Building your routine

Have you ever watched “Morning routines”? “Night routines”? Maybe a “day in the life” video on youtube, hoping that you are able to wake up that early? Or be as productive during the day like what you’ve watched in those videos? Well, that's why building a routine is actually really good for you! It may even change your life for the better and help you! I personally enjoy watching morning routines, night routines, and day in the life videos because I aspire to wake up that early and be productive as well. Initially, I did try to copy their routines, I used to write down whatever they did and replicate the routines, hoping that I could be as productive and fresh in the morning as they were. That did work out for a couple of days, sometimes some routines did work out for weeks but honestly, never in the long term.

That's when I realized that the only way to actually have the “perfect” or the “most productive” routine, or the routine that your body and mind desires, is to actually slowly build your routine based on you. What I mean by this is, in order to have a “perfect” routine that you, personally do enjoy, you need to understand your needs and what your body and mind are comfortable with. Every single body and mind is different, frankly, it's quite difficult for people to be able to adapt to the exact same things. This means that I may not be an early riser or someone who's able to sleep early, and that's completely fine and normal, but that doesn’t mean that it's impossible to change.

When I did try to make a routine for myself, based on what I saw in the videos, I forced myself to wake up early and sleep early, and do yoga in the morning and the night as well, and try to work out during the day, eat healthy, be productive all day,  because I went to that extent to try to replicate routines. However, it actually doesn’t work that way. When I realized that I couldn’t cope with this routine for the long term, I assumed that it wasn’t possible to do it at all, but that's where I was wrong for the second time. It took some time to actually realize that building your routine doesn’t happen in one day. 

I believe that its really important to have a good routine for yourself because, in that way, you’re able to optimize your time better. However, you need to be patient with yourself and take the time to understand what your needs are. If you want to build a routine, you need to make the changes slowly and see if you’re comfortable with it. My sleep schedule was not the best, sleeping at 2-4, waking up at 6-7, and taking afternoon naps, and on weekends, sleeping in till the afternoon, wasn’t really the best choice for my health but I thought that waking up early and sleeping early was impossible.

I was wrong. I thought that it was impossible, but it actually wasn’t. The first time I tried, I, of course, failed, because I was trying to force myself to follow the routines I watched online, but, the second time I tried it, I slowly and patiently adapted to a better routine. By this, I mean, I was so used to sleeping at 2-3 that I didn’t jump to 9-10 pm, I slowly started with 1 am, then got into bed by 11 pm, then some days I did relapse back to the late nights, but I didn’t give up just yet. I started again, I got into bed earlier and waited till I fell asleep, and even with the mornings, my main focus was getting enough sleep. So, since I slept early, I also focused on waking up early, thus, I was slowly building on my sleep schedule routine.

Similarly, I wanted to see what else I could change in my routine. I saw in the videos how people were able to do yoga in the morning and night, and how they looked so refreshed so I decided why not. I did force myself to do it, and it did take time to realize that it didn’t really help me. I’m not saying that yoga isn’t good for you, but personally, it didn’t really help me, in terms of my mental health, so I decided to stop doing yoga and focus on some breathing techniques which are actually really helpful. I did try and work out, and that actually went really well but didn’t work out in the long term because I did overdo the workouts. I used to watch how people could work out for 2-3 hours straight, but I slowly came to the understanding that my body is comfortable with 30 mins to an hour of working out, and that to, maybe twice or thrice a week.

Therefore, I started trying out more things to see what really makes me feel comfortable and what works for me, but at the same time, if something didn’t work out and I wanted to make it happen, I had to be patient with myself and wait for my body and mind to adapt to it. Like, I used to be able to study only at midnight and beyond when it came to school, and it was quite bad considering the fact that I wasn’t able to even prepare for my exams for the whole day because I couldn’t focus unless it was at night. That didn’t mean that I gave up just there though. I decided that since I could wake up early and put a stop to the afternoon naps, I could maybe try and sit down to finish my work in the morning. Honestly, nearly every morning during my summer vacation, I woke up early and sat down on my table. Even if I wasn’t able to focus, I still sat down and waited for my mind to come to terms that I had work to complete. Now, I can proudly say that even if it's 4 AM or 5 AM, I’m able to study without procrastinating too much.

I realized that at the end of the day, to only find the perfect routine that you desire, you need to be patient with yourself, your mind, and your body. There’s absolutely no deadline to make a perfect routine, so you just need to work on building your routine every single day, and every single day, try to make small changes and see if they work out for you or not. If some things don’t really turn out the way you want them to, then don’t give up just yet! Keep at it and sooner or later, you’ll be able to achieve it!

A routine is like a puzzle. You need to start figuring out which pieces fit and until you do, the puzzle may be incomplete. Be patient with yourself, and sooner or later, when all the pieces seem to fit, the puzzle will be ready. Be patient with yourself, and take time to understand your mind and your body needs. 

-Ananya

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