♥ Realistic Early Morning Routine

There was once a time I'd sleep in at every given opportunity. I'd miss 9AM lectures because I couldn't get out of bed and I would stay up until 3AM and obliterate any chance of a productive morning. Now, though, I'm a changed woman. I prefer the morning shift at work when I'm there (it starts at 5:30AM) and I am determined to force my body to wake up early every single day... There are a few things that make it much easier, though.


I suppose a morning routine actually starts with the night before. Over the past year, I've stopped drinking alcohol and going out. This has massively changed my evenings. I no longer go out until three am and I would much rather be all snug in bed by ten, watching a movie. I try to fall asleep by eleven or twelve and set an alarm for half seven.

Starting the day with a nice, healthy and fulfilling breakfast is essential. I'm now in the habit of having hot water, lemon and honey as my first drink of the day. I'm trying to be very strict diet wise and this is just a healthier alternative to tea. For food, I try and have a 'healthy' cereal. Something without sugar like Cheerio's, Shreddies or Weetabix. With that I have semi-skimmed milk (I'm not into dairy alternatives), but I do try and have as little milk as possible. While I'm eating breakfast and getting down my water, I'll usually open up my computer and send off any emails I have to, check my university emails, do bits of uni work if I have work to do for that day or catch up on blogs. I try to dedicate around twenty minutes each morning to blogging, replying to comments, reading and commenting on other blogs or writing my own posts. Setting this time aside each day has really made me fall back in love with reading blogs, as usually I'd just spend an hour a day watching youtube and getting my fix there. The more I make myself use my blog and read others, the faster I've seen my own following grow. After breakfast, I'll pop to the gym, for a quick workout most mornings. I spend around 20 minutes doing cardio, then I usually do some pilates, weights or squats! The walk to the gym is around half hour, so that's a perfect warm up and cool down. I shower at the gym, and come home and get ready to head to university.

At the moment, I'm writing my dissertation so a vast majority of my time is spent working on that and my other essay I have to write before the academic year is up. I head up to the library, with a packed lunch and try to stay there until around 5PM. As my deadlines are only one week away, I've never felt so busy or stressed or worried about anything in my entire life than I do right now. I'm on track to finish on time, and I've even booked in to have my dissertation printed three days before it's due just to help calm my fears about it all. I know it'll be fine, it's just this last push to get all my work exactly as I want it to be!

I find that as I wake up earlier, I get loads more done. I'm way more productive as I'm up and ready earlier and it means I get in my three meals and my body is set into a routine. It gets easier and easier to wake up and most mornings my body is slowly learning to wake itself up at seven! I'm sure when I've handed in all my work I'll be inclined to have a few lie ins, but gone are the days I'd still be in bed at lunch time. It just feels like a waste.

Em x

tumblr | twitter | instagram | pinterest