Why It Is Only YOUR Routine that Matters
How to stop the “information intoxication” and find the routine that works for you.
After yet another experiment with my hair, it was in an awful condition. My natural curls looked like hell: dry and all over the place. Raven color was not the one for me.
I had to fix it somehow. Another color wasn’t an option, it was going to make my hair even worse.
I called my friend:
«Anna, I need a routine for my hair. I need to be doing something to fix this stack of hay on my head», I said.
«Routine is good. Do you know exactly what you’ll be doing? », she wondered.
«I’ll find something online, some masks, I don’t know». I definitely had a plan :)
“Eugenia… Routine. You know, my doctor once told me that if I get too stressed at school, I should try a mix of mint herbs and something else. It would help me wind down if I was too overwhelmed.
I got the mix. I took it religiously. Every day, same time, for about a month, I was taking this remedy. I do not remember having a particular effect. However, I remember my Mom asking why I was making an infusion out of pizza seasoning.
Turns out, the boxes got mixed up in the pantry. I ended up winding down after exams with some basil, garlic powder, and whatever else you add to pizza spices.
Was the routine there? Definitely.
Was it the right routine for me? Not unless you count placebo.
Just make sure your hair routine is what is right for you”.
Type “perfect routine” into Google and you are in for a treat.
Go on any publishing platform and you will see an article: “The routine you should follow if you want to be successful”.
There are a million articles on why you should include intermittent fasting into your diet regime, and even more articles with perfect morning schedules. They range from waking up at 4 AM and end with waking up by listening to your body. I loved the one where they recommended to ‘follow the Sun’s rhythm’. Poor Scandinavians, it must be very challenging for them.
From intermittent fasting to eating six times a day, writing your daily plan in the evening or the morning…
Some say doing it in the evening is just a form of procrastination to get over with your day and make a promise you will “do it tomorrow”. Others say it’s the best idea to prepare for the day ahead. It’s while you are sleeping that your subconscious mind will work on those tasks.
Is everybody a morning person if they try hard enough or are there some built-in rhythms that make us more productive? Should I drink coffee? Keto coffee maybe?
Oh, how I loved that delicious creamy goodness!
How can I be more efficient at what I do? How do I make my work week last 5 hours when now it’s more like 50, how do they do it? What plan do I follow?
Dozens of articles on perfect routines for writers. Write in the morning when your head is clear and everybody is sleeping! Write during the day in a café where you can observe people and get inspired! Write in the evening if you are not a morning person and that is when the motivation strikes. How am I supposed to become a writer if I am a beginner and I don’t even know when to write?
I had pinned down every advice possible and tried to make it into a daily routine. THAT routine would take me at least 5 hours and that wouldn’t include working. It was ok for two days.
And on the third day, she gave up.
I felt like it was back when I dyed my hair raven black and was trying every remedy possible and the result wasn’t there in two days.
I didn’t have a professional to build a routine — I had a hundred of them. I went to coaching weekends, seminars, webinars, read a hundred of books in a year and I was still all over the place. No consistency, no routine, no regularity. I started thinking I was the problem.
Who am I to NOT be ok with a plan offered by those who made it there where I wanted to be?
They taught me in the university that the question contains a part of the answers. My answer was “your routine”.
It then dawned on me. I tried one thing that was sustainable for me in a long-term run for 21 days and then some. It worked. I started building up on this thing. It started working. Turns out I don’t need to wake up at 5 AM and I won’t fail miserably if I don’t put a stick of butter into my morning coffee. I am fine working out at 4 PM because it just works for me and it doesn’t interfere with my day as a freelancer.
Productivity. Happiness. Consistency. Repetition. Convenience. Possibility to maintain. This is the real routine. Listen to those who made it, to your intuition, your body. You do YOU.
Routine is not rigid. It must be adjusted and only you know how.
Perfectionism is the enemy to your routine because if this is where you strive for perfection, you will throw your “perfect plan” out of the window after the first fail.
It is not a fail. It is just something that you need to adjust for yourself.
I review my routine daily, weekly, and monthly, according to the size of my tasks and big goals.
Test what works for you and stick with it. It might be hard at first, like that phase where your natural hair grows back, and your roots are kind of weird. The result will be worth it though.
Written by a woman with zero hair experiments in the last 10 years, natural curls, and a routine that has been working 80% of the time so far.
