Tell us about your morning routine.
My morning routine begins slowly.
I make coffee. I give myself an hour to journal before I open my phone.
The world is welcome to carry on during that hour. I trust it to find something to do without me.
Years ago, my life coach taught me to leave my phone alone first thing in the morning. That lesson stayed with me. There is something I appreciate about having a little time with my own thoughts before finding out what everyone else is thinking, selling, announcing, or urgently requesting that I have an opinion about.
Especially before coffee. Let’s be reasonable.
So I begin with the page.
An hour might sound like a lot of time to spend journaling, but I like giving myself enough room to get past the first answer. Sometimes you need a little while before you know what you actually want to say.
And a journal will wait.
It doesn’t send a follow-up notification because I haven’t finished a thought. It has never informed me that seventeen other people are having a more productive morning. I find these excellent qualities in a companion.
I can take my time. Write a little. Pause. Have some coffee. Let a thought arrive without immediately asking it to become useful.
There is enough of that waiting later.
What I value about this routine is how simple it is. Coffee, a journal, and an hour before the phone. I can begin the day at a pace that feels like mine.
I’m grateful to the life coach who taught me that small boundary years ago. I wonder if they knew it would still be part of my mornings, long after the conversation itself.
Some lessons stay with us that way. Eventually, they become something as ordinary and familiar as putting the coffee on.
And when the hour is over, I open my phone.
I find the world has generally managed to remain very busy.
But by then, I’ve had a chance to hear myself.
And the world gets a much more agreeable version of me once the coffee has had an opportunity to contribute.
