Let's talk about how to build an optimal routine.
One of the biggest advantages to having a routine is making sure that you get every
single thing that needs to be done done every single day without fail.
But there are a lot of flaws to having a routine.
For example, I just learned over the past couple months that having a super high intensive
or time consuming routine is actually bad depending on your goals.
So for example, if your goal is to improve your work or improve your business, get a
skill learnt or any type of goal that just requires pretty much one or two tasks to be
done in order to move forward in that goal.
For example, my goal is to be a YouTuber.
So the only task that needs to be done really is record.
And that's all that remains is the work to be done.
That's what Alex Ramosy said.
All that remains to move forward in your goal is the work to be done.
So the work to be done for my goal is record.
And so that's why if you're not recording, then you're not moving forward.
And I'm very aware of that as I'm doing my daily routine because my daily routine, I don't
even record till the afternoon right now.
It's 3.47 p.m. and I get off of the computer at five o'clock.
I'm done for the night at five o'clock.
So I really only give myself like at most two hours every day to record.
So that's something that needs to improve moving forward.
But let's learn how to make the most optimal routine.
This is a strategy I kind of came up with on my own, but I'm sure that other people have
talked about it and have used it before.
And it's pretty much where, first of all, I write down on a journal.
So I use just like a journal I got off Amazon.
If you're watching on YouTube, you can see I'm showing up my journal.
It's just like a black journal that I got off Amazon.
And I write down in a piece of paper.
You don't even have to use a journal.
It could just be a piece of paper.
I just write down every single thing that I want to do.
So for example, right now what I would write down is read, meditate, edit, thumbnail, record,
gym, run, eat, like all of that, all those things.
I would write all of that down in a list.
And then I would try and figure out which ones were the most important and then which
ones were kind of low priority.
So for example, the most important thing for me is record.
As long as I'm recording, that's what matters because I'm improving my skills.
And so then I move editing and thumbnail creation to the lower important tier.
They're still important, but I'll show you why I move them to the lower tier because
when I fill in my time slots, so the next step is to write down the time that you want
to wake up.
So for me, I like to wake up at 4am.
It's different for everyone.
Some people like to wake up at 8am.
Some people at 5am.
Some people at 3am.
It's different for everyone.
So for me, I just like to wake up early.
I like 4am is my good time right now.
So I say, wake up at 4am.
And then I have, I just write down every single hour.
So I just write down in a list, 4am.
And then like one or two lines below that, I say 5am.
And then 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 1, 2, 3, 4.
All the way down until my bed time.
So what time I go to bed is 6 o'clock.
Right now I'm going to bed at 6 o'clock.
So I go all the way down to 6 o'clock and then that's what I write down bed time.
So 4am is wake up.
6 o'clock, 6pm is bed time.
And then just don't even worry about like the sleeping hours because you don't need
to create a routine for that because you're just gonna be asleep.
And then next what you do is you start to fill in like your non-negotiables.
So for example, for me, my non-negotiable is I have to brush my teeth, have to get some
water in, get my supplements in and go to the bathroom and shower first thing in the
morning.
Those are my non-negotiables.
I did try to go to...I did try...there was a phase of like one week where I would just
go straight downstairs to the basement to start work for the day right away.
I didn't like it.
And so that's why my most optimal working like environment is after I have eaten or not eaten.
After I have brushed my teeth, showered and drank water and used the bathroom.
Like that allows for no distractions.
I've taken care of all of the things because if I sit down and I start working and I haven't
brushed my teeth and I like feel that grossness in my mouth, I think about that and it breaks
my focus.
Same thing with my shower.
Like my body, if my body feels dirty, which it always does when I first wake up, then
it breaks my focus and if I have to use the bathroom, it breaks my focus obviously.
So all of these things are non-negotiables.
I do them first thing in the morning.
It usually takes about 30 minutes.
So I wake up at 4 a.m. and then I have a 30 minute time slot put down for non-negotiable.
And then for another non-negotiable is at the end of the day, it's in my nighttime supplements.
I start at 5 o'clock and then my nighttime routine, I start at 5 o'clock, which is supplements,
brush teeth, floss and journal, meditate and then go to bed.
So those are my final non-negotiables.
Those are what I have to do every single day to make sure that I have optimal sleep and
optimal work flow.
So after you have decided on your non-negotiables and you've written them down in your list,
then you go through and look at your most important tasks for the day.
So for me, my most important task will be recording.
If your goal is to build a physique, your most important task will be going to the gym.
So you start to fill in your day.
And there is an art to it and it is a skill to acquire and it takes knowledge to have.
So the way you fill in your daily routine depends on your goals and your knowledge based off
of placement of certain tasks.
So let me explain that.
Then my current knowledge is fairly advanced, but it's also very limited because I know
that I don't have the perfect knowledge for it's the most, for example, it's really optimal
to get your work done while you're fasted in the morning.
So that is knowledge that I have, but there is knowledge that I don't have that I just
don't know.
So you basically have to treat it like a puzzle and take in your knowledge base and all of
your kind of understandings and then put each task where you believe is the most optimal
for it.
So for example, right now my goals is recording, but one of my kind of bigger goals is reading
as well and learning a lot.
And right now I have reading right after my shower, which is at 430, but I am kind of
second guessing it after a couple of weeks of doing it because I realized that my focus
is not too great that early in the morning for reading for concentrated thinking tasks.
So I think that my most optimal routine would be doing my physical activities right after
430 in the morning.
So one of my plans is I'm actually buying or I'm actually getting gymnastics.
I'm asking for gymnastics rings for Christmas.
And so I am after Christmas, I'm going to be using those gymnastics rings in the morning.
And that is my plan right now because I realized that reading in the morning that early in
the morning, I lose concentration and it takes me one hour to read 12 pages most of
the time.
So that's not really optimal.
It would be better if I place that reading later in the day so I could get a higher
efficiency on my time investment.
And so that's another example of the more knowledge you learn, the more information
you learn, and the more you realize how to optimize your routine, the more you'll switch
it around.
So then the next thing I would fill in is the next most important thing to me.
So the next most important thing after recording and reading is the gym.
And I want to, like right now I put the gym right after I'm done reading because I want
to get the gym early in the morning because I like, I just like to go to the gym early
in the morning.
So that's just what I prefer.
It's probably not the most optimal and I'm aware that it probably is not the most optimal,
but it's just what I like.
So I would prefer to do what I like than the most optimal if I don't really enjoy it that
much because for the past three, four months, three to four months, I did, actually for
the past four months, I've been going to the gym in the afternoon after I've eaten like
pretty much all of my meals and I just don't enjoy it as much.
I like going to the gym early in the morning.
So that's just one time where you have to decide whether you want optimal or what you
prefer.
And ideally what you would prefer is optimal, but in this case, it's not.
So I would choose what I prefer because I just like, I enjoy the gym and I want to be able
to enjoy it.
And then you just go down the list and just keep filling in the most like optimal times.
It's just a puzzle.
You have to sit there and think.
It took me probably four or five days to actually finalize my current routine.
You could actually, I have them all written down.
You could actually go back in my journal and look over a course of like a week of many
different times where I tried to create a routine and then it was different and then
I tweaked it and I tweaked it.
And even in this episode, I'm still tweaking it because I'm realizing, oh, I can change
this that way and I can change this that way.
So basically the strategy is to write down your most important tasks and then also write
down the time you wake up and the time you go to bed and then all the non-negotiables.
That's basically the strategy.