Drew and Joe from Whims That Work discussed their morning routines on the most recent episode. I greatly enjoyed the show despite the fact that there’s a tiring amount of advice in this category right now. You can’t look at Medium without seeing articles like 15 Steps For the Perfect Morning Routine That Will Lead You to the Promised Land. Seriously.
But the topic itself is one that interests me a lot. I love to see real world examples of how talented people structure their time. After listening to the episode, several thoughts came to mind.
Different times work for different people. There’s a lot of focus on the “perfect morning” in our culture right now and as a morning person I understand the allure. But some people simply find their energy at night. The exact time is not what’s important, but what we do with the slots of uninterrupted time in our schedule.
The same is true for the activities. There’s a lot of different things you can do with this time. Drew and Joe mention quite a few: reading, writing, meditation, morning pages, and just clearing your head. Planning for the day. All are healthy and helpful for helping us remember why we do what we do. And how we should be going about doing it.
These routines change with life seasons. Joe has kids, Drew does not. I also have kids, but they’re older than Joe’s. These details have an affect on when you take the time to do the kinds of things discussed on the show. And how long you have to do them. When my kids were all under 10, evenings were an option. Now that we have teens and tweens, they’re the ones staying up in the evening and I’m hitting the hay. Different seasons of life bring different rhythms.
This episode was an enjoyable listen. But I also was surprised as I listened. As the show unfolded, there was a big piece missing. More on that below…
There’s a person missing here
Back to the episode of Whims That Work I talked about in the opening of this email. There was one thing that really surprised me as I listened to the show during a run this week. In all the things Drew and Joe mentioned, there was no mention of Christ. No prayer, no communion. Joe mentioned meditation, but the focus was on a clear mind and improving the ability to focus.
I couldn’t help but wonder why this was not mentioned.
Now, not everyone shares the same faith. I get that. And even if you call yourself a Christian, there is a lot of diversity in how you express your faith, how you spend your time, and the liturgical rhythm of your life in a local church. However, when two Christians take the time to publicly share the details of how they spend their mornings, I tend to expect to hear details about how they spend time with Christ himself.
If a Christian meditates, should it be to stretch the ability to focus? To open the mind? Or should it be to fill our minds on Christ and his word? If a disciple of Christ has two hours in the morning to do the things — the most important things — that set up the rest of our day for success, should that time be spent seeking the presence of the Almighty and hearing how he wants us to spend our time? To know his will?
I had the chance to contact Drew and Joe and ask some of these questions. And that was slightly awkward — questions like these can be offensive and so easily taken the wrong way. Digital communication leaves a lot of room for misunderstanding. Thankfully, they were very gracious and we ended up having a good conversation.
My hope was to ask the questions without sounding preachy or judgemental. The reality is twofold:
- I struggle with these questions myself and
- I’m intensely curious about how Christians in our modern culture handle this aspect of their life
Many readers here have shared how this can be a struggle. So I often wonder how can help each other — even if only online and separated by distance — as we fight against the lust of the world and even the good things of this world to enjoy Christ more fully.
In the spirit of transparency, I’ll share my own habits.
- Although things are shifting slightly as my children get older, I still tend to be an early riser. I’m usually up around 5 AM (with a range between 4:30–6 AM)
- As the kids get older, my time of devotions (study, prayer, meditation, reflective thinking) can sometimes happen right before bed (which is usually a range of 9–10:30 PM)
- My time tends to be spent mostly on reading the word, short prayers, and meditating on a passage of scripture
- Some days I focus specifically on memorizing a text, but this also usually leads to meditation on the meaning of the text
- If I happen to be getting close to teaching a Sunday school class, the morning time may be focused on that
- Occasionally I’ll run in the morning and devotions come later
- Some days, the duration of these activities is short and I start on my work day early. To me, short means 15–30 minutes.
- Sadly, my prayer life is pretty stinky. I’m far more fond of studying the word than praying … the Lord knows this. We talk about it often 😀.
- This reality is likely due to my thinking about prayer in the wrong way and it’s something I want to improve. I’m trying by learning to pray succinctly and sincerely and by memorizing a lot of Psalms and praying those instead of my own words and thoughts
- Most important, I want to get better at “waiting on the Lord” because prayer is bidirectional and listening is just as important (or even more so) than speaking to God. I do this listening in the word, for I believe that is where he speaks to us
Anyway, I do go on. This is all what life is about for me. So that is exactly why I both enjoyed and was intrigued by this episode of Whims That Work.
How about you?
Would you be open to sharing your own habits in this area? It would be great to get a summary of what you folks think is most important, where you succeed, and where you struggle. We live in an interesting time where brothers and sisters in Christ can connect all across the world. And we’re all part of this body.
I’d love to hear how other parts are doing. Hit me up!
