The new year’s routine.
New years resolutions are so 2018. Here is why and how you build a new year’s routine.
TL;DR: Here a short Tick story about this article (best on mobile)
Running out of air
Last year has been insane. Graduating from the Zinc VC incubator with an incredible co-founding team and startup. Raising funds. Hiring. Building.
And most importantly, the tremendous personal growth which comes with running a startup.
I had no idea that any of this would happen.
The only thing I knew for certain was that this will be “The rush hour of my life”, plastered with both failure and success.
And rush hours are busy. Messy. And chaotic.
During rush hour, you experience all kinds of emotions: You are tempted to yell at the other drivers, ponder if you will ever arrive, and regret not leaving the house earlier.
Most importantly though, you are in a rush. And in a rush, we forget to eat healthy, exercise and take care of ourselves.
As an entrepreneur, we are driven by the need to help others. Yet as anybody who has ever taken a plane knows:
Pull your own oxygen mask over your head first before helping other passengers and children. Oxygen is flowing even if the bag does not inflate.
Ignore the second bit.
In the event of an emergency, you’re urged to take care of yourself first before attending others.
You are no help to the rest of us if you are flat out of oxygen like the girl from this 90’s anti-pot advertisement.
The rush hour of the startup journey is like a continuous emergency situation. Everything seems urgent. You are constantly putting out fires.
So how do you take care of yourself when you have just no time or mind space available?
You do what every tech entrepreneur would do:
You automate it.
Switch off your head
Routines have a bad rep.
We associate them with long and boring days at the office where we have to switch off our heads just to survive. Those are bad routines.
You can make good routines work for you.
Routines are simply a series of behaviors we perform automatically (habits) so our mind can focus on other things.
Watching Netflix every evening after work is a routine. So is taking your shoes off when you come home. Or brushing your teeth.
Good routines: healthy behavior (however you define them) that would normally require a lot of willpower to perform.
Bad routines: unhealthy behavior which occurs because of a lack of willpower or motivation.
Funnily enough, we often know exactly when we have fallen into bad routines (e.g. fiddling on our phone for 1 hour in bed after the alarm rang) but lack the willpower to overcome them.
Top performing entrepreneurs and executives know this. They know that in order to master the chaos of the outer world, you have to master the inner world first.
They shame young people for wanting to be CEOs when they can’t even keep their own rooms organized.
They also know that in the rush hour, it is incredibly important to remain calm and stable.
Routines ground you, they make sure you start and end every day the same, giving you the stability you need in uncertain times.
Nobody likes an unpredictable colleague or boss who comes into the office every day with a different mood on.
So in 2018, I’ve built my own routines.
Don’t force it, remove barriers!
New years resolutions don’t work because we try to force them through sheer willpower. But if we always laid lazy in bed instead of going for that morning run, what makes us think we’ll do it now?
The trick to a solid routine is not forcing it with willpower. This never works, especially in the e.g. in the morning when you are anyways only two steps away from crawling back under your blanket.
It follows this formula:
Behaviour = Willpower — Friction
Most new years resolutions simply try to increase our willpower e.g. to be healthy. They don’t address the fact the barriers to being healthy are the same as before! Better to make the behavior so easy or even
enjoyable that you have to do it.
Because especially in the morning, you are weak. Don’t get frustrated about it. We all are.
The trick is to remove all possible barriers the night before when you still have a lot of willpower!
To remove those barriers, you need help. People don’t change by themselves.
You need a hypeman, like a gym buddy for your routine. Somebody to support you, who cheers you on and remind you what you have to do.
Luckily, the best hypeman for yourself is… you!
Get your future self ready. Lay your running clothes and shoes in front of your door. Set alarms for the evening as well as morning. Fill up a bottle of water and place it next to your bed.
Cheer yourself on, every evening for setting yourself up for success. Every morning for successfully doing the things you always thought were too hard to do.
In the beginning, this will take a lot of conscious effort (and phone reminders).
Yet over time (some say 21 days, Forbes disagrees), your routine will become a solid habit. Fully automated, little to no extra effort, boosting your confidence.
You’ll be healthier, happier, and more stable.
Ready for the rush hour.
My routine
I used a free trial of Fabulous App (created by Dan Ariely) for ideas, never got the subscription.
Evening: 15min speed reading course. Switch off all electronic devices at 11 pm. Prepare running/exercise gear for the morning. Fill a bottle of water and place it next to my bed. Floss (Dance and hygiene). Read until tired.
Explainer: Setting myself up for the morning when my willpower will be low. Reading helps better with sleep than Ambien, also leads to less awkward tweets. Generally, waking up early is easy, it’s the going to bed early that’s hard.
Morning: Wake up at 6:45am to chug the bottle of water. Snooze until 7am. 15–20min of running/exercise. Shower and Breakfast. Journaling about yesterday and important decisions today. Tying together any loose ends from yesterday and then off to work.
Explainer: I used to feel groggy in the morning until I realized it was just dehydration, water helps to kickstart the day. Journaling helps to take time to reflect and avoid regret when making important decisions.
Lunch: Meditate for >10min.
Explainer: Serves as a check-in halfway through the day and recenters you.
A few additional observations:
Slippery slope: Routines are hard to establish but extremely fast to lose. Just a few days of slacking can destroy weeks of work. Watch out for this especially when times are hectic or you’re traveling.
New Environments: When you are moving house or starting a new job it’s the best time to start new routines since you don’t have to fight old habits. The second best time to start is today.
Moral Licensing: Just because you establish a good routine during the week doesn’t mean you can slip in other areas or on the let it all go on the weekend ;) As fun as it is, sleeping in on weekends just ruins your sleeping pattern.
Overload: It’s tempting to just dive in and create a long routine with plenty of healthy habits. Only to never do it. Start with two or three and add new ones over time.
And my new habit for 2019: Always take the stairs! (Please remind me of this when you see me, I live on the 6th floor)
Happy new year everybody!
Disclaimer: All views and opinions are my own. And by that I mean a vast mix of my own observations and bits and pieces I picked up in books, podcasts, and conversations.
If you have any questions, suggestions, or routines you’d like to share just drop them in the comments or shoot me a message.
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