What routines do you have in your life? And what are they for? Seems an odd questions but think about it?

First think about what a routine is. A routine is defined as:

  1. a customary or regular course of procedure
  2. commonplace tasks, chores, or duties as must be done regularly or at specified intervals; typical or everyday activity: the routine of an office
  3. regular, unvarying, habitual, unimaginative, or rote procedure
  4. an unvarying and constantly repeated formula, as of speech or action; convenient or predictable response: Don’t give me that brotherly-love routine!

When I think of routines I think of mindless, automatic repetition done at set-times, or in response to some trigger. Not very sexy.

However routines are essential to any productive endeavor as they allow the mind to focus on what will yield the greatest results. If you constantly had to decide everyday when to eat, what route to take to work, when to have status meetings etc. you would be exhausted from just getting yourself to a place where you can produce or create.

In living your life as a practice you’ll likely set some ambitious goals and standards for yourself. With only 24 hours in a day and scores of people, obligations and distractions competing for your time you MUST have routines to be effective in meeting the standards and goals you set for yourself.

So think about it; what are your routines? Perhaps you have an exercise routine, a set sequence of exercises or moves you do one after another. Why this routine and not another? How do you keep yourself motivated about this routine? Do you change it often? And what about looking at your typical day? If you were to observe your day, can you see your routine? What do you do everyday or most days and in what order? Without good or bad judgments, can you see where these routines will lead you five or ten years from now? Can you see the impact your routines have right now on the way you feel, look and think?