Okay so we know that waking up and doing things in the morning is the best way to achieve our goals in life. We can exercise, study, work, meditate, etc. much better than other times in the day. However, most of us feel pretty crap in the morning.

So what can we do about it? How can we wake up ready for work?

Update: You might want to check out this post that has advice from a Buddhist Yogi about waking up early.

Ways to wake up feeling fresh in the morning

Here are some things you can do in the short term and the long term so that you will wake up fresh and energetic in the morning. I’ve divided them up into three sections; (1) the night before and (2) during the night and (3) the morning.

The Night Before

1. Avoid coffee, red wine and chocolate the night before
To wake up fresh you need to get a good sleep and one of the best ways to ruin a good sleep is to upset your gut. You really need to keep it happy during the night.

Coffee, red wine and chocolate have been scientifically shown to disturb your sleep more than any other food. They upset your intestines in such a way that you will wake up constantly or have a very light sleep that doesn’t re charge you at all. Try not to have these things after lunch time.

2. Go to bed happy with your partner
One of the best ways to get a terrible sleep is to go to bed before you solve a problem with your partner. In my relationship I never let the sun set on an argument, even if I have to compromise a little bit on my own ego.

Before you go to bed make sure your partner is happy (as much as you can) and make sure that you are happy with them. It is also one of the best things you can do for your relationship, let alone your sleep.

3. Meditate, pray and calm down before going to bed
Every night before I go to bed I do about 30 minutes to an hour of meditation. This is amazing as it allows you to throw out all the days worries and forget about the worries of tomorrow. The future cannot be changed while you are asleep and the past is gone so there is no point losing sleep over it! Let it go.

Meditate or pray or do whatever you do. Simply sitting there and watching your breath is a great way to prepare yourself for a nice deep sleep. Check out this post if you want to learn to do a quick little stress relieving meditation.

4. Don’t eat dinner right before bed
A lot of people run home after work, cook up some dinner and then eat it and go to bed. This is a bad idea. The process of digestion takes a while and you do not want to be laying down right after you ate a big meal. Try and leave a few hours in between your bedtime and your dinner and see how you feel the next day.

5. Organize your room according to Feng Shui principles
I know a lot of you probably think that Feng Shui is a load of bull but just give me a second to convince you that it actually has some “western logic” behind it.

For those of you who don’t know Feng Shui is an ancient Chinese art of setting up your home in a way that balances the energies and vibes by putting furniture in certain “hot spots”.

The bedroom is particularly important and I have found that since I arranged my room according to Feng Shui principles I have had a much more “rested” sleep. In particular the placement of your bed is important. Feng Shui tells us that you should sleep where you can see the door but not be in he direct path of the door opening. This helps us sleep with a sense of security. I can see the practical reason for this. You can get some more bedroom Feng Shui tips here.

6. Go to the toilet
Even if you do not need to go to the toilet before bed you should still have a go and squeeze out whatever you can. The reason for this is that the kidneys will continue to work during the night and by the morning your bladder will be nice and full. If your bladder fills up early you might feel the need to go during the night and this cuts out valuable time from your sleep.

You might think that sleeping is about the total time spent asleep but this is incorrect. It is important to stay asleep without breaking it because it takes some hours to get into the “zone” where you are truly at rest. A toilet break interrupts this zone.

During the Night

7. Not too hot, not too cold
Another sleep related tip: your sleep is greatly affected by the how hot or cold you are during the night. It is important to get a good balance as this keep your energies calm and stops them from spiking.

Try and find a balance between clothes and bed covers. For example, I like to sleep without any clothes but with a heavy blanket. This keeps my temperature pretty consistent.

8. Keep the window open
One of the best things you can do for your health in general and your sleep in specific is to keep your window slightly open during the night. This has two benefits.

photo credit: volvidejapon

Firstly, the gap in the window will allow poisonous carbon dioxide to float away. The reason the human body breathes out is because carbon dioxide is poisonous. And during the night you take a heck of a lot of breaths and your room fills up with this gas. Let it out the window.

The second reason is that you need to allow new oxygen to float in. This might also help you regulate the temperature of the room.

9. Keep your sleep consistent
People think that you MUST have eight hours sleep to get enough.

Not true.

It is more important to go to bed at the same time and wake up at the same time everyday. Not everyone needs eight hours. In fact, if I get eight hours sleep I usually feel tired and groggy for the entire day. Six to seven hours is about right for me.

Start by setting your bedtime at the same time each night. Forget what is on the television and just go to bed at say 11pm each night. After a while start setting your alarm for the same time each day; even on weekends. If you don’t start waking up fresher and happier each morning I will write you a personal apology.

10. Cut out noise, it’s actually killing you!
I recently read in New Scientist Magazine that your life is actually being shortened by noise during the night. Yep, that’s right… that screaming police car or roaring traffic is actually killing you! The magazine said that the noise has an effect on your heart and waking up many times during the night puts your body under a lot of stress.

Try and keep your room quiet by wearing some earplugs. You can get earplugs that only cancel out certain sounds so that you can still hear your alarm or a baby monitor on your bedside table.

The Morning

11. Drink a glass of water
A cool glass of water on an empty stomach actually has a lot of health benefits as well as serving to wake you up. The water will kick start your metabolism and as such you will wake up faster and feel more alert.

12. Exercise
When you are groggy in the morning and nice run in the fresh air can wake you up fast. However, the interesting thing is that when you exercise in the morning you will actually have more energy the NEXT day. The more you exercise the more energy you will have as you become fitter and healthier.

If you need some tips to get up and exercise early check out this post on early morning exercise hacks.

13. Don’t drink coffee… everyday
Science is now showing that our body becomes accustomed to the caffeine in our coffee and we have less of a reaction to it. This means that your daily cup of coffee is waking you up less and less every day that you drink it.

A better idea is to save the morning coffee for when you are really tired and need a little bit of help. Perhaps if you had to stay out late or get up extra early and you have disturbed your regular sleeping habit. This is the time to have a cup of coffee.

14. Breathe deeply
The first thing you should do in the morning is take some deep breaths into your stomach and concentrate on waking up. Imagine breathing in a bright white light that makes your body feel happy and light.

15. Have something to be excited about
If you get up and go to a job you hate to work with a boss that drives you crazy you are not going to really enjoy waking up. However, if you have something you enjoy to go to you will be more likely to wake up happy knowing you have a bit of joy coming your way.

If you can’t leave your terrible boss then you should make time in the morning to do some sport or activity that makes you happy. Start your day with something happy and fun as opposed to starting it with work.

16. Get up straight away
When I was in the Himalayas a buddhist master told me that one of the best things you can do to wake up early and feel alert and fresh is to get up straight away. As soon as your alarm goes off you should get up without snoozing it over and over again.

He said to me half jokingly: “You have to get up before your self cherishing does”.

17. Be grateful for not dying
The Buddha said that every time you go to bed you should consider that you won’t wake up. That way, when you wake up you will be especially grateful for the day you have ahead of you. Instead of seeing the day as a burden that you have to “get through” you will see it as an opportunity to do something meaningful and beneficial.

Why? Because you could die tonight.

When applied correctly this realization will bring you tremendous energy.

Conclusion on waking up freshly

Each of these tips works. I have tried it on myself and my friends. And the great thing is that the more of these tips you apply the fresher you will feel when you wake up. Try them yourself.

Do you have any other to add? I’d love to hear them!

Top photo: photoeyeliam

**Top 10 Daily Mind post.**

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The weather just got chilly here and now everyone seems to have a cold. But how do you survive the flu season when you can’t afford to take the day off? Here are 8 hacks for when you are sick at work.

1. Use your lunch break to sleep
When you are sick it is actually a good idea to eat less. You see digestion takes up a lot of vital energy and when you are sick you need that energy to go to fighting off the germs. Now I am not saying don’t eat anything. Fruits and vegetables are great. But, keep the heavy foods to a minimum.

You may need less food but you also need more sleep. Usually we get an hour lunch break and this is the perfect time to go and have a power nap. Science has shown that a 20 minute nap taken during the middle of the day is the same as getting over two hours of sleep during the night. However, you do not want to get more than about 30 minutes at nap time because then it will be too hard to wake up.

I suggest going down to the park (if it is warm) and having a sleep in the sun. The sun has a very physical impact on how well we feel and a few moments of rays can make a massive difference. At least get outside and clean your airways out with some fresh oxygen.

2. Drink green tea
Green Tea has been used by the Chinese and the Japanese for thousands of years. They have long considered it a medicine – not just a tea. And modern science is starting to back this up. Recent studies showed that those who drank green tea were up to 60% less likely to develop cancer. Green tea is fully of antioxidants and is a very relaxing way to detox your body everyday. When I get sick I try to drink two or three cups per day and it always makes me feel a little better.

photo credit: ms.Tea

3. Drink a lemon, ginger and honey tea
In this post I introduced the Lemon, Ginger and Honey Tea. It is a hot drink that I learned when I was in Bodhgaya in India. I was told it was an ancient Indian combination and it was a powerful cold and flu fighter and preventer. They were right. It fixed my cold up a lot faster than normal and I haven’t had a bad one since – even when everyone else is sick.

4. Take a load off
Throughout the years at work you have probably clocked up a lot of favors. Every now and then we do things for people and they say “I owe you one”. Well, now is the time to call in that favor.

Go and look around the office and find someone who owes you a favor and ask them to help you with some of your work. Nine times out of ten they will be happy to lend a hand. It is a good way to make friends as it is a mutual helping – explain that you will help them next time they get sick.

5. Make a deal with the boss
One of the best things you can do is go to your boss and STRATEGICALLY explain to him/her why you need some of your work load assigned to someone else. Here is how you do it.

Go to your boss and explain that you are really quite sick but didn’t want to miss a day of work because you didn’t want to let the team down. Explain that you know how much pressure everyone is under and couldn’t live with yourself if you had a day off and left them in the lurch. Then explain that despite coming into work you underestimated how sick you really were and really would appreciate some help because you don’t want to produce poor quality work.

Your boss will love it.

Showing that you are a team player is a big advantage but also knowing when to ask for help counts for some points. This strategy allows your boss to see that you are trying but need some assistance.

6. Make use of “toilet” breaks
Sometimes you need a break when you are sick but you can’t exactly lay down at your desk. My girlfriend mentioned that she uses up her toilet breaks when she is sick by heading down to the cubicle, placing a rolled up jumper against the wall and having a short nap. You could probably get away for ten minutes at a time like this.

7. Give yourself an allotted time to be sick
One of the best things you can do when you are sick at work is take a short break and give yourself an allotted time to be sick. Just sit there for five minutes and groan and moan and feel awful. After the allotted time is up you should compose yourself, take a few deep breaths and head back to work revitalized and full of bravery.

8. Meditate on compassion
His Holiness the Dalai Lama often says that if you want to have the inner strength of a warrior you need to develop compassion. One of the best times to meditate on compassion is when you are sick.

If you are feeling lousy you can think about the fact that there are people out there who are feeling a lot worse than you are. This should give you a renewed sense of energy and vitality – a sense that you should keep working hard because things aren’t that bad.

The next way you can meditate on compassion is by the using the buddhist practice of Tong Len. Tong Len means “sending and taking” and is where you use your breath as a tool to increase compassion.

Firstly, breathe in an imagine that all the suffering in the world is coming in to your body and dissolving. You take on all the suffering of others so that others don’t need to experience it. Secondly, when you breathe out all your happiness and health goes out to others and makes them all healthy and joyful. Finally you make the aspiration that buddhist makes whenever they are sick:

“May all sentient beings’ sicknesses ripen on me right now while I am sick. May this sickness purify all sentient beings of their illnesses right now.”

top image: photo credit: Lost in Scotland

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I write this article sitting in a busy internet cafe. I am struggling to stay focused with all the distractions going on around me. Television blaring, music on the radio, beautiful women and all the distractions (Facebook) that are on the net itself.

So how can we avoid distraction and stay focused at work?

10 Ways to stay focused at work

1. Develop a firm resolve
The first thing you need to do is take a few moments to develop a firm conviction that what you are doing needs to be done and you cannot waste any time. I tend to waste the most time when I have nothing particularly pressing due so I feel like I can do it later. Develop a firm resolve that you need to work now.

2. Break the procrastination habit
Leading on from number one you need to fight the habit you have built up over the years to let your mind tell you it is okay to do it later. Sometimes we complain that we are distracted but in actual fact we are just procrastinating. Make sure you know the difference.

3. Set a goal
Each day you should set yourself several goals. A goal does not just have to be something that takes years to achieve – a goal is any ambition that you set to a timeline. If you want to get a work report done by the end of the day you need to set yourself that goal and write it down on paper. Written down goals are somehow more powerful.

4. Be strong
When a stunning woman walks past it is easy to do what everyone else does and stare. However, who does that really help? It doesn’t help you get your work done. It doesn’t satisfy your sexual urges (it makes them worse!) so it would just be better not to look up. Remind yourself that you are in control of your mind and be strong.

5. Be a rock, not a tree
I once heard someone describe an influencial political leader like this:

“Mr. X is not a tree. He is a rock. He doesn’t get blown around by the wind.”

It is important to understand the wisdom of this. It is important for you not to get blown around by all the external events that are taking place all the time. This goes for work, love, happiness, etc. If you allow the things outside of your mind to take hold of you it will not be long before you have lost control of your life. Be like the rock.

6. Relax
Sometimes when we are too tight and stressed we find it difficult to achieve any sort of focus. When your mind is tight it will be taken away by anything that enters the senses. For this reason it is important to stay loose and relaxed. When we are relaxed we are more able to work with our mind. Our thoughts will be clearer and we will have more control over them.

7. Disconnect the internet
If you really need to get some work done it is often a good idea to turn off the internet for an hour or so. Make sure you have everything you need and then just switch it off for a specific amount of time. When we have distractions easily available to is we will often fall victim to them. Identify what distracts you and then get rid of it if you start to feel tempted.

8. Avoid the coffee
Coffee makes us jittery and anxious. It is very hard to stay focussed when you have had a few cups of coffee as your body will simply not let your mind sit still for two seconds. If you need to drink while you are trying to stay concentrated it is better to drink green tea, water, milk or something that has a relaxing effect.

However, sleepiness can also be a distraction in which case you should check out the tips in this post on waking yourself up at work.

9. Close the door
One of the most simple yet powerful things you can do is simply close the door. People will not feel as obliged to “stop by” if the door is closed. Of course those that intended to come and see you will still do so, but this who are just walking past will not stop in. Don’t always have it closed, however, as this will dilute the potency of the message. I keep my door closed only when I am actively working.

10. Find a deep motivation
When I was in India I learned the importance of having a correct motivation. The old buddhist master used to say that when you have a correct motivation you will be more able to accomplish tasks in a meaningful way and you will be less likely to lose your way because the motivation really means something.

The best motivation you can develop is one that is focussed on helping others. If you apply this motivation to whatever you do your life will work out and become a very meaningful journey.

“As human beings we all want to be happy and free from misery… we have learned that the key to happiness is inner peace. The greatest obstacles to inner peace are disturbing emotions such as anger, attachment, fear and suspicion, while love and compassion and a sense of universal responsibility are the sources of peace and happiness.” – His Holiness the Dalai Lama

top image: photo credit: DeusXFlorida

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