I tried Jeff Bezos’ routine and this happened!

Jeff Bezos is the richest man on Earth with his giant e-commerce website, which needs no introduction – Amazon.com.

I saw his interview the other day on Youtube and was amazed by his morning routine. How simple yet effective it was. How well he managed his routine throughout the day. It all captivated my mind and my imagination.

I have covered his full morning routine in my previous blog, “Ultimate Guide to Jeff Bezos’s Morning Routine.” I took upon a challenge to improve my mornings, tried to imitate his routine, and go through the experience and share my learnings with you in this follow-up blog.

Just to recap what Jeff Bezos’ morning routine looks like, here’s the excerpt from my previous blog.

Jeff Bezos’s daily routine –

1. Wake up naturally without an alarm clock
2. Read the newspaper and have coffee
3. Have breakfast with kids before they head out for school
4. Set up the first meeting of the day at 10:00 am
5. No meetings post 5:00 pm
6. Go to bed early to wake up early.

Now that we have the context in place, let me take you through my experience and learnings in the past 14 days of implementing this routine in my daily life.

My Routine

Here’s what my routine looked like in the last 14 days of following Jeff Bezos’ routine – 

1. Woke up at 7:00 am
2. Read the news on Inshorts while sipping on hot coffee.
3. Had breakfast with my parents
4. Start my work and schedule any meeting post 10:00 am
5. Stopped any work-related decision-making post 5:00 pm
6. Went to bed by 12:00 midnight

My Experience

Waking up at 7:00 am

I will be frank; it was hard at first. Change in your waking-up cycle is never easy. The first two days, I woke up at 7:30 am even with the help of an alarm. It was because I kept snoozing the alarm and going back to sleep.

3rd day was my first breakthrough when I woke up at 7:00 am, but this was again with the help of an alarm clock. Eventually, Day 6 was when I got rid of the alarm clock altogether.

It felt amazing, to be honest! When I started waking up at 7:00 in the morning, everything changed.

Have you ever woken up early and opened the windows? The feeling of the cool breeze on your face is just Divine.

I suddenly realized how much time I had. I could do a lot of things even before I start prepping for my day.

Read the news on Inshorts while sipping on hot coffee.

After getting fresh, I made some hot coffee for myself while reading the latest news on the Inshorts app. Since the lockdown is going on, all newspaper distribution services are closed, so digital is the way to go to consume all my daily news fix.

This habit kickstarted my brain. The caffeine and those few minutes of actively reading the news boosted the creative engine of my mind, and I felt vigilant and active.

Breakfast with my parents

After the reading and the tasty coffee session, I helped my Mom cook some delicious breakfast for our family. We sat down together and had breakfast.

We had casual talks together, discussed news and current affairs, shared a laugh, and sometimes we would facetime my younger brother who’s stuck in Bangalore due to the lockdown.

This simple exercise improved the relationship that I had with my parents. Mobile phones and busy schedules of our lives made us drift apart a bit. We lived in the same house but hardly spoke to one another.

We felt more connected while sitting together and talking about random stuff. Breakfast is the best time to connect with your family, and this routine helped me with this.

Start my work and schedule any meeting post 10:00 am

I sat down with my office work around 10:00 am each day and took a bird’s eye view of how my work was laid out for the week and then close in on the particulars for the day.

Scheduling all my meetings and work post 10:00 am had a significant impact on my work schedule.

1. It made me stress-free as I don’t have to worry about anything that might come up before 10:00 am
2. It compelled me to take important meetings and decisions regarding work first thing at 10:00. It made me prioritize work and get better at time management.

Stopped any work-related decision-making post 5:00 pm

Not having to make any crucial decisions after 5:00 pm was a bliss. Many of you might think its impossible, but let me tell you, all decisions that required me to handle them after 5:00 pm were re-scheduled to 10:00 am the next morning. It is harder than it sounds, but it made me a better decision-maker.

Scheduling and re-scheduling helped me polish my leadership skills. A leader has to make tough decisions sometimes and live with those decisions. I grew smarter and more aware of my decision-making skills. Sure, I made a few mistakes along the way, but I learned.

As an entrepreneur, it’s easy to get caught up in the rut and burn out while making decisions daily. Decision making is crucial as it can make or break your business. So this routine helped me to prioritize and make better decisions whin-in time and re-schedule others to the next day.

Jeff Bezos’s routine also helped me focus on what’s on my work plate at the moment rather than fuzzing about what I could do in the future.

Focus is important because the more decisions you make, the worse those decisions get. So, it’s vital to make sure the crucial decisions first, so that they can be your best decisions of the day.

Went to bed by 12:00 midnight

I usually got done with work by 8:00 pm, and then I tried to sleep by midnight. It was hard initially as I was used to binge-watching at night, and my sleep pattern was all messed up. But sleeping at 12 and waking up the next at 7:00 am gave me 7 hours of mindful sleep, which boosted my energy.

I felt energetic, active, and ready to roll, while in the older days, I felt lazy; it was difficult to get out of bed early morning.

My Learnings

How crazy is that the richest man on Earth finds time in his mornings to relax and actually enjoy his life. It shows that the excuse of not having enough time is entirely invalid.

Finding ways to optimize, systemize, and delegate your time so that you have more free time in your life is vital.

What I learned in these 14 days while following Jeff Bezos’s routine –

First of all, short-term relaxation is, in fact, long-term productive

By taking time in the mornings to relax, you’re going to increase your productivity throughout the day. Since you start your day proactively, decide on what you want to do instead of reacting and responding to everything and going crazy in trying to catch up.

Second of all, Explore your creativity by doing meaningless menial tasks

It is scientifically proven that doing meaningless menial tasks, especially in the morning, are more likely to open your mind up for creativity.

For example, walking or doing the dishes or even making breakfast, which Jeff Bezos does quite a lot.

And third puttering is good because it’s a reminder to enjoy the process

In life, we’ve goals, and goals are reasonable. But, you’ve got to remember that there’s a chance that you’re not going to reach those goals.

So you’ve got to make sure that you’re enjoying the journey and the process of trying to achieve these goals because if you’re not enjoying the process and you don’t reach that goal, it will be a lot of time wasted. 

Whereas, if you enjoy the journey and embrace the outcome, whether or not you reach the goal or not, but since you’re enjoying the process, everything will be alright, and it will be an experience of a lifetime. 

What not to do when following Jeff Bezos’s routine

1. Don’t sleep for less than 7 hours – This will make you feel tired and lazy upon waking up. You don’t want that feeling. You should get enough sound sleep to wake up fresh and happy. You also don’t have to wake up at 5:00 am every morning. As long as you are getting enough sleep, even 7:00 am, or 8:00 am is okay.
2. Don’t hit the snooze button – The idea is to get rid of the alarm clock altogether. But I understand its not always possible for everyone. It takes time. Even it took time for me too. The body requires time to set its clock. So take your time but avoid hitting snooze on your alarm clock every 5 mins. Wake up as soon as the alarm goes off.
3. Don’t rush into things – Upon waking up, try to avoid the urge to check your email or anything related to work. The urge to get the job done might rush you into getting to work immediately upon waking up, and the whole idea of a relaxed and minimal morning routine will go to waste.
4. Don’t drag yourself alone during the morning hours – Spend your morning with your loved ones. Do exercise or yoga, cook your favorite meal. Sit with your family, your children, and just talk to them. Do whatever makes you happy.

Conclusion

I think it’s a perfect way to live life thinking about what are the things that are important to you what are the things that move the needle and once you find those two three four five activities execute on them relentlessly and try and cut out the rest as much as you’re human.

Having applied this routine to my daily life for the past 14 days, especially when the entire world is under lockdown, what was the impact? Have I noticed any change? The answer is, “YES.”

Results

One specific change was by slowing down and relaxing in the morning, I’ve found that I’ve been happier and I’ve got more done by literally doing less.

I’ve been able to get more done, and the reason for that is because I’m ready to proactively get more particular on the tasks that are actually going to move the needle forwards.

I cut out the noise before I take the time to relax and enjoy the process. I found that when I’m in a better mood, I get better work done.

And I think it comes down to the quote that “slow is smooth” and “smooth is fast.”

By taking things slow, I have a smooth morning where I feel in control.

I feel happy, I feel relaxed and by having a quiet morning and the result is smooth and fast to my ability to get more done.

Tell us about your experiences while doing this routine. We would love to hear your thoughts. Please comment below and if you like this blog on “ Ultimate Guide to Jeff Bezos’s morning routine ”, share it with your friends and family.

Please subscribe to our newsletter so you don’t miss any of our blog posts in the future – Click here to Subscribe!

P.S – All Jeff Bezos pictures are Courtesy – WikiMedia