Win the day with Bookends

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If you are anything like me (and countless others) you have tried time and time again to create the perfect daily routine.
Does this sound like you?

• You have a to-do list the length of your arm but you add tasks faster than you complete them?

• You want excellence in life but you feel like you are fighting an uphill battle?

• You want to meditate and stretch but you never find you have the time?

Everyone has a plan, until they are punched in the face.

Mike Tyson

I have found that I create an endless list of things I want to accomplish but never have enough time to complete them all. The funny thing is that it seems no matter how small or how large my to-do lists are I never seem to get traction or get ahead. This is called Parkinson’s law, and it states that your tasks will swell to the time allowed to complete it (similar idea to how a Koi fish will grow to the size of its tank).

It seems that no matter how well formed the plan is, something always comes up during the day which completely derails all of the plans.

Every day, fires need fighting.

The most successful way I have found to combat this is to create daily bookends. A bookend is the two ends of your day, the morning and evening. Even though I cannot control the chaos and fires that happen throughout the day, I can control what happens in my mornings and at night. In this post, I will share the best strategies for creating a morning and nighttime routine which will help you win the day.

Morning Routine

For years I tried to create a giant list of everything I thought would make for a perfect routine. The problem, however, was it would take 1-2 hours and that would mean I would need to sacrifice sleep and wake up at or before 4 am. That was not happening.

Original Morning Routine

1. Workout – 60 minutes
2. Make/Eat Breakfast – 20 minutes
3. Journal – 10 minutes
4. Shower and get ready for the day- 20 minutes
5. Make Coffee – 5 minutes
6. Stretch – 10 minutes
7. Create daily to-do list – 10 minutes
8. Daily Check-in – 5 minutes
9. Read – 30 minutes
10. Social Media Post – 20 minutes

Total = 190 minutes (over two hours!)

I failed this routine for a long time until I realized I could do a Pareto (80/20) analysis and find the few items that created the biggest impact and then scrap the rest. I decided sleep was number one, get my body moving was number two, and setting an intention (being warmed up mentally) was number three. The rest had to go.

1. Shower and get ready for the day- 30 minutes -> Now I just shower at night, and will rinse my hair to reset the bed head.

2. Make/Eat Breakfast – 20 minutes -> Instead I use intermittent fasting and do not eat until 10am.

3. Journal – 10 minutes -> This was important but I lowered the amount of time spent, now I use the 5 minute journal, and the morning section takes 3 minutes.

4. Workout – 60 minutes -> Too much time, so unless it’s the weekend I workout after work

5. Make Coffee – 5 minutes -> No changes here. YOU’RE NOT TAKING AWAY MY COFFEE.

6. Stretch – 10 minutes -> I just move my body with whatever feels tight and do a little foam rolling – 5 minutes

7. Create daily to-do list – 10 minutes -> Instead of creating huge to-do lists I now just focus on the most important items and forget the rest. My dream is to only have one task per day on my list.

8. Daily Check-in – 5 minutes -> I created a google docs sheet which tracks my vital metrics and this only takes about 2 minutes to do.

9. Read – 30 minutes -> As much as I would love to read every morning it takes too much time, so instead I use Audible while I’m getting ready so I can listen to books without any additional time spent, and/or on my drive to work.

10. Social Media Post – 20 minutes -> I have really reduced the amount of time spent on social media, now if i’m doing a post I will do it throughout the day and just not worry as much on having “perfect” timing.

Refined Morning Routine

1. Get Ready for the day – 15 minutes

2. Journal – 3 minutes

3. Have salted water + Make Coffee – 5 minutes

4. Stretch – 5 minutes

5. Daily Check-in – 5 minutes

Total = 33 minutes

Now with my refined morning routine, I get the best bang for my buck. I can look good, feel good, and be ready to conquer the day in just over half an hour. The best part is, if I’m feeling tight on time I can put a hat on and save 5-10 minutes in the getting ready process.

I would say the most important part is the ritual of getting my body moving, checking in, and doing some journaling. This makes each day feel more intentional and less like groundhog day. When I do go a period of time without them my days tend to blur together, I’m more agitated and I feel less fulfilled. Just kidding, we all know the most important part is the coffee.

Throughout the day

Every time I have a huge to-do list something will come up and either I will need to miss out on an opportunity by staying on my to-do list, or I will deal with the interruption and then be frustrated that I didn’t get anything done on my list. The real magic in my system of bookends is that I have super low expectations throughout the day and instead of worrying I will not get everything done I know that the most important parts are already scheduled and for the rest of the day I can focus on the few most important tasks.

What has worked the best for me is under-scheduling myself. For example, at work, I will put down three main projects/tasks I need to work on and three auxiliary tasks that I can use as breaks from the bigger more intense ones. An example could look like the following:

B1 – Production drawings for a new design
B2 – Review Co-workers drawing package for a new fixture
B3 – Quote customer on a new steering system
BA1 – Follow up with purchasing on the last order for revised parts
BA2 – Check on the status for the marketing brochure
BA3 – Professional Development

As you can see, the first three are the main tasks that I will work on for 1-2 hours at a time. At which point I will do one of the auxiliary tasks as a break. This will leave several free hours in my day which allows me to put out the fires, chase the big opportunities, or simply finish off my to-do list.

I used to have 20 items on my to-do and I found that I was spending so much time doing shallow work, just to check items off the list. I was not providing as much value as I was capable of. After reading Cal Newport’s – Deep Work (see my book summary here) and doing Darren Hardy’s – Insane Productivity course, I realized that I was afraid of being seen as an unproductive employee. My perspective has completely changed on this and now I focus on the one most important thing (if you have not read Gary Keller – The one thing, I would highly recommend it). Just by doing this I am less stressed and getting more important and impactful work done.

Transition Time

I find this to be one of the most important parts of my day. Between work and home time, I like to exercise. I aim for this 3-5 days a week. The exact amount depends on how drained my body is and whether or not I am woodworking instead. The workout is crucial in clearing the mental calculator and dumping out all the baggage from a day at work. This is an hour that all I have to focus on is me. My choice is typically CrossFit 3X/week and then either a run or Peloton. Having the separation is so important to being engaged at home and not just dragging all the work issues into home life.

Evening Bookend

As the saying goes, “a great day starts the night before.” This is so true. By having consistency with your evenings you can maintain high performance over the long term. Instead of cramming lots in for a few days (burning the candle at both ends) and then crashing, you can do less each day but accomplish far more over the long haul. For me my evening routine is really simple.

• Nothing productive an hour before bed

• No food/booze 2 hours before sleep

• Stretch

• Meditate (my tip for this is by having a long shower. I am always the most relaxed and have the best thoughts in the shower so I typically use this as the start to my evening bookend)

Summary

It’s important to identify the minimum effective dose for creating routines. All too often we create these elaborate routines that never get followed and instead leave you feeling let down (or is that just me?). Stick to the bare minimum that you will do 80% of on 80% of the days. Long-term consistency is the most important part.

Morning

• Coffee

• Water with salt

• Stretch

• Journal

• Daily Check-in

• Get ready for the day

Evening

• Nothing productive an hour before bed

• No food/booze 2 hours before sleep

• Stretch

• Mediate

I track these key metrics in a google sheet every day which helps remind me of what is important and I can use it to track patterns.

Let me know what your daily routine is below in the comments. If you are looking for any help setting up your own routine do not hesitate to reach out and ask.

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