Order of Man - FFN 107： Crafting the Perfect Morning Routine

00:00:00.000 You're a man of action. You live life to the fullest. Embrace your fears and boldly chart

00:00:05.000 your own path. When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time. Every time.

00:00:10.460 You are not easily deterred or defeated. Rugged. Resilient. Strong. This is your life. This is who

00:00:17.240 you are. This is who you will become. At the end of the day, and after all is said and done,

00:00:22.800 you can call yourself a man. Gentlemen, what is going on today? My name is Ryan

00:00:28.040 Mickler, and I am the host and the founder of this podcast, The Order of Men. Whether you are

00:00:33.100 listening in for the very first time, or you've been around for a couple of years now, or whatever

00:00:38.060 it may be, I am glad that you're tuning in. Man, there's been some crazy things in the news, of

00:00:42.760 course, and I think there's a downright dismissal of masculinity in much of society today. And my

00:00:48.980 job here, and hopefully you're on board with this, I think you probably are, otherwise you wouldn't

00:00:53.580 be here, is to reclaim this idea of what it means to be a genuine man in a society that

00:00:59.580 seems, again, to be dismissing it and has some confusion about what this actually looks

00:01:03.860 like. So my goal here with the podcast and the blog and the Facebook group and everything

00:01:09.020 that we're doing is to give the foundation and the framework for what it means to be a

00:01:15.400 man. We have hundreds and hundreds of thousands of downloads each and every month on this podcast,

00:01:20.140 and then we've got thousands, tens of thousands of men joining in, in our Facebook group discussions

00:01:25.620 and the mastermind programs we run and the courses and the events that we plan. It's just

00:01:30.380 been a pretty amazing ride. Like if I look back over three years, it has just been an incredible

00:01:36.580 ride and I'd never had any thought that I would be where I am today. And frankly, it just wouldn't

00:01:43.220 be possible without you, men who are stepping up in a big way in your communities, in your businesses,

00:01:48.520 in your families, and being the men that you know you are designed to be and know that you are called

00:01:54.120 to be. So guys, this is your Friday field notes. You get to listen to me talk for about 10 or 15

00:01:59.900 minutes on some ideas and thoughts that I've had from throughout the week. I do have an interesting

00:02:04.040 one planned for you today. I want to talk about morning routines because I truly believe that having

00:02:09.940 a powerful and a well-articulated morning routine sets the rest of the day up right. And in my

00:02:18.140 experience has helped me be much more efficient and effective, which is something I think all of

00:02:22.560 us want a little bit more of. Before I get into that, let me give you a couple of quick

00:02:26.400 announcements. I don't have a whole lot today. One thing I did want to make mention of is that we

00:02:31.320 have an order of man store. A lot of guys don't know that. And we just came out with what we have

00:02:35.940 dubbed our testosterone booster shirt. So if you haven't checked that out, go to store.orderofman.com.

00:02:42.160 We've got a couple of different shirts over there. We've got several hats, decals. We've got our battle

00:02:47.500 planners. We've got a lot of stuff over there. So just go check it out. Store.orderofman.com.

00:02:53.140 It's a great way to support us. And while we're talking about support, if you would, please

00:02:58.220 subscribe. All right. Just subscribe to the show. Make sure that there's other men in your life,

00:03:02.760 brothers, friends, colleagues, coworkers, neighbors, dads, whoever it may be. Another man that needs to

00:03:09.100 hear about the message that we are sharing. All right. Share this episode. It's critical that we share

00:03:14.900 what we know. The third announcement that I wanted to make is that we are right in the middle

00:03:19.640 of an order of man readathon. This is something I announced on my Instagram page, which is at

00:03:25.260 Ryan Mickler. My last name is spelled M I C H L E R. Uh, we're going to the end of this month. So all

00:03:32.240 you need to do to enter the drawing and the giveaways. And I'm going to tell you what that looks like here

00:03:36.340 in a minute is post any book that you read. You can have as many entries as possible, as many entries

00:03:41.960 and books that you've completed posted on Instagram, tag it with O O M O M as an order of

00:03:47.800 man, O M readathon and tag me Ryan Mickler again as well. Uh, and then you are entered into the

00:03:56.080 drawing. It's as simple as that. Uh, I am giving away a book pack. It's 12 rules for life by Jordan

00:04:02.260 Peterson. Own the day, own your life by Aubrey Marcus resilience by Eric Greitens, and then extreme

00:04:08.320 ownership by Jocko Willink and Leif Babin. Ego is the enemy by Ryan holiday. And of course

00:04:13.440 it wouldn't be complete if I didn't give you my book sovereignty, and that's going to be a signed

00:04:17.880 copy. So it's those six books I'm doing a giveaway with again, make sure you join us over on Instagram

00:04:22.460 at Ryan Mickler tag O O M readathon and tag me on those posts as well. And you're entered into the

00:04:28.640 drawing. All right, guys, enough of that. Let's get into this discussion today. Again, I want to talk

00:04:33.700 with you about, I think this is a really important topic and I think it's easy to overlook because

00:04:38.220 we've all heard about morning routines and morning rituals. We've all heard this stuff,

00:04:42.920 but I really believe that having a healthy morning routine is probably the single most important thing

00:04:49.720 that you can do in the morning during your day as it relates to establishing a benchmark and a

00:04:55.760 framework, the foundation for the way the rest of the day will go. And the reason I think that most

00:05:00.940 people probably overlook this or haven't been able to stick to a morning routine is because there's so

00:05:08.220 much advice already out there. And what a lot of guys do is they begin to believe that they have to

00:05:13.980 do it a certain way, that they have to do it the way the one guy did it, or they have to do it the

00:05:18.460 way that I do it. And here's what I'm here to tell you. I'm going to share with you my morning routine.

00:05:24.080 That doesn't make it the morning routine. It simply means that this is what works for me.

00:05:29.540 The most powerful thing that you can do with regards to your morning routine

00:05:33.500 is to find something and build something and craft something that works for you. Not me,

00:05:39.420 not your neighbor, not your friend, not the other guy that you're following on social media or whoever

00:05:43.320 it may be. Find something that works for you. And this really is a process of experimentation.

00:05:49.880 You've got to try some things. Some is going to work and some is not going to work. So again,

00:05:54.040 I'm going to share with you what works for me. If you like it, adopt it. If you don't like it,

00:05:57.920 don't adopt it. If you like parts of what I talk about, adopt part of it, you get the idea.

00:06:02.320 All right. So number one is your wake up time. I happen to get up at 530 every morning. I don't

00:06:07.400 care if you get up at five or 430 or three or six, it doesn't matter to me. I think what the

00:06:12.480 most important thing here is that you get up at a time that's going to allow you plenty of time in

00:06:19.140 the morning to get the things that you need to do done. I see so many guys rush. And I used to be

00:06:24.540 like this too. We just rush in the morning and give ourselves just barely enough time to shower,

00:06:30.560 maybe grab a quick bite to eat on the way out the door, hit the traffic and into work. But you've

00:06:35.460 got to get up. You've got to give yourself time to do some of these other things that I'm going to

00:06:39.960 talk about with you today. So do that. If it's two hours, if it's three hours, I did a video on

00:06:45.140 my morning routine a while back and I got a lot of comments. This would take me all day. It wouldn't

00:06:50.320 take you all day. It would probably take you two and a half hours. So I suggest that you get up two

00:06:56.080 and a half to three hours before you need to be into work. And again, that's going to be dependent

00:07:00.500 upon traffic and some other things, but give yourself two to three hours in the morning.

00:07:04.620 I promise you, you're going to feel better when you get more done before the sun comes up or before

00:07:10.920 you step foot into the office than what most people do all day. So again, for me, it's 530. I don't

00:07:16.580 care what works for you. Just get your butt out of bed. Give yourself a couple hours. Let's get

00:07:20.900 these other things done. Now, the first thing that I do when I wake up is my hydration. I set my water

00:07:26.740 bottle in the fridge the night before so that when I get up, it's there, it's ready, it's cold. I can

00:07:31.820 start hydrating. That hydration component is so important to me because if you think about it,

00:07:37.500 you've probably and hopefully spent somewhere between seven to nine hours out of your day without any

00:07:43.860 water whatsoever. So the very first thing I do in the morning is hydrate. I get that water intake up.

00:07:50.220 A lot of people talk about different supplements and putting salt and lime and lemon and all the

00:07:55.000 wonderful things and little concoctions they make. And while there may be some truth to that and that

00:07:58.580 works for some people and it maybe works for you, for me, it's straight water. Just drink a bunch of

00:08:02.520 water. I'm up. I'm ready to go. And I noticed that's the first thing to do that actually wakes me up.

00:08:07.880 Now, I just started, this is second, I just started doing yoga like three or four days ago. So when I get

00:08:13.820 up, I hydrate, I was stretching. Now I'm starting this yoga program that I'm doing right now. And I

00:08:20.300 can tell you, I feel better going into the gym. I don't know that it's necessarily impacted or affected

00:08:26.160 my performance yet, but I will say that I feel better when I'm stretching, when I'm loose, when I'm

00:08:32.840 up, when I move the body. And I think that's the most important component of this is that you actually

00:08:37.180 move your body and then you get up and you, and you tell your body that, Hey, now it's time to work.

00:08:42.840 It's time to operate. It's time to do the things that I need to do. And again, I do that through

00:08:46.720 a stretching program usually. And now I'm getting more into yoga, which I have quite honestly

00:08:51.900 resisted for a while, but over these past three, four days or so, man, I just feel a whole lot

00:08:57.180 better. All right. So yoga is what I do. It's about 20 or 30 minutes before my wife gets home from the

00:09:02.040 gym. Uh, the third component, the next component is that once she does get home and into the door,

00:09:06.900 I'm out the door and I go into my CrossFit gym. I'm there at six o'clock from six to seven,

00:09:12.040 every single morning. Uh, I personally do CrossFit and I do that four to five days per

00:09:16.780 week. Uh, I also do starting strength. I know, uh, a lot of you guys are probably familiar

00:09:22.180 with, with both of those CrossFit and starting strength, but look guys, here's what I've got

00:09:26.460 to tell you. And this is a disclaimer here. I don't care what works for you. All right.

00:09:30.980 I get messages like, Oh, people get injured and they get hurt at CrossFit and starting strength

00:09:35.460 is this. And this program is that, and you should do this. Look, I've been doing CrossFit

00:09:40.540 for four years. I've been doing starting strength for about six months or so. And between those

00:09:46.060 two programs, I feel like I'm getting things dialed in. Uh, I, I know there might be different

00:09:51.740 programs out there. I know that there's risks of course with any level of exercise, but this

00:09:57.760 is what works for me. And that's the most important thing. You could have the best program

00:10:01.460 in the world and all the data and all the facts. And that's important. Don't get me wrong

00:10:04.900 here, but you could have all of that information and you could know exactly just exactly what

00:10:11.280 you need to be doing from an exercise perspective. But look, if you're not actually doing it, if

00:10:16.340 you're not going into the gym and picking up heavy things and running around and moving

00:10:20.620 your body, it doesn't matter how wonderful the research is. So find a program that's, that's

00:10:25.980 backed, that's safe. And, and really importantly, that actually works for you and, and,

00:10:31.240 and you'll continue to do it. So again, exercise is what it is for me. Now, once I'm done with,

00:10:36.940 with CrossFit or starting strength, which again, takes me about an hour, I'm back home

00:10:40.240 about seven o'clock. I get right into scripture study with, uh, with my family. So I head

00:10:44.500 home. Uh, the kids are usually awake at that point because my wife has had some time to get

00:10:48.520 ready and woken them up. Uh, we all meet downstairs for scripture study. Uh, we typically read from

00:10:54.120 the Bible and a lot of people ask, you know, what, what study guides or what scripture study

00:10:59.500 program I use. I haven't ever looked into any of those. We just read from the Bible and we read

00:11:05.820 usually one chapter, maybe half a chapter or a third, I guess, just depending on how long it is

00:11:11.080 and how long we can have my four kids is attention. So we'll read and then we'll discuss it. We just

00:11:16.700 talk about it. Hey, what does that mean to you? What did it say? What do you like? What do you agree

00:11:20.200 with? What, what do you have questions about? And we just discussed the chapter, the verses that we had

00:11:25.060 just read. And then from there we get right into our morning prayer. Now there's six of us in the

00:11:30.720 family, me, my wife, and four kids. Uh, five of us are old enough and incapable enough to say a

00:11:36.520 prayer. So I do Mondays. My wife does Tuesdays. My oldest does Wednesday. My next does Thursdays and

00:11:42.520 so on. Uh, and that, and that works out good. You know, we just, we have our family prayer. We get on

00:11:47.440 the same page. Uh, we, we do that together and that seems to work out pretty well for us after that.

00:11:52.600 And guys, I think this is really, really, really important and something that I don't think a lot

00:11:58.460 of people do right after our prayer. We do what we just call our family meeting. Now this family

00:12:04.160 meeting doesn't take very long. It's usually five to 10 minutes, if that even, and it's just an

00:12:08.820 opportunity for us to get on the same page. Like what practices do we have and what's our schedule?

00:12:15.000 And is there a dance recital we need to attend? And where's dad going to be this weekend? And his mom

00:12:19.860 sticking around, or is she going out with her girlfriends tonight or whatever, whatever the

00:12:23.800 day looks like, we just all get on the same page. I don't want there to be any guesswork about where

00:12:28.880 dad is or where mom is, or who's got the baseball game and who's picking up who and what kids are

00:12:33.280 doing what. I mean, it gets a little hectic around here with six kids. A lot of you guys

00:12:36.940 understand that because you have large families and without us getting on the same page in some

00:12:41.960 capacity, I just feel like we just wouldn't be as efficient. And there'd be a lot of confusion and

00:12:46.440 guesswork, which slows everything down and makes us inefficient. So that morning family meeting is

00:12:51.980 really, really critical. Now, after that, we get into our family breakfast. So we head into the

00:12:58.300 dining room. We have breakfast as a family. We talk with the kids, you know, what's going on at

00:13:03.320 school? What do you like? What are you not like? What are you struggling with? Are there, are you

00:13:07.160 dealing with bullies? You know, we converse, we talk, we laugh, we have fun, and we just have a good

00:13:11.560 time. And I think that it sets a precedent. And that precedent is that family comes first and that

00:13:17.860 we are the most important people in each other's lives because when they get out into the world and

00:13:23.200 they get dealing with friends and teachers and clients and everybody that we deal with on a daily

00:13:28.720 basis, that stuff's important. But I think having this family breakfast grounds us to what I believe

00:13:35.080 is truly important. And that's the people inside the walls of my home. And I think this is an area

00:13:40.580 that a lot of people are, are lacking. And I think if there's just one small thing that men and women

00:13:48.040 can do in their lives and their family's lives to improve family dynamics, improve family relationships

00:13:53.600 is to eat meals together, at least breakfast and dinner as often as you can. I get it. It gets crazy.

00:14:00.720 It gets busy. Life is tough. Sometimes both parents are working. Sometimes kids and little Billy and,

00:14:06.860 and little Susie have practices and dance recitals. I get it. But I promise you, in my experience,

00:14:12.860 anyways, this has just worked wonders for the dynamic of the family. And it allows us to know

00:14:18.360 what's going on in our kids' lives. So that's important. Family breakfast. Now, after that,

00:14:22.240 we get into getting ready for the day. Obviously, I hope I don't need to explain what that actually

00:14:27.400 looks like for me, but I will say for my kids, we have something that we call the morning five

00:14:32.040 because we're having a lot of confusion with the kids on what they need to be doing in the morning

00:14:35.700 and how to get ready. And they didn't know what to do. So we just called it the morning five.

00:14:40.220 Very easy. They eat breakfast, which they've already accomplished. We already talked about

00:14:44.040 that. Number one. Number two, they do their chores. Number three, they get dressed. Number

00:14:49.040 four, they brush their teeth. They do their hair and that kind of thing. And then number five,

00:14:52.700 they do something educational. So they can read a book. They can play an educational type game on the

00:14:58.580 computer. Maybe they have some homework that they need to get accomplished that that's looming before

00:15:02.740 they get into school, whatever that looks like. But that's our morning five. Again,

00:15:06.160 it's eating breakfast, doing their chores, getting their clothes on, brushing their teeth,

00:15:10.660 and then doing something educational. And this has to be done. This has to be done. There's

00:15:15.700 consequences if they don't get this stuff done by the time they leave for school. And it's not that

00:15:20.680 they get to ditch school. It's just that they get consequences after school. So once that's done,

00:15:25.860 once the kids are out the door, once I'm ready, the very first thing that I do when I get

00:15:30.580 downstairs, which is where my office is, fortunately, I don't have a commute, is my daily planning. You

00:15:35.500 know, it's very, very easy guys for us to get into the office and we get right into emails or just any

00:15:42.360 of the projects that we have to get done. But I'm telling you, if you can figure out a way and you

00:15:47.700 can, it's just a decision that you make to take 20 to 30 minutes before your day for planning, I think

00:15:54.940 you're going to notice some big, big improvements in your business. And you know, I plan out the day,

00:16:00.040 I strategize, I prioritize and figure out what I need to do. I do all of that before I get into

00:16:05.760 emails and before I respond to people. And before I do a podcast before anything else, it's always

00:16:12.020 planning, plan, plan, plan. Then I've got the rest of the day to execute and engage in that plan.

00:16:19.220 And that's, that's what it is. My kids are at school. My wife's doing her stuff, but now I have

00:16:23.160 the proper framework, the foundation for an effective day. And guys, I've spent a lot of time

00:16:29.820 refining this routine, tweaking it, adjusting it. And I've also got an evening routine. I'm

00:16:35.320 going to talk about that later for the sake of time, but this is just about morning routine.

00:16:39.020 So again, as a recap, maybe you want to take some notes. Maybe you want to internalize this stuff

00:16:43.100 again, take what works for you, leave what doesn't figure it out, experiment. So for me,

00:16:47.480 it's five 30, wake up, it's hydration. Very first thing, a yoga or some sort of stretching

00:16:53.440 regimen, a CrossFit or starting strength, depending on the day, scripture study, family prayer,

00:16:59.500 family meeting, breakfast together. It's the morning five. And then it's my daily planning.

00:17:04.800 And then I get to it as simple as that. So guys, there it is. My perfect morning routine. I've been

00:17:10.640 working at it again over the course of years, years and years, four or five, six years. I've refined it.

00:17:15.820 I've tweaked it. I've honed it. I've adjusted it. I've, I've experimented it. And that's what you have

00:17:20.580 to do. Experiment, find what works for you, leave what doesn't keep what does. It's going to take

00:17:25.560 some time, but I promise you that investment of your time and energy and crafting this perfect

00:17:30.780 morning routine, it's going to pay dividends for the rest of your life. So invest the time

00:17:36.580 and energy in doing that with that guys. And before I sign out, I would encourage you to share,

00:17:41.060 share what your morning routine looks like, share some pictures of you engaging in your morning

00:17:45.300 routine. And, uh, I think that we can inspire other men to incorporate and adopt some of this

00:17:51.440 stuff. And you'll learn from me and them as well. So that's what this is all about. Order of man.

00:17:55.560 It's about helping each other out. It's about expanding and growing and collaborating and working

00:17:59.260 together so we can improve together. So share it on Twitter or Facebook, both at order of man,

00:18:04.240 shared on Instagram. That one's at Ryan Mickler. Love to see what you guys are up to. I'm honored that

00:18:10.340 you're here on this journey with me of reclaiming what it means to be a man again in a society that

00:18:15.540 I think dismisses it. And, uh, I think that's going to get worse, but we've got to, we've got

00:18:22.480 to reverse that trend. We've got to do something a little bit differently. And that's what this

00:18:26.860 movement is all about. So appreciate you guys being here until next week, take action and become the

00:18:31.700 man you are meant to be. Thank you for listening to the order of man podcast. You're ready to take

00:18:37.440 charge of your life and be more of the man you were meant to be. We invite you to join the order

00:18:42.080 at order of man.com.

Order of Man - May 11, 2018

FFN 107： Crafting the Perfect Morning Routine

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