforts and solidifies what I’ve been doing in the morning.
How do I do it? Very easy. Every evening I make a to-do list of what I want to accomplish the next day and the next day I…just do it. For me personally, a to-do list is the perfect way to accomplish what I want. First of all, a list breaks down your big, seemingly unachievable day into single, short and achievable goals. Checking off the tasks one by one also motivates you to finish everything you planned to do the night before. Lastly, a to-do list gives you visual feedback, which is something I really need.
Of course, as we know, nothing interesting is ever completely one-sided. A coin has 2 sides. Have I been tired the past month? Sometimes. But I can’t say that I’m more tired now than I was before. A day of scuba diving really takes it out on you and whatever time I wake up in the morning, I’ll always be pretty exhausted when I arrive home. Have I gone to bed earlier than I used to? Of course. But the hours I now sleep in the evening, that before I spent not doing anything really, I can hardly consider lost. On the contrary. The whole point was to exchange that time for more useful time. I still basically sleep the same number of hours. You could say my night has shifted a few hours forward, that’s all.
What does the future hold? A lot. A ton of possibilities. When I look at what I’ve accomplished in 1 month, I can’t start to imagine where I could be in a year. I want to keep reading fiction. I do it for a full hour every morning or during the day. Some might consider reading fiction lost time, but I’ve always felt that reading fiction nourishes my soul, helps me relax and is a great way of seeking entertainment without being lazy. I also want to keep reading nonfiction and studying. I have a ton of books on biology, marine biology, astronomy, and a whole range of other interesting subjects, ready to be devoured. I want to be able to add Indonesian to the languages I speak fluently. I want to develop new skills. Be able to dance without suddenly realizing there are these big, lump things called arms attached to my body and without being convinced that every single eye in the room is staring at me. I want to get in shape, running and working out. I want to keep my language skills fresh, talk to natives on a regular basis. I want to learn how to lucid dream. Learn new card games. Learn more about engines and how to fix them. If I keep things up, stick to my new routine – and I’m very confident that I can – all these goals are at my fingertips, ready to be conquered.
Can you do it as well? For sure! You wouldn’t believe how easy it has been so far. That’s the main reason I believe this routine is something I’ll keep doing in the future. Up until now, I can’t say I’ve ever had any real difficulties with my new routine. If this is something you want to try for yourself, go ahead! I can’t see why not, there’s nothing you could lose. You could start small. Set of making a to-do list for tomorrow with as little as 3 goals. The biggest piece of advice I can give you is to make your tasks concrete. Either timewise or quantity wise. Don’t write that you’ll “wake up early” or will “study French”. No, write that you’ll “wake up at 5am” or “read for 30mins” or “study 10 French words”. Get accustomed to the new rhythm of your new way of living. Or, instead of starting small you could just dive in headfirst and go hardcore. Whatever works best for you. Just stick with it. From what I’ve learned, trying to achieve any goal in life, consistency is key. Don’t do something 10 hours on the weekends and being lazy during the week. Better committing 30 minutes a day doing the same thing and your goal will be so much easier to achieve in a fraction of the time spent. Go for it, I believe in you.
