Tina Fey
Sticking to a daily routine is the key to success, right?
But why do you feel so terrible? And why aren’t you thriving and achieving your best self yet?
Perhaps you have habits that are actually sabotaging your success and it’s time you reprogram your routine.
No matter what success looks for you, here are 6 signs to look out for.
1) You feel tired and stressed even when you just woke up
Are you waking up with a blasting alarm just to join the early risers club that includes the world’s top CEOs and most successful people?
Except instead of feeling energized and inspired, you struggle through holding onto your coffee cup like a lifeline.
You’re hoping patiently that by sticking to this routine of rising early, your body will eventually get used to it.
But you just don’t. Don’t beat yourself up because it’s not actually because you’re undisciplined or uncommitted.
Sleep researchers are finding reasons why waking up earlier isn’t necessarily better.
And if you don’t feel energetic or hopeful or more creative at the start of your day, you’re likely sabotaging your success without even knowing it.
What to do instead:
To maximize your full potential, know your sleep chronotype. It’s your body’s natural preferences for wakefulness or sleep and work with it as much as you are able to.
According to the Sleep Foundation, “scientists consider it very difficult to purposely change your chronotype”, which can lead to ‘social jetlag’ or when your natural chronotype is in conflict with the demands of your work and life.
2) You fitness routine doesn’t feel right
Bored, pissed, or in downright pain?
It’s a sure sign your fitness routine doesn’t match you and is actually sabotaging your success.
You might have listened to someone’s well-meaning advice that ashtanga yoga changed their life OR that going to the gym and doing reps was THE game changer…
But it doesn’t matter if your body doesn’t agree.
In my case, I kept doing exercise routines to feel better even when I was in excruciating pain because they always told me, “You must be really out of shape…your body must be adjusting” and so on.
Turns out I had an illness that was worsened by strenuous exercise.
It took just giving up on what others were saying and actually listening to what felt good to my body until I intuitively moved into yin yoga, swimming, and gentle walks.
What to do instead:
Listen to your body and how you feel and choose from intuitive exercises to fit your every need.
So if you’re bored in the gym, hike. If you’re stressed, do yoga. If you’re depressed, do cardio.
No matter what you are feeling or how your body’s state, you have options that will support your fitness success far better.
3) Your habits and goals are painfully difficult to achieve
Daily routines are meant to support our goals but many people end up making daily routines THE goal. See the difference?
While routines are important to eliminate decision fatigue, it’s easy to fall into the trap of losing WHY you’re doing it in the first place.
Why do you exercise at 4am? To be energetic. Except your exercising is actually draining you because you’re losing sleep.
How about instead of worrying about crossing off an item on your daily habits list, listen to your body and just exercise later in the day.
Why were you holding regular Monday meetings?
To make sure everyone on the team is on the same page…except everyone is too distracted with their own tasks at the start of the week to pay attention. How about doing it on Tuesdays then?
What to do instead:
Remember your “Why” and if you don’t know it, find it.
Then let this “why” guide you on how to actually achieve your daily goals.
If you’re not achieving the why, then find a better way to achieve them whether it be by tweaking your habits or completely eliminating them and replacing them with something else.
4) You’re turning into a workaholic…but you’re not productive
If you’ve been led to believe that filling every last minute with work is the best way to maximize productivity, then you are wrong.
It might be the reason you’re not yet achieving your goals.
“A recent study of over twenty thousand people found that falling just one hour short of the optimum amount of sleep – seven to nine hours – was associated with a 60 to 80 per cent increased risk of experiencing negative moods like hopelessness and nervousness.”
If that wasn’t enough, research has also proven that lack of sleep has also been proven to decrease job performance, productivity, career progression and satisfaction, and even work relationships.
So it’s very likely that bad sleep is hurting your career far more than you realize.
What to do instead:
Set a specific time for work and strictly follow it. And as much as possible, don’t bring work home with you.
If you work from home, separate your work from your bedroom and set a time to end your workday. It’s tempting to work nonstop sometimes but refrain from doing it because it will have a negative impact on your daily routine (and success).
5) You’re not excited about life
You’ve aced your routine to the tee except now, every day is feeling more and more the same. You’re not meeting new people or having new experiences.
You talk to the same people, do the same things, and you’re starting to feel uninspired thinking, “Ho-hum, just another day.”
In other words, your daily routine is too routine-y…that it starts to stunt your growth.
You sense you need something new….but your routine has now trapped you in a rut.
They say routine is extremely important to achieve success,…but why do you have a feeling that it’s keeping you from becoming the best version of yourself?
What to do instead:
Balance your persistence with your routine with “non-routine” things that can make you grow and expand.
After all, one way to achieve success is by trying out new things and meeting new people.
So if there’s a workshop you want to attend (that could enhance your career, for example) but it ends at 11 pm every day, don’t worry so much about ruining your sleep for a few days.
Once your daily routine is established, it will be hard to break them. So go shake things up a bit and don’t be too obsessed with your routine. It will take care of itself.
6) You feel like you’re becoming someone else
You’ve turned your daily routine into habits, and while you should be happy with that, it seems like you’re turning into a person you don’t know.
You feel a bit strange because you now consider yourself a stranger.
While it’s true that sticking to daily habits for a long time could be transformational, it should make you feel more and more yourself each day. You should be able to feel “Now, this is me”, instead of “I’m losing myself.”
What to do instead:
You’re probably following someone’s guidebook to how to live life instead of honoring your authentic self. Go back to the habits you created and analyze which ones don’t match who you are.
More importantly, figure out which ones you’ve eliminated that are linked to your authentic self. Maybe you stopped knitting so you can focus more on work…but knitting actually makes you happy. Or maybe you stopped reading because you want to stick to your schedule of sleeping before 10.
Go back to your list and tweak it so you’re still honoring yourself as you achieve your goals.
Last words
A daily routine is meant to simplify our lives and make it more efficient.
It’s designed to help us meet our grand life goals through small consistent actions day by day.
A routine can end up sabotaging our success if we don’t design it based on who we really are and what we really want.
If it’s a daily routine following someone’s version of success, it can lead us astray from our own life path.
For a routine to make sense, it has to be specifically designed to fit our needs, and our aspirations. And as we grow and expand, our routines must be ready to shift as well.
So keep track of the routines that are meant to stay.
And if you find these signs of sabotage in your life, make the changes and continue evolving with a routine to meet your changing sense of self.
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