The Morning Routine

ARTICLE BY James Costa | POSTED ON December 10th, 2009 | Freelancing and Business | 8 Comments

Freelancing is not an easy job, by any means. You work for yourself, which means there’s no safety net. If you don’t have enough self-motivation you’re basically screwed.

The probability of catastrophe increases if you’re working from home where distractions are abundant. Ever had to spend a day at work and all you can think about is sneaking off to take a nap in the break room? You don’t, because you don’t want other people to see you drooling on the table when they walk by, but the thought torments you all day long. Now imagine what would happen if you worked at home, where your warm comfy bed is literally steps away, and no one with a camera phone or a penchant for mass e-mail pranks has access to your apartment… that you know of.

So, how do you keep yourself in line?

I call it the morning routine. Mornings for me are very difficult. I can pretty well sleep in as late as I want and, for the most part, my meetings can be done from home.

In order to avoid wasting prime work time, I have conditioned myself to get up at the same time every day. Your body can be a fine tuned machine if used correctly, and the longer you get up at the same time every day the easier it becomes.

First thing I do is make coffee, and sometimes I’ll eat breakfast too. This gives me energy and gets my mind off my growling stomach.

Whatever I make, I bring it to my desk and sit down to catch up on RSS feeds, work on networking/marketing the company, and catch up on e-mails.

After I finish the morning reading, I look at my deadlines and use them to make a list in Things of tasks I need to complete.

With the Things list as a reference point, I open my calendar and schedule blocks of time during the day. I plan out each hour that I am going to be working and continually refer to it throughout the day to make sure I am keeping up the pace. For those of us whose attention tends to wander, you can keep on track by setting hourly alerts in iCal (if you’re using a Mac). An egg timer would get the job done just as well.

I base the length of the time blocks on how much work needs to be done and the priority that each task needs to be finished. That way, the most important task for the earliest deadline are first draft picks.

In a typical day I work about ten hours. However, it is not ten unbroken hours of work. I also allocate time to make phone calls to friends or watch a TV show for a short break. I set aside half an hour for lunch, and try to leave fifteen minutes of empty space between client meetings to get organized before the next round begins. Those things help me keep on schedule and to keep me sane. The Pomodoro technique is similar. They also recommend working in timed intervals, but I find that twenty five minutes is too short to accomplish much for me.

In total, the morning routine takes me about an hour. By the end of it I am energized, caught up on reading, my day is planned, and I’m ready to tackle my work. If used honestly, the morning routine gives me a sense of accomplishment at the end of the day.

Freelancing is tough, but it is not hopeless even when it seems to look that way. The morning routine is a great help. It gives perspective and motivation early, before you even know you need it.

(Photo Credit: Mylene)

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