Daily Morning Routine - Get Ready Faster & Wake Up Happier

This post may contain affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission. More here: Disclaimer & Privacy Policy

A good daily morning routine is important for starting the day off happy and motivated and also a great way to keep things orderly.

Below you'll find ideas on what makes up a good routine morning as well as an exact description of how I start off my days and tips on how a little daily organizing goes a long way. Enjoy!

Do The Opposite Of Nothing: The Ridiculously Simple Strategy For Serious Procrastinators To Go From Overwhelmed To Organized

Check out my latest book and bust through that procrastination! Available as a paperback, an audiobook and an ebook on Kindle but NO KINDLE NECESSARY. Enjoy!

What Makes Up A Good Daily Morning Routine

Let's begin with what happens before the morning madness. The following items are important preceding factors to a good daily morning routine.

How many hours of sleep you get - It is vital to everything you do that you are getting enough sleep. Make sure that you go to bed early enough to get a good 8 hours (or whatever time period is your sweet spot) of shut eye.
How you wake up - If you are in a pleasant dream and your siren of an alarm painfully jerks you out of your sleep, then you probably won't wake up happy. Instead use something like the Sleep Cycle app. Consider any other factors that affect how you wake up and make changes where necessary.
When you wake up - Are you constantly rushing out the door? Is it perhaps because you don't give yourself enough time to get ready in the morning? Go to bed earlier and wake up a little sooner, so that you have more time to go through a good morning routine at a comfortable pace.

Next, let's talk about the daily morning routine itself. It's important to figure out what things need to get done in the morning and how.

Establish the tasks that need to be done. For example, no matter what's happening today I know I need to get myself ready, take my vitamins and have breakfast, and tidy up my home a little bit.
Know what's involved. Now that you know what things need to be done in the morning, the next step is to know what's involved in each task. Going with my example above, getting myself ready involves brushing my teeth, washing my face, putting my clothes on, doing my hair and makeup. By knowing and listing these things, I can accurately say that it takes me 20 minutes to get ready in the morning. This helps me estimate how much time I need for my morning routine more precisely, thus also indicating when I need to wake up.
Do the tasks in order of priority. Do the things that must get done first and then everything else follows. This ensures that if you do happen to be running late that you've gotten the most important things done and the rest can wait. In order of priority, my morning routine involves getting ready, taking my vitamins and having breakfast, and then tidying my place up a bit, so that's how it gets done.
Have a plan for extra time. Since I know how long my morning routine takes, I usually wake up 10 or 15 minutes earlier so I can have some time at the end to do some miscellaneous tasks. I use this time to be on my computer answering urgent emails, reading articles, posting status updates on my social media outlets and so on.
Always know where your essentials are. If you know where your wallet, phone, and keys (and purse) are, then you will avoid the last minute panic of trying to locate these items. Create a home for them, so that you always know where they are (e.g. hooks by the front door for the keys). Easily locating your essentials saves time and frustration and is a perfect ending to a great morning routine!

My Rockin' Daily Morning Routine

Doing all of the things listed above will create a great daily morning routine. Here is mine for reference.

I get about 8 hours of sleep the night before. I wake up using the Sleep Cycle app that gently pulls me out of my sleep, and I start the day happy from the second I open my eyes.

I get ready by brushing my teeth, washing my face, putting my clothes on, doing my hair and makeup. Then I make my bed and go in to the kitchen bringing dirty water glasses with me.

Next, I take my vitamins, start the coffee maker, have some breakfast, change the dog's water and do any dishes in the sink. If necessary, I get my lunch ready to go.

While the coffee is still brewing, I tidy up the living room by folding blankets, fluffing pillows, putting dog toys back in the basket and distributing items to their proper places around the house (i.e. my husband's dirty socks go to the hamper, dirty water glasses go in to the dishwasher, etc.).

With the remaining 10 or 15 minutes, I check and answer emails and do any other computer tasks that I can. In the last 5 minutes, I use the restroom, put on my shoes, put my dog in the kitchen, grab my purse, keys and coffee, and off I go.

The whole routine takes about 45 -50 minutes, and I love it. It works for me, and in less than an hour I get so much done.

A Little Organizing Goes A Long Way For A Successful Daily Morning Routine

Once you've got your good morning routine down, infuse a little bit of organizing into it as I did. It goes a long, long way towards staying organized.

As I said above, I tidy up my home while the coffee is brewing. In that 5 minutes or so, I can fold a few blankets, fluff some pillows and distribute items to their proper rooms in the house.

Doing this small organizing task every day is one of the things that keeps my home most organized since I'm putting everything away on a daily basis, so I highly recommend it to you.