My Daily Routine

Sharing is caring!

My daily routine allows me to live a more focused, less stressful day in the midst a busy, busy life. Without a daily routine, life would be much more chaotic and less productive.

Setting up my daily routine and making it work for me (I don’t work for it) has been revolutionary in helping me achieve my personal and professional goals.

My daily routine is different than a schedule. While the routine incorporates aspects of a schedule, they are different in the purpose of each.

A schedule keeps you on-time and hitting the mark when you have appointments or tasks that must be accomplished at a very specific time.

A daily routine allows you to set priorities and accomplish tasks in a predetermined order. You may need to accomplish the task by a certain time, but the sequencing of the tasks is the focus.

What Is a Good Daily Routine?

• A good daily routine is one that works for your unique personality and life.
• A daily routine should support your specific values and goals.
• It should reduce stress in your day-to-day life.
• A daily routine provides structure that allows you to predict the framework of your day.
• A good daily routine helps you be on-time and meet your daily requirements and responsibilities.
• The predictable structure of a routine allows you to free up brain power that can then be used for problem solving and creativity in the rest of your day.
• A good daily routine provides efficiency and allows you to structure your day so that it works best for your needs.
• A good daily routine is structured to support good habits and discourage bad habits.
• A daily routine allows you to prioritize tasks in your day that aligns with your values.
• You are in charge of your daily routine, it is not in charge of you. You can make changes to the routine to make it work better for you and your changing life.

My Daily Routine

Morning Routine

Wake Up

I wake up at about the same time each day. My day is currently based on my children’s school schedule. During the week, I wake up between 6:30 and 7 am.

Even on the weekend, I try to get up within an hour of my regular weekday wake up time.

This helps me maintain a similar schedule day after day and that helps my body get into a routine and helps me sleep better at night.

Check Phone

I take two to three minutes to check my phone. I am careful to not get sucked into social media or games. This morning check-in is only to see if there are any high-priority work requirements that popped up overnight.

I do not keep my phone in the bedroom overnight. I recommend keeping it in the kitchen or at least the hall outside of your bedroom so that is not a distraction.

Exercise

I confess that I don’t enjoy exercising and that’s why I need to tackle it first thing in the morning.

I wake up about 15 minutes before I begin exercising. If I wake up much earlier than 15 minutes, I’ll get distracted and not exercise.

Having a workout buddy for accountability helps me stick with my exercise routine. My workout partner and I connect virtually each morning. Think creatively, like having a virtual workout partner, to include exercising in your daily routine.

After I exercise, I make and eat breakfast. I’ve begun making smoothies in the morning and they are incredibly filling. As a result, I usually only finish about half of the smoothie and save the rest for a mid-morning snack.

Plan ahead for easy-to-make and healthy breakfasts so that breakfast fits easily into your daily routine.

After breakfast, I shower and get ready for the day. Even though I work from home, it’s important to officially get ready for the day.

If you’re home fulltime, check out these specific stay at home mom routine ideas for your daily schedule.

Mid-Morning Routine

Work

I answer any emails or messages that need to be answered early in the morning. Then I begin working on the tasks that I’ve already identified for the day.

I use the printable bullet journal planner that I created. It also comes in an undated bullet journal template format.

Whenever tasks arise, I enter them on the day that I need to work on them. So, when I turn the page of my planner, I already have many of the tasks identified for the day.

Chores & Errands

I have a set routine for my weekly chores. For example, I do laundry on Monday, the floors on Tuesday and Friday and meal planning on Wednesday.

I fit chores in between work tasks. I use the chores as a break from work (or work as a break from chores sometimes).

I also group my errands up so I only have to run errands one or two days a week. Grouping errands together saves me a lot of time in my week and my daily routine.

Lunch

I eat lunch at the same time each day, at noon. I take the time to sit down with a book or to watch the news. Since I work online all day, I purposefully take a break from being online while I eat my lunch.

Afternoon Routine

Work

The time right after lunch is my most productive time, so I save that time for work projects. I can often knock out a two or three hour project in the window of time right after lunch.

Health

I am purposeful about drinking more water and eating a healthy afternoon snack. This helps me avoid the mid-afternoon slump and is easy to add as a healthy habit in my daily routine.

Dinner

I meal plan a month at a time, so I don’t have to think about what to cook for dinner each day. Using a monthly meal planner (get your free printable to plan your own monthly meal plan) saves me time and stress in my daily routine each day.

We eat dinner at about the same time each day, plus or minus 30 minutes. Eating dinner at the same time is a cornerstone of my daily routine. Having a set family dinner time allows me to plan my entire afternoon and evening around that dinner time.

Evening Routine

Clean Up

As soon as dinner is over, we clean up the table, all the dirty dishes and the kitchen. It takes about 15 to 20 minutes and frees up the remainder of the evening, while allowing us to keep the kitchen neat and organized.

Relax and Family Time

We spend time together as a family after dinner reading or watching T.V. Making time to relax together as a family is another key part of my daily routine. This time is important to me, so I make sure that is included in my daily routine every day.

Plan the Next Day

Every evening I review my schedule for the next day and any scheduled appointments. I plan out my schedule for the day and adjust my daily routine to accommodate any appointments or tasks that must be accomplished by a set time.

Planning ahead for the next day if a fundamental requirement to make sure that my daily routine works for my schedule and my requirements every day.

You can choose to plan for your day in the morning when you wake up, but I prefer to do it the evening before. This allows me to adjust my wake up time and morning routine if I need to.

Have a Set Bedtime

I try to go to bed at the same time each evening. I don’t get to bed until late because I choose to stay up until my high school-aged children go to bed.

Having a set bedtime is important to keeping my daily routine structured so that it works each day. A set bedtime allows you to get the sleep you need so that the next day you can focus on your tasks and projects.

A set bedtime also helps you wake up more easily each morning at a regular time. And getting up a regular time is key to the success of my daily routine.

More Tips on Routines

• Healthy Morning Routine
• Daily Routine Tips from 10+ Professional Organizers
• Create a Good Morning Routine
• 10+ Morning Routine Charts
• Morning Routine for School
• Back-to-School Morning Routine Printables
• Quick Daily Cleaning Routine for Busy Parents

Pin for later so you can find these tips about my daily routine when you are creating your own routine.

For more simple and powerful productivity tips, hacks and printables, see the table below. You can scroll though the table and look for ideas or search for specific ideas with the magnifying glass in the upper right-hand corner (on desktop). Click on the topic and then click through the specific article.