I love mornings. I love the fresh starts, the blank slates. I love the new breaths, the new sunrises. I love the fresher brewed coffee, spending more time in my pajamas.
I just love the peacefulness and serenity of the early hours.
That’s not to say I’m a natural morning person — I could sleep FOREVER (I’m not exaggerating) if I don’t set an alarm. But, over the years, I’ve learned that the mornings are just the best time for me creatively and productively. I also just feel awesome when I wake up early, so I trained myself to hop out of bed early on weekdays.
I’ve had the same routine for the past few years, but only in the past few months have I absolutely PERFECTED my morning routine. I hop out of bed, excited to start my day, and I feel refreshed, productive, positive, and creative before I even drink my coffee. (After my coffee, watch out world!)
YOUR MORNING SETS THE TONE FOR THE WHOLE DAY
Have you ever noticed that?
Like, when people are having a bad day, whether it’s noon or past dinnertime, we say, “Look who woke up on the wrong side of the bed.” (Figuratively or literally — I don’t know how you sleep.) My brother is also fond of saying, “Who peed in your Cheerios this morning?”
When you’re rushing out the door on an empty stomach, chugging coffee and late to work, you just KNOW the rest of your day will suck. And sometimes it does.
BUT when you wake up and you have 10 beautiful, peaceful minutes to yourself — that’s super awesome. And I bet the rest of the day will be, too.
For a few years now, I’ve been taking about 10 minutes to incorporate the SAVERS routine into my mornings. It took a lot of time before it became a habit (that’s just how habits work) but now I’m so glad it’s something I do.
What’s a SAVERS morning routine? It stands for Silence, Affirmations, Visualize, Exercise, Read, Scribe. So what does my version look like?
SILENCE
When my alarm goes off on my phone, the first thing I do is turn it off.
The next thing I do is put my phone down. I DO NOT open up Instagram or Twitter or Snapchat or even my messages app.
I put in my eyedrops, and I hop out of bed.
A lot of versions of the SAVERS routine I’ve looked at suggest meditating for silence, but once I close my chronically dry eyes I WILL fall back asleep. So, I practice silence by quietly being with JUST my thoughts first thing in the morning. No phone. No social media.
If there’s one thing I encourage you to take away from this blogpost, it’s this: don’t look at your phone as soon as you wake up. I used to do this, and it would just bog me down so so so much before my feet could even touch the floor.
AFFIRMATION
After I get up, I head straight to the bathroom where I wash my face, brush my teeth, and go through my daily affirmations in my head.
Right now, these are my daily affirmations:
- I am radiant.
- I am enough.
- I am a #1 New York Times bestselling author.
- I am grateful for all that I am and I am becoming.
I like to do this while I’m looking at myself in the mirror, because. . .*deep breath* (buckle in for a story)
One day, when I was at the gym watching myself exercise in the huge wall mirror. I was just staring at myself, and then I thought: “Wait, this is me. THIS is me. THIS is Madeline. This is what Madeline looks like.”
And then I had a split second of an almost out of body experience where I saw myself so objectively. I saw myself as if I were a stranger. I didn’t know who I was or what I was supposed to be doing because in the grand scheme of things, while I’m the center of my own world, I was hardly the center of anyone else’s.
Then that was all over, and I was back in my body. (Okay, it wasn’t quite that dramatic, but you get the picture, right?) I realized that my arms were hurting (because #tbt to when I was working out) and I was flooded with questions. “Who am I? What’s my purpose? What’s the point? Why am I here, on this planet in this lifetime right now?”
Then I remembered my affirmations. I remembered what I like to think of as my purpose — to be radiant. I want to glow so I can give light to other’s.
Now, it took me a long time to realize what exactly my “mission” on this planet was. For a while, it was just a quote on Pinterest that I liked. I can’t tell if one of the lines in my daily affirmations has been my life purpose and it just took me so long to realize, or if it was the other way around.
Either way, affirmations are important. They ground me. Remind me WHY I’m here.
VISUALIZE
It’s time to whip out the vision boards! I have one posted on my wall, and I also have one saved to Pinterest, which I’ll scroll through, taking time to look at the pictures and read all the quotes.
(I’m also making coffee during this time, and by making coffee, I mean using my Keurig. I’ve talked about my favorite coffee before if you’re looking for recommendations *wiggles eyebrows*)
EXERCISE
WAIT DON’T RUN AWAY (which is ironic, because running is exercise, so running FROM exercise is still technically exercise). Let’s take it easy here.
I exercise at night. I like to spend my whole mornings writing and working on my WIPs, but it still feels great to get a bit of blood moving before I sit down with my writing.
To get my body moving, I do three sun salutations in a row, trying to focus on my breathing and keeping it fast and powerful. It takes like a minute? But it’s so refreshing to get my blood and breath moving. I highly recommend you move in some way. You’re gifted with a body — use it!
READ
This is when my morning routine morphs into my writing routine, which is pretty cool!
After I finish my stretching, I grab my coffee, and light a few candles, I break out one of my favorite writing craft books and just dive in. I read anywhere from 2-4 pages, which isn’t a lot, but it adds up.
SCRIBE
Okay, this is a fancy word for “write” because SAVERW wouldn’t have the same ring to it.
Right before I start writing-writing (as in, working on my WIP), I’ll do a quick 5 minute brain dump of everything on my mind. As it’s morning time, my brain is usually still fresh, but it’s nice to make sure that I leave all my worries before I enter my writing sessions.
Then I start to really write, and I’ll put in anywhere from 1-2.5 hours of work on my dreams before I even eat breakfast.
Caffeine and Writing Dreams 