There is a seemingly never-ending amount of literature out there about the power of the perfect morning routine. “Wake up at 4am. Workout for 2 hours. Complete an entire day’s work before 9am.”

The problem is, no “perfectly structured” morning routine will work for you unless your why behind it is strong enough. You have to want to do it. Don’t adopt somebody else’s morning routine just because it sounds good.

In this episode, I walk you through what my morning routine looks like, how journaling, exercise, and meditation play into that, and how to create a morning routine that makes you excited to get up in the morning.

View full show notes here.

00:04 - Adam (Host)

Welcome to the 200% Life Podcast with Adam Hergenrother and Caitlin Frotland, where we bring you weekly insights into spiritual growth and business success. Hey everybody, so on this episode I'm going to jump into my morning routine how journaling truly creates clarity and allows you just to have a more clear, crisp goal for the day. How a morning routine can create a lot of powerful energy for you throughout the day. How it's easier to tackle all the challenges that may face you, which, let's be frank, we're all facing challenges right now. So it's better to be able to show up and face these with a full load of energy and being able to take them head on. It's you know, it's funny, Caitlin, because when you're trying to take on a challenge and you're not feeling up to yourself, it feels like seven times worse as a challenge. Have you ever had a challenge happen, Like when you're on vacation and you're not there? Maybe I'm the only one, but I think, as an entrepreneur, you probably under, like people get, this is if I'm not there and there's a problem, it's magnified 10 X.

01:05 - Caitlin (Host)

Yeah.

01:05 - Adam (Host)

It just is like. It's just like, wow, the whole world's falling apart and then all of a sudden you get back in there and like 15 seconds later, you feel it, you sense it and you go no challenge isn't as big as I thought it was and it's the same way. By having a morning routine gives you that ability to take on these challenges full steam. Uh, also going to talk about how the future self is a wonderful practice for your morning routine, especially if you're starting out it was one of the most important things that I did, starting off 15 years or so ago, using a journal, using a future self tool, and how the most important part of all of this is finding a reason to get up early so you can create that momentum and have this be something that you maintain and not just start and then stop. You know, caitlin, one of the common questions that I get a lot and I'm actually curious about yours as well too is how to create and maintain a impactful morning routine.

02:02

I think a lot of people think about morning routines as a chore or they think about them as the something they have to do, which is why, really, they never last, and for me, when I kind of back up. I was never. And one of the other things I always hear is I'm not a morning person. But well, if you go to bed at 11 o'clock at night, you're probably not gonna be a morning person. For me, growing up, I was never. I didn't have a morning person. But well, if you go to bed at 11 o'clock at night, you're probably not gonna be a morning person. Yeah, for me, growing up, I was never. I didn't have a morning routine, right, I didn't have one at all.

02:32

In fact, for my, through my first my real job that I had, or in college, I would sleep till you know seven, eight, nine o'clock and then get up and go to class. Actually, the first job that I ever had, I was a commercial underwriter, uh, and I think I had to be at work maybe eight, 30. I think that's probably what it was. So I would sleep to like seven, 45, right, or whatever it was, even my job. After that I I remember actually it's funny I remember, um, uh, after about six months being that job, I went and took a job as a financial controller, which I had my own office and it was great, and we started work at seven o'clock in the morning. We got done at four, so it was fine, and I actually had a 90 minute lunch break so I could go and actually work out, which was part of the routine that I wanted to do throughout the day. So it actually worked out really well. I think I might've gone there a little bit earlier too. Maybe we started at 7.30 and I got there at seven to kind of work through the hours, whatever.

03:27

Anyways, I remember working for this job. This is one of the reasons why I actually left and became an entrepreneur, and I'll circle back to how this is important for your morning routine. When I was actually working there, I would literally get up like I would have everything the night before made and I would get up 20 minutes before I had to go to work. It's actually the first time I started drinking coffee. You know I never drank coffee until then, and now I drink one cup of black coffee a day. I'll talk about that in my morning routine. But I remember coming home after working you know eight hours, nine hour days and wanting more work. Does he ever do you ever? You know what I'm talking about Like I just wanted something else to do.

03:56 - Caitlin (Host)

Yeah, maybe before life, before kids. Yes, okay, I definitely didn't.

04:00 - Adam (Host)

I was, you know, I owned investment properties and it was funny. I was, you know, I owned investment properties and it was funny. I was living with my brother at the time and I owned. I wanted to have a less frugal lifestyle, so I owned investment properties. I was living in my brother's basement with no doors or anything. I remember I had this little desk and I was like, maybe I'm going to write a book, maybe I'm going to, like, go start something else the internet.

04:18

04:37

I was, you know, there was nothing wrong with my job at all. It was totally it was. It was fine, they treated me well, I got paid great for what it was, but there was just a limit of like I wanted to extract more from the hours that I was putting into it, I wanted to get more out of it, I wanted to maximize my time. I hated just having knowing that I had to wait until four o'clock to leave. You know what I'm talking about.

04:58

It was just one of those jobs that it was just like, especially back then. It was like you have to be here until four o'clock, regardless of my work is done. So I would literally like walk around the office Cause I would do my work so fast. In fact, the actual job that I had before this as a commercial underwriter um, I don't know if I've ever shared this story I uh, like two or three weeks into my job, I had my manager's manager come over to me and they gave me a file and they said look, adam, you need to make this file last for the next week. And it was like a Monday morning and I was turning out these files in less than a day and nobody had ever done that before. And it's not because they're not smart, it's because they just everyone like worked the system.

05:36

They got their files and they just you know there's nothing wrong with that if that's your key but like they would literally just like they'd work on it for a little bit and then walk around check the quote, like they literally cause they had to be there all day, so they wanted to make sure they can maximize the time and I just I'm sitting there in that first job going like I couldn't tell that it was an entrepreneur that I would necessarily want to be. I was like I don't like working for other people, I don't abstract. If I can get more out of an hour than somebody else can in six, why do I have to sit here for six hours? But you can't obviously tell that to a major public corporation. So when I left, that was kind of the.

06:12

I remember that moment so clearly because I remember standing up out of her cubicle and I looked up and I was looking around. There's probably 50 other cubicles in the top floor of this building and I'm going man, everyone is just going through the motions. They're just going through the motions of life and just allowing it to kind of. I'm like this is and I wasn't even saying it from a spiritual perspective, I was saying it from like a money perspective. I'm like what are people doing? Like this is not how I want to live my life, and so I ended up that's where I actually ended up getting fired from my job. It was the best thing ever, and then I took this why did you get?

06:43

fired. My mom worked for an individual that was just at my graduation party, because it was just my first job. I had it before I left.

06:56

I actually had it locked in before I graduated and he told our department once he found out in there, unbeknownst to me, that he didn't want me working on his file because he didn't want them to know how much money he had. He said he didn't want me to be able to have access to know how much money he had in his bank or how much money they were making, because my mom worked at the company and they assured him of that and he was one of the larger banking individuals' relationship at the time. Well, of course, they made a mistake, gave me his file. About four months into me working here they let my mom go and they said it was because of financial challenges and I had known this guy and she had worked there for probably nine years, so I known them pretty well. It was a small office, there was like eight of them, so they were always at our functions and stuff and I would.

07:37

I I literally was working on his file like literally while this happened and so that when my, my mom got fired, she was, you know, she was kind of hurt and everything. So I just called him up and I said, hey, I'm just curious what the real reason is, why that? You know why she got let go. And um, and he gave me the same reason. I go well, that's not true. I'm looking at your file, cause he said it was financial. I go well, I see that you're doing perfectly well. And he goes. We shouldn't have access to my file. And I knew I was like screw it. I was like, oh, okay.

08:06 - Caitlin (Host)

You were not meant for the corporate space, clearly.

08:08 - Adam (Host)

No, I wasn't, I wasn't, and so I remember I was like man.

08:11 - Caitlin (Host)

It's like 10 corporate roles. You broke in this whole story. Yes, I did.

08:14 - Adam (Host)

I did and I got pulled, like the next day they CEO of the bank, actually was the one that came in there. He's like well, why would you do that? I go, well, why wouldn't I? Like, he didn't be like and he was, he could see it in me that he was like, like I get it. And he was like look like I'm really upset that we have to do this because you're you were probably there Our top, we had, you know, we had hopes, you know leadership hopes for you, and that was part of just kind of the natural drive, probably more or less, that I had. He's like we have to let you go and I go. Well, you're really letting me go so you can keep your client. And he goes, yes, and I go.

08:49 - Caitlin (Host)

Okay, I understand.

08:50 - Adam (Host)

And it still hurt Like being fired is not fun even though, like. I know I did something wrong and I also know like other people gave me the file and four years later three to four years later I won a economic award in the entire state of Vermont.

09:13

It was called the Rising Star of the Year Award. It was through like our business community, so I had nothing to do with real estate, nothing to do with that. I got it and there was a big black tie event for like 5,000 people to share it in, and guess who it was that had to give me the award publicly was no, yes.

09:32

So the next time I see him. We were on stage and he shook my hand and he gave me this award, right for what it was, and he was like fancy meeting here, and we ended up chatting afterwards and he's like, see, he's like he actually said it. Then he goes. I knew you were going to be a leader, but you're also he also. You were a little cagey, which I am like right. He's like I am not set for the corporate environment, but anyways, that was kind of a funny side note, so that's why I got fired.

09:54

So, anyways, I went to financial another company. I was their financial controller and the same thing started happening. It was just more of like I was there for probably eight months, nine months, and it was great. Like people were fine, they eight months, nine months, and it was great. Like people were fine, they were there, they gave me a leeway, but I just had to be there the entire time and that's that always. I remember just when I was like when I build a company or I have a company, like it's going to be results driven right. It's going to be about like if people want to get up at five and work, people want to do it at's accepted upfront and people understand those responsibilities.

10:30

11:06

But I did a morning routine. I woke up and it was probably I mean it was like 745 I'd sleep into, which seems like like an eternity, and when I say it at, you know, at 42 now, versus when I was 24, 23 years old, and I would get up and like I wouldn't, I had nothing. I would just get up and start working, right, kind of like I would get up, probably take a shower. I think that's what I did. I just started working right. I would get right into it, especially in business, and it worked. So it's not that it didn't work right, it still allowed me to be successful. It allowed me to push through.

11:35

12:16

And so I said, well, this is what a lot of successful people are doing. There's a model. But part of it was there was also that voice in my head saying we were successful too. But then when, for some reason, when I read it from Tim, like these guys are way more successful than I am created way more value than I have, right, so I'm going but yeah, to what degree does it work? And that's where I think people can get caught and where it seems like, oh, what I'm doing works, yeah, I get, that Is there if you want it. Is there more that can work?

12:41

And so I slowly started getting up in increments of like 15, 20 minutes earlier. And then what started happening was I don't think I've ever broken this down like this before. Over a period of probably a year, I started getting up earlier, but then I had nothing to do, so then I would start to work, but then, all of a sudden, I had really no work to do in the morning because I didn't have any kids and didn't do anything I was dedicated to. So I was like, what am I supposed to do? So I started working out in the morning, which is a huge shift for me. So I started working out in the morning. That kind of gave me something to do. And then all of a sudden I, you know, shortly after that, I started journaling in the morning and it was a very short journal and I started reading in the morning a little bit.

13:17

So I started adding and dabbling with all like everyone pretty much would know like what do I do in a morning routine? There's meditation, there's prayer, there's exercise, there's prayer, there's exercise, there's journaling, there's. You know, you can work if you want to. I'm not suggesting that, but you can. You can certainly do that. You can have time for yourself, you can read, you can, you know. I think those are kind of the basic things. There's probably a few other things people could do, kind of the basic core of what people do in a morning routine.

13:41

And so I started adding a few of these things in there and really what I started to do is, actually, I started to get encouraged about wanting to wake up earlier. So let's say I was doing at six o'clock. Then I was like, well, now I want to get my workout in and I want to get, like you know, some journaling in, so I'd get up 15 minutes earlier and then 15 minutes earlier, and so it was very slow over the course of a year and then eventually it got to the point where I'm up between four and four, 30. And and it's also a little bit of, because I want to get it done for my kids- Right.

14:10

So I think for a while I was around five or five, 30, probably five, 30 for a while. Uh, and then, as my kids started getting a little earlier and moved, I wanted to get things done more importantly in the morning. Um, so I actually started shifting it earlier to the time. And that's when, I think, at some point, when I started doing training for higher levels of fitness with either Ironmans or half Ironmans or whatever that I was doing, I wanted more exercise time, so I moved my time up earlier. And then I actually started elongating my journaling routine.

14:43

15:13 - Caitlin (Host)

I think that's what really stands out in your story. There is that it seemed to shift from like oh, this sounds like a good thing that I should do. I should try it out, but as you started to weave in the different pieces of it, you wanted to do it and you added in more, and it goes from something that you should do to something that's really fulfilling.

15:31 - Adam (Host)

Yeah, and I think you know, I know you have a morning routine. Obviously you're in a different phase in your life, but it's to me, if I don't get my morning routine in, I'm just off, right, like it's just off at some point, and for me that consists of getting up early. It also forces me to go to bed early and I've said this for a while, but nothing really good in my life has ever really come after 8.30, right, like it's true, like just nothing. I either eat more or watch something or you know, whatever it is, I'm just nothing really productive comes from me. There are some people that can be really turned on at night. I know an individual that works for me that he does truly turn on at night, but that's very rare, by the way. That's less than probably five or 6% of the population, um, that actually are productive at night. Most people are productive watching a show and they get caught into it. Next thing, you know, you just get caught into this loop of staying up late and sleeping in. So for me, this kind of forces me to like get everybody to bed by eight o'clock so that I'm sleeping by nine o'clock, and aim for, you know, somewhere around seven hours of sleep, from getting up at four, and first thing I do is I go downstairs, I'll drink water this is kind of like what I do and then I turn on my there's like a PMF mat with a pulsed electromagnetic field mat that has charcoal and ionization in it. I actually lay on that now when I meditate for again, that's something I added in last year was the mat. So I meditate. So I didn't add any more time, I just added me laying on the mat instead of laying in a chair is when I'm doing that, so I get that benefit of that, of recovery, free radicals, it reduces inflammation, all that stuff that's good for your body. So I do that for 20 minutes and then I get up and then I drink one cup of black coffee and then which I really look forward to and then I just do a series of journaling. For about a half an hour I journal about each one of my kids.

17:19

I actually start with a gratitude journal and people always ask me like, do I go back and read my journals? Rarely, rarely do I ever do it, and I'll tell you why. For me, anyways, the gratitude journal is just I am grateful for and it could be my health, my kids. I'm grateful for a challenge at work, I'm great. So, whatever it is, I'm just trying to like get the wheels going.

17:37

It's also when I'm first waking up and just trying to get gratitude and that's like three minutes right, and then I get into a journal for each one, me to type, I type way faster and I can also bring photos that I take from my phone directly into every single one of their journals.

17:52

So since each one of my kids was born, sienna missed a couple months, but besides that, every one of my kids, 99% of every single day that they've been alive, they have a journal about what they did the day before, what they said, their first steps, when they snowboarded first, when they switched to skiing, you know when their first sleepover was, all of these kind of things, and I highlight it in a headliner so they can search it easy to be able to find it, and then I pull in photos from it. It all links to the cloud. So now they have an entire like, basically history of all these things that you think you're going to remember as a parent, like when they're like oh, I'll never forget their first steps. Three years later you're like when was that? What year was that Like? It just starts to be a blur right, because there's other important memories that you want.

18:35

So I just started tagging all those things in there and I kind of write about it. Things they've said first sleepovers, first big fight they had with a.

18:45 - Caitlin (Host)

That now, or is that something you're going to give?

18:47 - Adam (Host)

them. They go through and they know that I do this every day, so sometimes they're sitting next to me. They'll go back and read one of the journals that I wrote about them, or they'll look at like one of my first journals or something along those lines. I think as they get older they'll want to see it. Or, like just recently, they wanted to, actually wanted to see. That's why I gave that example. He wanted when he switched from skiing to snowboarding and like what year it was and we had both kind of forgot it, but it was right there in his journal, like, and so you can see when he did that, um.

19:13

And then I journal about my wife, my partner, um. I I probably do about three or four days a week with her. Um, I did every day for a while but now it's more about three to four days a week of just something she did, something, she said, something that we did as a family Just kind of have some things in there for her. The first couple of years I did it and I put it in like the 365 things that I'm grateful for and I gave it to her at Christmas. I did that for a couple of years but then, like it kind of lost. It's like she's I don't know. She got used to it coming right.

19:44

The first year was a big, like, wow, you did this. This is right, the first year was a big like wow, you did this.

19:47 - Caitlin (Host)

This was amazing, yeah.

19:47 - Adam (Host)

So then I kind of just kind of kept a journal about her life so she can look back on at some point in time in her life, and then I do one with my own life right, which is the one that I spend the most amount of time on, which is really the anything that you know that in your mind, where it's like you've got thoughts going on they're trying to grab you, trying not to, it's just getting it all on paper, whatever it is. There is no right or wrong, there's no ashamed of the words that come out, it's just you're putting it out there and it's like for me, that gives me this, this clarity, this peace of mind, this kind of this moving it beyond. And it's really. It's very cathartic for me when I get to journal, like again, there are some days where I may just write a paragraph or two and be like I didn't really have any, like it's, it's, you know, I didn't have any real big thoughts I needed to get out.

20:35

I don't try to force it. Um, during those times I may say, okay, what is my year, my life looked like in three years, which I'll bring in the future self, which we'll talk about in a second Um, or I may make some changes to that or just kind of add some living in there, or if I'm working on a construction project. That's creativity. I actually sometimes would go to creative work then and start looking at it, because I really enjoy that stuff.

20:52

And then there's other days that I will write like an entire book, like at some point, like you know, maybe publish what all those different things are, but like they are, I mean they can be seven pages long. It'll take me 45 minutes, but I'm just writing anything. That's like if it's a big disturbance inside there. I'm trying to just get it out through words, right Through journaling.

21:14 - Caitlin (Host)

So you're not really necessarily seeking clarity in the words, but just getting it out like almost dumping it to let it out of your system, or I think it's both.

21:23 - Adam (Host)

I think when you remove it, it gives you clarity. So every time, like, it just no longer grabs you. So, literally, what I'm trying to do is preventing it from me actually engaging in that lower self, the personal self, ego, your self-concept, or the disturbance that you're feeling. So, for instance, if, like you know, you're really worried about money, like you start worrying about okay, like all right, like I'm really experiencing this worrying about money and I'm really experiencing this worrying about money and I'm really experiencing this fear about, like, what's going to happen in my life, but let me, let me just pause for a second. Here's where we're at. Here's what it looks like. Here's our plan of what we can do. Here's some things that I can. You just kind of creating clarity through the mud of all of that, so you're kind of throwing it in there, then you're working there and massaging the rest of it throughout the journaling to give you clarity of whatever that is, whatever the situation may be.

22:06 - Caitlin (Host)

That makes sense, because when it's like stuck in your head, it's kind of like a ping pong match. You can't see it right?

22:10 - Adam (Host)

24:08

I used to, before we had an email format for everybody to take advantage of. It's a free resource that we have. I used to have it on a piece of paper and I literally would have it like this and I would read it. I actually it's funny I had a folder, um, like I had a folder that sat next to my computer and it had org charts in it, had my future self, had a 411 in it. It had like this gratitude, it had some affirmations, and I would literally go through the whole folder every day. That was back in like 9, 10, 11, 12 and that's just what I would use for all those different things to go through that folder. And that was another form of clarity for me. But the future self was the first one I always started with because it just gave me direction of where I was going, what I was focused on in six different categories, which again we can. We have a free tool for everybody to be able to go to it. It's just AdamHurgenRothercom slash future.

24:56 - Caitlin (Host)

Yes, and also I have revamped it lately too. So not only do you get the future self, but then you get some journal prompts to do help guide you through exactly what you're talking about. But this one is five minutes, so yours sounds like an endless morning routine when you describe it. But this one is compact and to your point. Then you can just build on it as different things resonate with you more and more Well that's why I share with people for the future cell phone.

25:21 - Adam (Host)

Like look, the reason why we created that tool is because one it worked for me and for people in my organization. I remember people coming to me and like this actually I don't know how it even worked, it's not like even shows up. So let's just say, like you're, like you want a family vacation and like you don't have any plans for it, all of a sudden you read it every day, read every day. Then all of a sudden, like just you find yourself, it's just there. Then you have it and then it's like the future manifested it in a way right For whatever it was.

25:47 - Caitlin (Host)

I did one a few years ago and when I look back at it I can absolutely cross off things that I have that have happened. I mean I want to say like I accomplished it, but it's not.

25:52 - Adam (Host)

it doesn't even feel like that, because it just kind of just shows up and then you look back at it and you go, oh shit, like I actually did these things.

26:04

Yeah, and I didn't look at mine for a where. Look, you're playing. I mean, it's not 200% life, you're playing in the 100% outer world, which is everything's manifested in the outer world, right. And then you're playing 100% inner world, which is your inner experiences that you're experiencing. But you can play in the outer world.

26:18

Anything that you're doing first starts in the mind. That's some like big spiritual term, or you get all lost in it, like I'm just going to sit here and magically things are going to appear. You're just, it's a, it's a direct action, like if you want to dig up, you know a hole, you can, you can see it clearly, but you have to take action to dig the hole. And then you manifest the hole, right, it's the same thing that you're doing, you know, with other things. It's just it's a little bit different than when it is physicality. So you still, you just create it.

26:46

That's the thing about the future self is what it's actually doing. Caitlin is actually creating the habits that you need and the actions that you need to take each day to actually check off or accomplish those things that you're doing. That's all that's really happening. It's just aligning, it's getting you aligned with your own actions. That's what the future self tool does is so that your actions are actually directed in a way that's giving you a specific result that you're looking for in your life, which is what a goal is right.

27:13 - Caitlin (Host)

It's amazing and it's like the future self is like that. I feel like the future self almost sounds like the cornerstone of it, but then these other activities that are layered in are just really continuing that like laser focus or emphasis, like they're all work together to build momentum towards those.

27:31 - Adam (Host)

Yeah, that's why we have it as a tool. It's it's less than five minutes it takes to read. So it shows up in your inbox every day, so you have to delete it. So that means that you're purposefully deleting it or not looking at it, because it's there every morning and for me it's like you can find two minutes right To just read it. Three minutes, four minutes, less than five minutes to be able to read through there and just to kind of help direct your day and sort of have people give it a try. But that's really. And then from there I get into exercise, which ranges from you know an hour to you know some. Some days are five, six hours long, but most days it's probably about 90 minutes of exercise, hour 15 of exercise, and usually I am either with friends or I'm listening to an audible book or a podcast of some sort to kind of fill that in there.

28:16

And then I come back and I am, I usually hang out with my family for a few minutes where everyone's kind of getting ready eat some like a healthier breakfast, usually eggs and like a, like a piece of Ezekiel bread or like oat toast or something along those lines.

28:28

And then I start a day, and so the cool thing is is by like eight o'clock I mean, you've accomplished so much, at least for how early I get up. The key to all of this you said this earlier is find a reason to get up, find a reason to go to bed earlier and find a reason to extract more out of each hour. And I don't mean out to be rigid, to have this rigidity in your life all the time, but when you're most productive, be most productive and then set aside time for you to keep gaining clarity and keep working on your interstate and your outer state. So they're both moving forward in the same direction at the same time.

29:04 - Caitlin (Host)

So, in terms of your what you're doing for physical exercise, what does that look like and how long is it?

29:10 - Adam (Host)

Yeah, you know it's changed over the years. You know, for a while I was lifting weights or go to a gym, um, and then that has more shifted. When I got specifically training for any type of triathlon, which I really enjoyed, um was biking, running and swimming. I I enjoyed swimming when I'm swimming, but I don't enjoy like driving there and getting in there. So the minute I was done doing triathlons I really hung out my towel and swimming.

29:35 - Caitlin (Host)

Like it's like you're in chlorine.

29:36 - Adam (Host)

I just it's like I. Somebody asked me the other day they're like would you do their Ironman? I said I would, or any or half Ironman I would if there was a big group of people doing it or if my kids wanted to do it.

29:50

That's where, if, like, my son came to me and said I really want to do an Ironman with you, I would do one with him. So it'd have to be. I don't need to do it for myself anymore. I've qualified for the world championship. I've kind of pushed my body. I know it was a great exercise, it was wonderful, but there would have to be another reason for me to do it. So now it's I skin every single day.

30:08

Which skinning is I've explained this before our podcast but it's you take your ski in the wintertime and you, you basically put a piece of like. It's almost like Velcro, but it's like a cloth that grips when you go up, so when you can't slide back, but slides when you're going forward, and you put the bottom of your ski and you turn your binding around, so it acts as like a cross-country ski, and you climb up the hill, which is a beautiful way to do it because it's very low impact, but your heart rate gets jacked real fast, real quickly. You're outside, you're on a mountain, it starts early, it's dark, it's you're, you're dealing with negative temperatures, so you're fighting the elements, but you're also on a mountain like and then. And then you wake up. The sunrise is always coming up, it's always beautiful up there and it's just, it's very just. You're just with the mountain in itself. So I do that literally every day. I've actually since November 3rd, um, I've skinned every day, except for, you know, maybe five uh, five days.

31:00 - Caitlin (Host)

Um how long does it take?

31:02 - Adam (Host)

Um, I'm up and down from the mountain in about an hour 10 minutes If I do one lap. If I have longer days or on the weekends, I may skin for three hours. I may take two or three laps or do a longer route or whatever it is. Last week we had really good snow. I started at four, 30 in the morning a couple of days and did two to three hour tours, um in the back country, um, and it was just, it was. It was wonderful. Snow is great. You get first tracks. It's just amazing to go up there.

31:26

If it's in the summertime, then it's running or mountain biking or gravel riding. It's similar to road biking, it's just you have bigger tires on. It's a little bit more comfortable and I really enjoy that too as well. And then I also add in two days sometimes three, but really about two days of strength training, which is I use a tonal for that, which I think is one of the best pieces of equipment you can have, um for anybody, even if they want to work out five days a week. Strength training is so such an important aspect. But to tonal, it's T-O-N-A-L. Uh, it's great. I've gotten a lot of people on it and it's a great strength work uh training and I can do an awesome strength workout in 30 minutes like a really great strength workout, so I had two days a week. I had that in too as well.

32:10 - Caitlin (Host)

So just looking at the timeline from when you first started a morning routine to now, what is that like 15 years? Or so, and so it's really started off as something super basic, yep.

32:21 - Adam (Host)

And very easy.

32:22 - Caitlin (Host)

Yeah, so for people who are listening and contemplating morning routine, they do not need to jump into this.

32:29 - Adam (Host)

Well, that should be the inner takeaway right, which is don't try to don't adopt somebody else's morning routine just because it sounds good Like you're and it's like, oh, I'd love to be that or love to do that.

32:41

Just start with something that's going to cause you to get up earlier, right? Maybe that's just I want to go for a walk. That's going to cause you to get up earlier, right? Maybe that's just I want to go for a walk. Maybe it's that I just want to sit in quiet and enjoy my tea or my coffee for 15 minutes. Just find a reason to start getting up earlier and, as you do, you'll naturally start finding your balance in there.

32:59

But I said in the beginning and I'll say this again is like there's got to be a reason why you want to do this and there's got to be a you've got to feel the benefits from this physically energized, wise to be able to do this. That's kind of that inner takeaway which is like you have to want to do this because there's going to be times where, like you're not going to want to do it, or what I see a lot of people do is they go on a vacation and or whatever it is, and they just get out of it and they never get back in it. And for me, the reason why the beauty about having morning routine is I rarely miss it. But if I ever do, like the, I'm craving to get back to that morning routine, like when we were on vacation a couple of months ago. We it was a little bit different morning routine, even though I did meditate and I did journaling. It was short and it was abbreviated. At least the meditation was and the exercise was throughout the day and I was craving to get back to the morning routine to have like my own time, my own space, just to clear things and get things out. So that's kind of the inner takeaways.

33:53

Find a reason that you feel excited about getting up and start small. And just start small and you can adopt other people's or you can try it on. Don't go out there and say I'm going to get up at 4.30 tomorrow and do everything that Adam's doing or whatever somebody else is doing. Just start with your own pace and kind of slowly work your way in there so it stays. The outer takeaway of this is what it gives you throughout the rest of the day, by the way, the accomplishment feeling. I guess that'd probably be the word I would use.

34:21

When you're done all of this at eight o'clock, you're ready to take on the challenges of the day. You just are. You can kind of check the box and everything. You go. Whatever happens to us today, I'm just going to handle Like it's just like you're just going to do it and it doesn't. And again there's going to be shit storms that show up there from everything from your kid getting sick or breaking their foot to business challenge to you know your mom's not happy you didn't call them back, I don't know. Like, whatever shows up in your life, you just handle it easier and that's becomes. The biggest benefit of doing all of this is that you can just handle reality as it shows up into the world a lot easier when you set aside some time for a powerful morning routine.

34:57 - Caitlin (Host)

I love that because it's like the morning time that you have on your own is the only time of day that really somebody is not necessarily going to be calling you If kids aren't up. It's like your time, and if you can fill that with things that fill you up, then before you even get out the door to your point you've already had a successful day, and then that just trickles over to everything else you