10 Morning Rituals to help you win the day in triathlon and business
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6:00 a.m. Your alarm beeps and vibrates into life. Reluctantly you turn it off.
The first thing you do is pick up your phone and scroll through social media and email.
This might create FOMO - sadly your day won’t look like Lucy Charles-Barclay’s (@lucycharles93) or Kilian Jornet (@kilianjornet), FEAR or/and STRESS - you see you have a deadline at 3pm, a big meeting, and a report and you think sh*t, how am I going to fit it all in??
These kind of mornings are unproductive and adds stress to your day. Good news: I have the solution.
I’m a firm believer of the good old adage if you win the morning, you win the day.
When done right, a morning routine can save you time and increase your speed, endurance, energy and ultimately your success - both in sport and business.
Here’s a list of 10 morning rituals (in no particular order) you can implement immediately to set yourself up to win the day:
Morning Ritual #1 Visualisation - or Brain Rehearsal
Get your head in the game - literally.
Your brain can’t tell the difference between what’s real and what’s imaginary, so when you positively visualise (or rehearse) your day, your brain creates a positive memory about the future.
In turn this creates a whole series of positive memories about what’s going to happen in your day and the positive feelings associated with it.
When you positively visualise your day, you grow and strengthen neuropathways into the performance you want to achieve. The more you exercise these neuropathays, the more automatic they become, which leads your brain to expect and predict a future of great, high performing things.
This means when you now consider your day and an element of your day, such as triathlon training, it has a wealth of very recent and positive, powerful and productive experiences of being successful in that situation.
Morning Ritual #2 Make your bed
Influence what you can influence - start with making your bed.
Making your bed first thing in the morning gives you a quick win and provides you with a springboard of wins and positivity for the rest of your day.
So if you do end up having a shitty day and/or you’re in a whirlwind of uncertainty, the one thing you can influence is making your bed, and if you’ve made your bed, then you’ve still got skin in the game.
As the former U.S. special operations chief and legendary Navy Admiral William McRaven said in his commencement speech at the University of Texas: “If you want to change the world, start off by making your bed.”
Morning Ritual #3 Start thinking positively first thing
Ask yourself, what am I most excited about today? And answer using positive language.
Having interviewed many morning people, this is the number one question that they ask themselves.
The words we say and use are the structure and architecture of our thoughts, feelings and experiences. They can make the difference between winning and losing, hitting our PB and achieving our potential.
By starting your day using powerful, positive and productive language, you’re firing the pathways for positivity, optimism, energy and motivation.
Morning Ritual #4 No distractions
Do NOT do this when you wake up:
Check your email
Check social media
Watch the news
Turn on the TV/Netflix etc.
Go directly to jail ;)
What you focus on, pay attention to and give intention to, will shape your life, whether you want it to or not.
If you're focused on the distractions, like the list above, and miss or poorly execute your rituals, your reality will reflect this.
Pay attention, focus and concentrate on what mindset practices you need to complete to the best of your ability on a daily basis. By eliminating distractions like social media you will start your day on the right side of the bed.
Morning Ritual #5 Gratitude practice
My friend and I were walking down Chiswick High street in London a few summers ago, when suddenly she said:
“Adelaide, there are SO many yummy mummys here!”
I was really taken aback. I couldn’t see any.
But then, all of a sudden those yummy mummys drinking lattes outside with their babies came into view. They were EVERYWHERE!
All I had been noticing was the occasional cute guy we walked past.
This is because my friend was in a place in her life when she wanted a husband and children, but didn’t even have a boyfriend. So her brain was pointing out to her everything she didn’t have.
I was single and looking for a young hot guy to be with, so brain highlighted the attractive men to me - while dimming the yummy mummys, as it’s not something I want.
Your brain edits how you see the world according to what you tell it to look for - consciously or unconsciously.
You can train your brain to show you all of the positive, abundant and helpful things in your daily life by using a morning gratitude practice.
Simply list 10 things you’re grateful (they have to be different each day) and 5 things that would make your day great.
Morning Ritual #6 Train
If you’re an athlete whose getting frustrated by outside events making your miss your training or reduce your performance, then the morning could be a perfect time for you.
It means you’ll start your day with a big win, in a powerful mindset and know that whatever happens during the day, you’ve already got your training in.
Morning Ritual #7 Mobility
One of my favourite people to follow on Insta (and YouTube) is Shona Vertue (@shona_vertue), she’s a personal trainer who’s known for her entertaining workouts and got David Beckham into yoga!
She’s a big advocate for morning mobility routines to wake up your mind and body, and it’s one of her non-negotiables. This means she always get this done in the morning no matter what.
Sometimes as triathletes you can often neglect stretching and cooling off after a workout, this is important to wind down the body and mind, and doing it in the morning helps you enhance your flexibility, iron out any creaks and get your body ready for the day.
Morning Ritual #8 Meditation
High-performance environments are fast-paced and everyone is playing hard. If you’re a pro athlete or not, if you have a heavy (or/and stressful) workload, don’t overlook the recovery aspects of performance.
A favourite “neuro hack” of mine is box breathing, as it’s an effective way to calm the body and mind.
Box breathing is a type of meditation, which is great for reducing stress and anxiety, and boosting mood, focus and memory.
I’m an advocate of box breathing, because it’s a highly effective technique to relax the body and train the brain for concentration and focus. It’s well known that Navy Seals use this technique to keep them on form and influence their emotions positively when under stress.
Here are the 5 stages of box breathing:
Sit comfortably, close your eyes or softly focus on a specific spot, exhale all of your air and then inhale through your nose while counting to 4.
Hold your breath for the count of 4.
Exhale all of your air out for the count of 4.
Hold for the count of 4.
Repeat steps 1 to 4, ideally for 10 minutes.
If the count of 4 is too hard, you can take the count down to 3. If it’s too easy, you can take it up to 5, 6 or 7 etc.
Morning Ritual #9 Journal (or Morning Pages)
I like using journaling as a brain dump, working through things and spotting unhelpful patterns (both beliefs, actions and thoughts).
Some go by time, others by the number of pages or just going by what you’re feeling on the day.
I find it’s like a washing machine for your mind. Your thoughts may go in muddled, creased and a little dirty, but they come out dry, smooth and in order.
A practice I’m currently doing is The Artist’s Way Morning Pages: “three pages of longhand, stream of consciousness writing, done first thing in the morning. *There is no wrong way to do Morning Pages* – they are not high art. They are not even “writing.” They are about anything and everything that crosses your mind - and they are for your eyes only. Morning Pages provoke, clarify, comfort, cajole, prioritize and synchronize the day at hand.”
Morning Ritual #10 Daily processes
What are your 3-5 key daily processes you have to complete each day to the best of your ability to achieve your goals and live your best life?
Knowing your non-negotiable and why each one is crucial to your success, will help you build your daily routine blueprint and stay on track to achieving your goals.
Your daily processes are signal tasks or habits that will keep your brain and body primed. My 5 key daily processes are:
Morning routine (read how to create a morning routine here)
Train
Client outreach routine
Social media
Evening routine (read how to create an evening routine here)
If you’re looking for more inspiration on what your daily routine and non-negotiable look like, read my blog ‘Plan your day like a Pro Triathlete’.
