Scripting the first hour of each (week)day

I’ve just been listening to an episode of the Tim Ferris Show podcast in which he answers some questions from the community. One of them was essentially about remaining productive when you’re having an off day. Tim answered this by talking about ‘decision fatigue’ and suggested scripting the first 30 mins or hour of your day to get into the right mindset.

This is a great idea and something I’ve kind of meaning to write about for a while. I’ve got a half-finished post about President Obama’s advice to limit the decisions you make – even about clothing.

So here we go. Here’s what I do every morning. It might be a slight update from what I wrote for My Morning Routine.

1. Wake up without an alarm clock. This means that it’s not always exactly the same time, but it also means it’s likely to be a ‘softer’ awakening.

2. Get the children breakfast. I try to start their day off well by being interested in what they’ve got to say. I sit down with them at the table and have a cup of camomile tea.

3. Go to the toilet. I check Twitter while I’m there. Well, at least I’m honest.

4. Make my wife a cup of tea. I take it up to her while she’s getting dressed.

5. Get my daughter dressed. She can do most of this now herself as she’s almost four years old. However, she can struggle with some buttons, etc.

6. Wash myself. I go to the gym or swimming every day and have a shower afterwards, so this is quick.

7. Do press-ups, sit-ups, etc. I use my roll mat for this as we have a wooden floor in our bedroom.

8. Get myself dressed. Depending on how I feel I’ll wear jeans and a shirt/jumper or else a t-shirt and a hoodie.

9. Help my son. He alternates between Khan Academy and Duolingo for a week at a time. It’s had a demonstrable effect on his numeracy and French skills.

10. Have breakfast. This is usually just a slice of toast with butter. About an hour before exercise I’ll eat a banana.

This routine is flexible. Kids are wonderful at being able to play and amuse themselves, so sometimes this takes an hour, sometimes two. It depends. Every morning I walk them to school, which I consider a real privilege.

I’ve just realised that the above makes it sound like I do everything while my wife does nothing. That’s certainly not the case! She makes the house run like clockwork. I’m a mere cog. 😉

The thing missing for me is time to take my own emotional temperature. Usually I dive straight into work when I should probably read more Baltasar Gracián first!