Morning Routine To Protect Your Mental Health And Build Resilience (By Request).

Are you working from home but doing your absolute best to help your children excel at this novel virtual learning concept, yet feeling more frazzled now than ever before, Dear Readers?  Last week, this blog made a point to remember 9/11.  But the general mood was a lot more somber as the country is enduring a pandemic that has claimed so many lives thus far.  Against all of this sadness, it is easy to let anxiety invade your mind, raise your blood pressure, and send you into a full-blown conniption.  Keep reading to find out how to tune out the noise and tune into what matters most to you to have a meaningful yet productive life.

Welcome, Dear Readers!  The JMS team is back with valuable insights that will inspire you to be fearless in the pursuit of your dreams.  If it’s your first time here, the JMS team is thrilled you decided to stop by the blog today!  FYI, JMS is a consulting firm located in Philadelphia that advises people and organizations on how to manage crises with efficiency.  To that end, the JMS team is in the business of designing recovery plans as robust as possible that avoid behavioral and financial paralysis.  Therefore, Dear Readers, this blog will help you make sense of these unprecedented times without feeling devoid of motivation and utterly defeated.  You got this, Dear Readers, and don’t you ever forget it!  

In this post, we discussed the case of Lisa (a ten-year executive working for a Fortune 500 company here in Philadelphia) who called the JMS team as her personal and professional lives appeared to be on a collision course.  Please take a moment to read that publication to understand why this blog insists that building resilience is the key to facing any crisis effectively.

Today, we are answering a question so many of you, Dear Readers, have asked us to cover: what should a morning routine look like as one is fighting to build resilience?  To answer this question in a way that is relatable and helpful to you, the JMS team asked Lisa to share with you four questions that helped her find her footing amid this devastating global pandemic.

Question one: why do I need a morning routine?

Man oh man Dear Readers, if the team had a nickel every time a new client who joined the JMS data-driven powwows voiced this specific question, the team would be millionaires!  Lisa is no different!  As a mid-forties professional, she resented the fact that the JMS team could dictate how she ought to organize her personal life.  Of course, Dear Readers, the JMS team is not so much in the business of meddling in personal lives but rather aligning to professional objectives.  To that end, Dear Readers, it is vital to have a solid morning routine to give purpose to your day from the moment you wake up.  Let’s not leave your success to chance, shall we?  

And since a crisis of epic proportion, or Big Bad Wolf (BBW) as this blog calls it, is emotionally draining, it is so easy to fall back into survival mode yet be productive when you have a predetermined morning routine.  This way, Dear Readers, you avoid feeling as though you are aimlessly wandering through life much like a chicken keeps running around even with its head is cut off! Don’t let life happen to you anymore!

Question two: how do I decide what element to focus on for a morning routine as I hate working out?  

Oh goodness, gracious, Dear Readers, nobody is forcing you to workout first thing in the morning if that’s not your cup of tea!  The goal is to have the most meaningful life possible rather than being miserable as you do what influencers, gurus, or coaches are telling you to do!  However, Dear Readers, you should know that the JMS team believes that health and wellness are indispensable components of creating a meaningful life. When working with clients, the JMS team tries very hard to nestle both in a well-designed morning routine.  

Some clients, like Lisa, hate exercising with every fiber of their being.  Rather than following a regime of unattainable workouts, Dear Readers, the JMS team suggests adapting the morning routine to what you like to do.  Since Lisa is already prediabetic, the JMS team could not let her get away with doing anything physical!  You see, Dear Readers, when a BBW smacks you in the face, it’s the unexpected and perhaps even unwelcomed invitation to reevaluate what you are doing with your life.  Lisa needed to reevaluate her aversion to exercising.  Especially as this global pandemic underlined a glaring truth: according to the American Diabetes Association (ADA), underlying conditions such as diabetes will worsen the risk of infection when contracting COVID-19.  (Please note, Dear Readers, this blog is not saying that people with diabetes are more likely to get the coronavirus).  

Listen, Dear Readers, what is the point of building resilience and wanting to live a life of purpose if you are eating yourself to premature death?  Furthermore, working from home requires extra effort to fire up the brain since there is no commute to account for as we all want just a wee bit of time in the morning to feel awake enough to start the workday.  For all these reasons, the JMS team worked with Lisa to find a way to introduce a form of physical activity that could wake her mind up and take care of her body at the same time.  Lisa settled on walking the dog Milou for 30 minutes every day, including weekends, as her preferred form of exercise.  By the way, Dear Readers, feel free to check out Healthline to understand why exercise is vital for prediabetics.

Question three: why do I have to wake up at the crack of dawn when I love to sleep?

Isn’t this the million-dollar question, Dear Readers?!!  Everyone always wants to know why productivity requires an early start of the day.  Having known Lisa for some time, the JMS team knew that she was not a morning person.  But now that she does not have to commute and drop her kids off to school, she told us that she wanted to sleep as late as possible.

Well, guess what Dear Readers, the JMS team rose to the occasion.  The truth of the matter is that your productivity infrastructure should be organic to your strengths and weaknesses to stick.  Consequently, the JMS team managed to move Lisa’s wakeup time to 7 am, a full hour after the time she used to wake up when she had to commute to the office. She still manages to get ready, grab breakfast, and be on time to start her workday at 9 am as always!

There is one caveat, however.  Dear Readers, please remember that you cannot do everything on your own.  And when a BBW slaps you in the face, you need even more help!  Therefore, the JMS team suggested that Lisa considered swapping duties with her husband.  Thus, she takes over Milou’s morning walk while her husband wakes the children up, feeds them breakfast, and gets them ready to conquer the distance learning objectives of the day.  Remember, Dear Readers, Lisa’s husband lost his job as COVID-19 mercilessly shattered his industry.  But, since the couple had agreed that he would oversee the instruction of the little ones through the end of the year, he was more than happy to take over morning duties and help the children navigate these unprecedented times.  

Question four: why do I need a planner?

Why, oh why, are so many adults having such an aversion to owning a planner?  Dear Readers, the JMS team is a firm believer in planners.  The motto at JMS is simple: if you dream it, you must plan it, so you can do it!   So yes, Dear Readers, in short, you most definitely need a planner.

But of course, Lisa was set against it from the word go!  She tortured the JMS team and refused to abide by such a simple yet necessary productivity rule.  So, after she threw away every planner available on the planet, the JMS team sat her down to create a customized planner tailor to her specific needs only possible thanks to the great team over at Plum Paper LLC.  By the way, Dear Readers, this is not a sponsorship.  The JMS team genuinely loves the incredible array of personalization options that Plum Paper LLC offers.  You can get a planner to suit you to a T.  We did it for Lisa and, by the way, that’s how she was able to bring her team’s performance back from the dead amid a global pandemic no less!  You’ll have to come back next week to find out how Lisa carved in space for resilience at work and how, in the process, transformed her direct reports into productivity powerhouses!

There you have it!  Has this blog convinced you that it is possible to live a meaningful yet productive life even right now as the coronavirus mercilessly ravages the nation?  Which question in today’s publication is your favorite one?  Which one is your least favorite?  Do you have a morning routine? 

If you are ready to get your mojo back, join us next week for another installment of the JMS Summer Productivity Series to help you find your way out of coronavirus-related setbacks.  Say goodbye to anxiety and hello to everything you have ever wanted out of life.  Let’s be successful together, shall we?

Drop us a line in the comment section below or at jms@branding24seven.com to let us know if you agree with us.  The JMS team loves to get mail, so don’t be shy, and feel free to send your letters at 21 S. 11th street 2nd Floor Philadelphia, PA 19107.  

As always, we thank you for taking the time to read this publication.  If it has left you inspired to chase the life of your dreams, please share it with friends, colleagues, and acquaintances!  

Catch up with the first, second, third, and fourth installments of the series in case you’ve missed it!