My Ideal 8-to-12 Morning Routine that Helped me Overcome Burnout

Some days I wake up with such a dread, not knowing what lays ahead during the day. Sometimes it is the work deadlines lined up that drag my energy down, other times its just my mood not cooperating.

My day goes by either way and at the end of the day I lay awake in bed thinking what did I do all day. The whole day feels like a waste. 

I am sure I am not alone and most adults feel this way at certain point in their life. I don’t remember feeling the same way when I was younger. Even though I did not do anything particularly spectacular then, but I still felt like my days were pretty fulfilling. I went to bed happy and encouraged.

When contemplating with my life then and now, I realised one stark difference. I had a routine set out for me when I was younger. I studied in a boarding school so every hour of the day was scheduled from when to wake up, when to take a shower, study time, sports hours, school time, rest hours, dining hours etc. Every single hour was blocked during the day. I did not like the rigid schedule then, but that is what kept me productive each and every day. 

When I got older, the structure of the day faded. Especially now that I am a working adult, I have all the flexibility in the world. Also I am extremely lucky as I get to work from home for my job. But one side effect of this arrangement is that I have no routine whatsoever during my day. 

My everyday routine has been to wake up, get ready, work the whole day, do household chores in between, eat and sleep. And this has led me to burnout quicker than ever.

Why are Routines Important?

Routines are important because it brings structure to your day and discipline to your life. If there are certain activities that can make our lives easier, doing them routinely can only bring the discipline and momentum to keep going.

I am sure we are all very disciplined when it comes to our work. This is because we have our manager and team depending on us, we are answerable to others in such a scenario, so we do not tend to slack at work.

But lets say you need to put in at least 30 mins of exercise everyday to lose that extra weight. You are only answerable to yourself. And we as humans mostly take ourselves for granted. You get busy with work and decide to skip working out one day, then another and so on. What eventually happens is that the entirety of your day is spent working on everything else but yourself.

This is where routines come into play. Setting up a standard routine in your day where you handle the most important things for yourself without focussing on your deliverables for others can help set that boundary.

No matter how the day is going, you can take yourself out from the situation and dedicate your scheduled time to your routined tasks. So it is important to set up hours according to your daily life.

Since I work from home, I usually start my work around 12-12:30 PM and it goes on till about 9 PM, sometimes 10. I do have control over when my work starts, but not much when it ends. Keeping this in mind, I set myself up a Morning Routine for the day, where my focus is just self care. This enables me to start my day slow but strong.

My 8-to-12 Morning Routine

8:00 AM : Wake up & Get Changed (30 mins)

I usually start my day around 8 AM. I would love to be an early riser, but that is not in the cards for me right now with the current lifestyle. I get to bed around 12 am, and I try my best to get a good 8 hours of sleep at one go. I

usually wake up to the door bell of my house-help. She visits around the same time to clean up the house and do the dishes. It is definitely not a very god idea to wake up to a doorbell everyday, but that just works for me now. I am very grateful to have her as this has allowed me to delegate most of the household chores to her. She is busy cleaning up the house while I get the opportunity to get started with my morning routine.

While my house-help is doing her chores, the first thing I do is brush my teeth, freshen up and get changed out of my sleep wear. Getting out of my sleep wear is so basic but that has created the biggest momentum for me. If I do not get changed I do not feel like my day has started.

8:30 AM : Journalling Time & Drinking Water (30 mins)

The very first activity I do in the morning is journalling. I have been doing this writing practice on and off since 2019, and it has given me incredibly positive results. I have seen my dreams manifested, problems resolved and has helped me connect to spirituality.

I do not follow any template or have any structure. It is just a morning brain dumping session. I just scribble and write down all that is going on in my head onto paper. It is just getting my thoughts out in the open and on paper. I personally address “Dear Diary”. It is like communicating to a friend without any interruption, judgement or getting unsolicited advice.

Writing has helped me in more ways than one. First of all, it empties all the worries in my head. When I see all that I am worried about written on paper, it does not look like such a big deal. I get to analyse my own problem from an outsiders perspective and things mostly seem better after that.

Second it helps me understand what exactly I am going through each day, what my goals are, where my focus should be and where it actually is. It has helped me understand myself better as a person. And subconsciously it has led my actions to be more aligned to my objective.

I tried journalling digitally as well. But that has not worked for me. I only advise using a pen and paper the old school way to journal.

While my journalling session is on, I do not forget to drink water. I have a hard time staying hydrated and that is one major issue. Drinking water is so important, yet I tend to take it for granted. I used to jazz up my morning drink, like having warm lemon water, soaked chia water etc. But honestly I have never been able to stick with that. So I just start by drinking a glass or two of plain water every morning while getting on with my routine.

9:00 AM : Reading & Time out in the Sun (45 mins)

Around 9 AM is when my house-help gets done with her chores and leaves the house all clean and tidy. The next 45 mins I spend just relaxing. I have always been a reader and books have been my inspiration. But in the hustle and bustle of life, I let go of this habit. Books were replaced by screens and words of wisdom and fantasy with doom scrolling reels.

My screen time is something I am trying to reduce. And so I use the next 45 mins to recharge myself. I have started reading in this time slot. I read however much I can in a particular day. I have not set any goal as such. Some days it is just 3 pages, some days it is 30. This habit is helping me build up the momentum to read.

For at least 10-15 mins in this 45 mins slot, I spend soaking the sunlight. I have always been deficient in Vitamin D, and want to incorporate it into my life naturally as well. I do take supplements when prescribed by the Doctor. But I know morning sunlight has a lot of other benefits as well. It helps with the circadian rhythm and energises the body. I do feel a huge difference in my day when I get sun exposure in the morning vs when I don’t.

I live in an apartment, and as is with apartments there is not much direct sunlight. I am lucky to have a balcony which gets beautiful direct sunlight in the winter months. But the other months do not see a direct light. This was by biggest excuse of not spending time out in the sun. I would complain about not having enough light so how could I get sun exposure.

The simplest solution was to get out of the apartment and into the garden area. Free exposure to sunlight and nature. Why did I not think of this earlier? I guess I was just lazy. Now I crave going down every morning and soak up the sun. I avoid sunscreen too. I know its not recommended. But I am out just for 10-15 mins and I am willing to take that risk being so deficient in Vitamin D.

I have clubbed reading and time out in the sun in the same time slot because they go perfectly together. Mostly when I am out in nature soaking the sun, I try to just be mindful. Just soaking in the goodness of nature without phone or distractions. But there are days when I want to read just a bit longer. In those days, I carry my book down to the park benches and read for a while. I spend 10-15 mins out in direct sunlight and the rest I grab a shady spot. It is probably the best time of the morning for me when I get to reset my energy.

9:45 AM : Household Chores (15 mins)

The next 15 mins after my energy reset, I do some basic household chores that are not my house-help’s responsibility. I make the bed everyday at this time. Run a load of laundry if its laundry day and do basic tidy and putting back things in its place. I also water my plants during this time.

I have voluntarily kept just 15 mins for chores in the morning because this can get out of hand really quickly. I love doing chores and can go on for hours. This has led me to not get anything else done during the day. My space is mostly minimal now and I do not have much belonging to take care of. This was a conscious decision so that I don’t spend a lot of time cleaning and organising.

For rest of the cleaning like the dishes etc, I mostly clean them as I go through them and try not to pile them up.

10:00 AM : Breakfast & Tea Time (30 mins)

Next is the time to fuel myself. I try not to skip breakfast and have something healthy everyday. I mostly consume something that is easy to prepare like oats with fruits, poha, upma or bread and egg. Something that does not take more than 10 mins to put together. I do not enjoy cooking so having easy to cook recipes have helped me to a great extent.

I also love drinking tea. I used to drink tea first thing in the morning earlier which was very detrimental to my health. Now I have switched it up and only drink tea once I am done with my breakfast. I prepare my tea and sit down with it for my next time block session.

10:30 AM : Blogging Hour (60 mins)

The next hour is the most intensive time for me during my morning routine. I have dedicated this time to work on my blog that you are currently reading. Starting this blog and growing it has been a long term dream of mine and I finally had the courage to start it in April of 2025. It has been 3 months now. Even though I have all the ideas for this blog to grow, finding time to work on it with a full time job and life has been incredibly difficult.

I tried working on it later in the evening, but I am usually distracted with work by then. This blog had taken a backseat most of the weeks because of lack of time and motivation. So the only time I figured I could give time to writing is during the morning before starting any other work. I feel mentally free and recharged enough to write.

I know just working on my blog for one hour each day, 5 days a week is not enough for its growth. But it is a start. As I get into the flow and I am able to commit more time and energy to this blog, I will do so.

However even with just 1 hour each day, I feel very productive with the blog. I see more words being written, work being done and ideas flowing into pages. This is motivating enough for me to keep going.

11:30 AM : Budget Check-In (5 mins)

I also spend at least 5 minutes (sometimes more) to check in with my monthly budget. It is very crucial I do this activity every day to be on track with my finances.

I set a monthly budget at the start of each month. You can read my blog post on How To Create An Effective Monthly Budget To Manage Salary. One aspect of setting a budget is to keep a tab on it. I do so every day and it takes hardly a few minutes.

I am able to see where my money was spent the last day and how much balance I have to spend on the categories I have decided. This step has made me so conscious of my money spending habit, and I tend to shop less impulsively. I am able to hit my savings and investment goals each month and I am in a better financial situation than ever before.

11:35 AM : Shower & Get Ready for work (25 mins)

The final time blocking activity in my morning routine is to shower and get ready for my full-time job. This is very important for me to set the tone of my work day.

As I have been working from home for the past 5 years, one thing that took a backseat is getting ready for work. I would sit at my work desk in my PJ’s sometimes. Other times I would shower in the evening after my workout or during breaks. Honestly I loved this flexibility. But the boundary between my personal time and work time kind of took a hit. And I did not have full focus at work or in my me time.

When I used to work from office, it was like a ritual for me to get ready for work, travel and go and sit at my desk only focussed on my work and nothing else. That was the most productive I had ever been. So I tried replicating the same at home.

I take this time slot as my break between my personal time and work time. I shower, get ready and sit at my desk. This signals my brain that I am no longer in home mode, but in office mode. This has allowed me to have that mental buffer to switch between tasks.

Why is my Morning Routine 4 hours long?

You might be wondering 4 hours is too long for a morning routine. Yes, it definitely is. But I have kept it this way because I am a person who cannot indulge in high intensity tasks first thing in the morning. That is why you would have noticed I do not have any physical exercise slot. This was intentional. I have tried many times but it takes a toll on my mental health if I start my day with high intensity.

My goal has been to have a slow morning as much a possible. So even though I do not get a lot of “productive” things done first thing in the morning, I get a lot of intentional things done at my own pace. This helps me stay productive the rest of the day.

I have the bandwidth right now to have a 4 hour long morning and I am very grateful for that. In the future when my life changes, I will alter my morning routine to fit my new lifestyle. It is not about how long you have a morning routine for. It is important what you do during that time.

My personal opinion to all would be to at least have 1 hour each day at the start to yourself. Do something that will fuel you for the whole day.

My Experience with this Morning Routine

Ever since I have set this morning routine, I have seen a difference in my day. I would be lying if I say I follow it exactly as the time I have mentioned. Sometime I start a task 10 mins earlier or later. But I do not fuss over it. My goal is to follow through as much as I have set during the morning slot.

This is where having enough buffer helps me. Sometimes the time slots overlap, but I do have enough time to cover up. But having said that if you have a strict time slot and miss out here and there, that should not be a deterrent.

The goal is to set a routine and follow it to the best possible ability. Everyday is not going to be the same. So it is not fair if you have to follow the same routine in those days where you feel off. The whole point of this morning routine if for you to have structure in your morning. It should be serving as a frame work for you to get support from.

I do not follow it religiously everyday. Even if I miss a part of the routine or even the whole routine somedays, I start all over again the next day without feeling guilty.

Final Conclusion

The whole point of having a morning routine is to set the tone of your day to be a positive one. Your routine itself need not be a stress inducing factor in your life. You do not have to follow anyone else’s routine mentioned out there. Work out what is best for you. Do some trial and error and see what makes your day feel the best. Start with a 30 mins ritual in the morning and slowly grow it by what comes naturally to you.

By doing so you will be able to figure out the key to your productive day.