Make Your Bed
Industry begets industry.
The best way to start your day is doing something for yourself. Some writers recommend getting up very early, before the priorities of the world creep in on you, to do your most creative work. Others prefer the coffee-and-morning-meditation route. Still more recommend the gratitude journal and self-reflection. There is value to each method, but the common thread that unites them is pursuing personal, internal works upon first waking.
I prefer a different method.
While the water is boiling for tea or coffee, spend 15 minutes and clean the space around you. As they say, cleanliness is next to godliness, but more than that, creativity shuns from environmental stressors, including the anxiety of messiness.
The 15-minute power clean has become a close companion in my life. The feeling of coming home at night after a long day to a spotless, tidy sanctuary is one that always seems to be worth the effort.
More so, the act of movement, of utility, of industry, first thing in the morning prompts further works throughout the day. The same way a morning run prepares your body for physical action later in the day, personal works prep your creative sphere.
Before I can sit down and write something worth reading, I need an environment that condones such action.
To compound things, the last thing I prefer to do after a long, mentally draining day, is spend time organizing, cleaning or restoring the environment around me. I would far prefer to do so at the beginning of the day when my willpower is at its highest.
The time it takes to boil water for a pot of coffee is just enough time to make my bed, sweep the floors, clean my end tables, do the dishes (or put them in the dishwasher, let’s not get ahead of ourselves here) and take out the garbage.
A calculated act of industry propels us forward through the resistance of the day.
