67 | Mastering Your Day: The Art of Routine: Justin Deese

Either you own the day or the day owns you. Today we're going to dive a little bit deeper into more details. But before I want to say this, thank you for coming and hanging out and checking out another podcast. This weekly episode where we're going to dive into a little bit about routine and at the time this releases, we just wrapped up Christmas and we're in that, that lull between Christmas and New Year's.

It really doesn't matter what year. So hang out with us and let's talk a little bit about what it looks like.

So truth is I chose this topic because being that it's the end of the year, people typically start to do things like makes new year's resolutions or, sometimes people call them other things, but really they're new year's resolutions or they're like, Hey, last year, I didn't do this. And this year I'm going to do that. And really whatever, whatever that looks like for you.

You know, I think it is a good time to reflect and figure out of, did I hit some of the goals that I wanted to hit for last year? But so I want to say this. I was doing a little bit of research on this topic because I do like, I like goal setting. And to me really a new year's resolution is nothing more than just setting a goal. Right. I think where most people make mistakes is they, they throw out these big lofty goals and they don't really dial in.

dial in these goals and I did an episode a while back about smart goals, which you can listen to that episode or Google smart goals. Smart goals is a really good way. There's a really good way to do any kind of goal setting, which smart stands for specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and time bound. Meaning a lot of people come into the new year, you know, either weight loss or health or you know, whatever that's normally.

One of the biggest topics that people think about, which is great. think people should, should always want to improve themselves, but they give out these goals. like, I'm going to lose 50 pounds or 20 pounds or whatever. And the truth is you got to break that down a little bit. today's episode is not really about the goal setting part of it, but it's just, and, more specifically, it's going to be about how do you own your day in general? So there is a thing that says 91 % of Americans that make resolutions.

do not complete them. And I got to tell you, when I found that statistic from the great and all powerful eyes of Google, I was a little surprised. And honestly, I was a little surprised because I figured it would be higher than 91%. But that's OK. Ninety one percent's a good deal for for the 91%. If you're listening to this, I'm guessing you're part of the nine percent that gets it done.

Right. The 9 % that takes action and see things all the way through. It's why we're hanging out. That's why you're here. Self-improvement. but did you know that the second Friday of January is known as quitters day? Like, think about that. So people make a resolution and they go live on it on January 1, like worst case scenario.

You're talking 14 day less than 14 chances are is less than 14 days. I haven't looked at a calendar to know how relevant that is to this year. If it's 14 days or nine days or whatever, but it's still, it's one of those things where it stinks that, that so many people give up on their, on their goals. but you know, here's the deal. A quote, just a quote just popped in my head that I want to share. It is from a famous philosopher, famous philosopher.

that famous philosopher is actually the Mad Hatter from Allison Wonderland. And the quote is, if you don't know where you're going, any road will take you there. And I think that's a lot of the truth when it comes to owning the day and being intentional. So now a little bit about me, I, you know, I have ADD, I guess now they call it ADHD. And the reason I'm the reason I'm bringing that up.

Is because routine is very important to me in, uh, in order to keep, keep it all together. If, if I don't have a plan or a routine, I could get up, I could spend 12, 14 hours a day working and get absolutely nothing done. So, so for me, it's not even an option not to have a routine. I like, have to have a routine and I, and I don't think, you know, whether you have ADHD or you are don't, I still think there's a lot of factors that will really

help you and improve, right? And even to the point where I have a group of friends where we text each more than kind of like where we are in our journey. Like, yeah, I got done and working out or yes, I meditated and this is not a group chat. I will tell you a little story about me. It's not even a little story, but I'll you a little bit about me. I do not like group text messages. I man, I don't like them. So I don't, I usually don't participate in them. And so I have, I have about a dozen friends and we have individual text messages.

Uh, that we send each morning, just checking in and it's, it's such a great thing, um, to have that accountability both ways, right? Like I don't want to not send something and they don't want to send something to me. So one of the things I would say about having a good routine is, uh, do you have somebody that will kind of check in with you or be that good accountability partner with you? I don't know. Um, so let me tell you a little bit about my daily routine and

Maybe this will help you. Maybe it won't. But this is what it looks like for me. So I wake up between five and five thirty each morning. And now I usually have a clock set. It's usually for about five fifteen. But some days I wake up before that. I don't really wake up after that because my clock goes off and I'm one of those that once I'm up, I'm up. There's no there's no going back to sleep once I wake up. And that means if I wake up at three thirty in the morning.

Then I'm, up at three 30 in the morning. So, one of the first things I do after my, let's call it my morning routine of, being an adult, right? Going to the restroom, brushing your teeth, that kind of thing is, I'll drink a glass of water. think sometimes we forget that we've been sleeping and our bodies are dehydrated because we've just gone however long without drinking any water, which is a lot of times why you're tired or why you have a headache or whatever. So, very first thing I do, I just,

pound a giant thing of water. And then the next thing I do is a supplement. Actually the specific supplement that I take is AG1. For a lot of years, I made my own green juices, which I hope that I get back to that, but it does take a lot of time to make those. And AG1 is easy, like scoop it, bam, shake it up, drink it, it's good. And then I'll normally have, I'll make a pot of coffee.

And usually while I'm making a cup of coffee or while the pot's brewing, I will sit down and I have a little place where I sit down and I have a daily reader and I kind of go through, I read my daily reader. Um, for my kids, for a lot of years, I do daily notes to them and usually their motivational quotes. Um, so I'll write, write something out for them that I stick it on their mirror. So when they get up in the morning and they look in the mirror, the first thing they see is, whatever, whatever quote that I've put up there. Um,

I'm going to say a little bit more about that. I wasn't planning on it, but it's funny because I've been doing that for a lot of years for my kids. And at one point I kind of stopped doing it and nobody said anything and I didn't think much about it. And I didn't know like, do they even pay attention? And one day my wife said, you know, the kids wish that you would keep doing that. like, I didn't know. anyway, so I do it again and I love doing it. And it's pretty phenomenal to think that they actually pay attention to it.

Right. It's, pretty cool. but anyway, so after I do that, then typically I will work out. Now I will tell you for me, working out is really walking or running and not gonna lie. It's probably more walking than running. I'm not a big weightlifter. have some equipment in my, in my office that I, you know, some dumbbells and stuff every now and again, I'll do a little bit of stuff, but for me, walking really does it kind of gets me going in the morning, gets my, gets my brain fired.

Which is nice. My, my morning time is typically my most creative time. And I don't, I don't know if that's just me or if most people are like that, but that is my most creative time. So a lot of times working out for me in the morning, I almost well, not almost, I struggle with it because I want to be working, right? I'm like, my gosh, I have all these great ideas and I need to get them on paper and whatever. And so to solve that problem, I have a treadmill in my office and it actually has a desk on it. So

If I'm watching or listening or whatever, I have my my little notebook right there that I can write any kind of ideas or thoughts that come to me, which is which is pretty cool. And now there's becoming all these apps. And I don't know if you're an iPhone user, then, you know, there's note apps now they'll do where you can hit the button and record your voice and it'll transcribe it. And so I'm starting to use that a lot now, which is which is really nice to

to be able to get that out of my brain and continue to work out and not, not be bogged down with thinking that I'm missing something or the opportunities missing. But once I work out, typically I will check, I will skim through my emails just to make sure there's nothing kind of major that I've missed or that is coming up or that happened overnight. Typically there's not, it's, it's probably one of those habits that I could, I could not check it, but I don't get too, too bogged down in it, but I do check it just to make sure there's nothing.

super, super urgent that I've missed. One of my apps that I use to kind of organize my life is called Todoist. It's a free app. It's on the phone, computer. That's kind of where I put any of my quick little to-do lists. My brain is one where when I have a task list, if I get to check it off, it just feels good to me. Like it feels really good to be able to just check it off. So I love that app. So I usually kind of just skim through that real quick in the morning and make sure there's nothing.

Just to kind of mentally prepare. Then on my calendar each day I have a block of time for getting ready for the day. And usually it's about seven and it's kind of getting ready for the day where I'll sit down with my calendar and just go through what the day is going to look like. And honestly what I'm doing is I'm mentally prepping for what the day is going to, you know, what the day is going to be all about because I do.

Again, just like this podcast, I feel like the more you own the day, the better it goes. And there's tons of benefits that we'll get to in a little bit on that. But having that calendar time between me and my calendar is really when I started doing that a couple of years ago and it was just such a big impact for me because now I'm thinking about it. I'm thinking about it where before when I was just kind of getting into my day, I would miss things because I wasn't even thinking about it or

there were so many alerts that I had going on that, you know, stuff just kind of gets lost in translation a little bit. But the other trick I started to do is on my calendar, I'm doing my prep for the morning, any invite or any calendar events that I have, any meetings that I have, I actually set an alarm on my phone and I set an alarm for my phone for 10 minutes out and it will basically that 10 minutes gives me time to prep.

or if it's a video call, make sure I'm where I can be on a video call or whatever it is, make sure I'm mentally prepared so that whoever I'm meeting with or whatever the topic is or whatever subject matter we're talking about, I'm ready to talk about it and be a little prepared because I don't like that whole being rushed thing. anyways, that's a little bit of what my daily routine looks like. that's probably between, you know, five, five 30 and seven. So,

To me, it's really a, I'm going to say a non-negotiable for me. If, if ever I woke up at seven and started my day, I would be so lost in my day. I honestly don't know that I would get anything done because I would just be in scramble mode. And that's just not a good, it doesn't feel good for me. Um, I don't think it feels good for anybody, but I don't know this, this is just me. Now I want to say this.

This, this all kind of ties into, to being intentional, like being intentional, not being reactionary. And I think there's all kinds of places in your life where this kind of stuff can show up. And I think about the saying of, know, how you do some things is how you do everything. I think the more that you're intentional about things you do, that that spreads across your whole life.

And even if you're one right now that you're not in control of it and the morning just kind of happens to you, which then means the day kind of happens to you. I think if you make some of these shifts, you'll be pleasantly surprised with the outcome that will happen by you being intentional. Now I know that some people aren't morning people. Some people are night owls or whatever. I don't think it matters whether you're, you know, a morning person or not a morning person.

But it is about being intentional with your day. And so you do need to give yourself some time to wake up. mean, you think about it. If your clock goes off and you wake up and you do your stuff and you're rushing out the door to go do whatever it is you're doing, man, just mentally, I don't know how in the world you could be in a good place to literally go crush the day. I feel like what happens is the day crushes you. And that's just not a, not a great place to be. So I do want to talk about a few benefits.

to being intentional about your day, increased productivity, right? If you are being intentional about what you're doing for your day, I think that what it does is it gives you this, the space, to be way more pro, productive than what you normally would be because I don't know the best way to say it, but because now all of a sudden, you know, what's coming, you're mentally ready.

And then, and then by planning and prioritizing these tasks, like you can give the focus and energy to the things that need the focus and energy. The other thing is part of it is that if there's something that doesn't need your attention as bad, or it doesn't need your to take up the day, you can make some shifts, which kind of brings you back to the control you get. You have a greater control over your day. When you know what your day looks like, like when you sit down and you know what your day looks like.

You have a such a better control over all the things that are going to go on and happen. Now from a leader, part of the, part of the deal is from a leadership standpoint, maybe you've got one-to-ones you're doing with your team. Great. You need to mentally be prepared. Don't ever show up and not be prepared. Or maybe you're hosting some kind of training for your team. Again, don't just show up, be prepared. So this is going to give you a little bit more control over what your day looks like.

The other byproduct of that is going to be now your focus is going to be way better because now again, your focus, you're giving yourself a little bit of space in order to be dialed in on what it is that you're doing that day. Another thing is going to be decision-making. I think you're going to have better decision-making simply because now you're going to know what it is you're doing. just, you know, it gives yourself a little bit of time.

you're giving yourself a little bit of space in order to look at it and make better decisions because they're a little more thought out decisions versus the on the fly decisions.

Another big benefit of being intentional about your day is this is going to reduce your stress. It's going to reduce your stress because now you're not in hurry up offense mode all day long. Every day, you're not going, going, going, going. You've got yourself a little bit of space where you can be intentional about everything you do, which again, that's just naturally going to reduce the stress level that you're going to have. The other, the other advantage to that is now from a mindset perspective, it is way easier to have a positive mindset.

when you own and control that day versus it's stumping you. Yeah, man. Think about that. Like just getting beat up and not owning the day and then in the day owning you. There's no way to have a positive mindset on that. Like, how do you get done with the day? And you're like, yeah, I totally got beat up today, but yeah, I'm feeling super great and awesome. Positive. No, own the day, own the day, own the day. Be more positive.

It will help you have such a better positive mindset. Now, a last, definitely not least, but a last benefit that comes from, from owning your day as well is you're going to achieve more goals. You're going to achieve more goals because now as you look at your day and you're thinking about all the things that you have to do for the day, now what you're going to be able to do is if there's some strategic time or whatever that looks like.

You're going to be able to carve out time to work on certain things. Now, if you're not intentional with your day, and again, this is me speaking to you from experience, Owning my day is something that I have to work on every single day. Right. And I know that when I get up, when I have a well planned out, well thought out, planned out day and an action plan and I follow it, what happens is then when there is that downtime,

I'm able to think about what strategic thing I'm going to work on. So part of my morning planning is if I have a two hour gap in my day, I can now think about what I'm going to be working on during that period of time where if you're just kind of going through the motions, then you get done with the meeting. You got a two hour gap. Now you're spending time going, no, what am I going to work on? It's just not, it's not a great way to, to do it. So here is my question to you.

Do you have a daily routine? And I don't mean it doesn't have to be 100 % dialed in written down, but do you have a daily routine? Let me take that back. Everybody's got a daily routine. Do you own the daily routine? Is it your daily routine that you intentionally want? Or is it that fight or flight first thing you get up in the morning running out the door hair on fire? Oh my gosh, every single meeting, every single person that I deal with is a hair on fire.

meeting. I don't But be intentional about your time. If I could say nothing else that would land for you for our time together today is as you think about your morning, be intentional. If you don't have two hours to spend to be intentional about your day, that's fine. Start out with 15 minutes. Start out with whatever amount of time that you can give yourself.

I mean, if you had an hour, great. But if you have 15 minutes, it doesn't matter. Just be intentional with the time. Be intentional so that so that as you start the day, you are owning that day. You're not getting crushed. You're crushing it. So that's what I've got for today. I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas. I hope you're all ready to start out to an amazing 20, 25. Thank you all so much for coming and hanging out and listening and being a part of this.