Wake up on the right side of the bed and ease into
your day with a positive, calm attitude.
from Stealth Health
The morning is probably no one’s favorite part of the
day, particularly if you stayed up the night before to
watch Leno or Jaws for the seventeenth time.
Remember: Stress and anxiety wreak havoc on your
immunity. Enter your day happy and relaxed, and
you greatly increase your chances of a healthy,
productive day.
1. Go to sleep with your blinds or curtains halfway
open. That way, the natural light of the rising sun will
send a signal to your brain to slow its production of
melatonin and bump up its production of adrenaline,
a signal that it’s time to wake up. When the alarm
goes off, you’ll already be half awake. Even better:
Go to bed early enough so that waking up when the
sun shines through your window still gives you the
recommended seven hours of shut-eye. If you
maintain this routine, it’s likely that you can start
relying on your biological clock rather than an alarm
clock.
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Have a small amount of sugar in the morning for
better memory recall that day and on into the
following day.
2. Set your alarm 15 minutes earlier. This way, you
don’t have to jump out of bed and rush through your
morning. You can begin your morning by lying in
bed, slowly waking up. Stretching. Listening to the
news headlines. Mentally clicking off what you’re
going to wear, what you’re going to do, what you’re
going to have for breakfast. It’s just as important to
prepare yourself mentally as physically for your day.
These few minutes in bed, before anyone else is up,
are all yours.
3. Stretch every extremity for 15 seconds. Try this
even before you open your eyes. Lift your arm and
begin by stretching each finger, then your hand, then
your wrist, then your arm. Then move on to the other
arm. Then your toes, feet, ankles, and legs. Finally,
end with a neck and back stretch that propels you
out of the bed. You’ve just limbered up your muscles
and joints and enhanced the flow of blood through
your body, providing an extra shot of oxygen to all
your
tissues.
4. Stick a chair in the shower and sit in it. Use one
of those plastic chairs you can buy at any hardware
store. Let it warm up under the spray for a minute,
then sit in it and let the spray beat on your back. It’s
simultaneously relaxing and energizing, like getting a
water massage. After a couple of minutes, you can
swing the chair out of the way and commence with
washing.
5. Read a motivational quote every morning. This
can provide a frame for the day, a sort of self-talk
that keeps you motivated in the right direction as
opposed to the negative thinking of the morning
news. Another option: Use a motivational mantra
that provides a meditation-like burst, or read or recite
a poem that helps you focus. A good one to use:
Rudyard Kipling’s “If.”
6. Take a vitamin. Keep a multivitamin out on the
kitchen counter right by the coffeepot so you
remember to take one every morning. More than 20
years of research led to a major recommendation in
one of the country’s premier medical journals
suggesting that every American take a multivitamin
as part of a healthy lifestyle.
7. Eschew any decisions. For truly relaxing
mornings, reduce the number of choices and
decisions you make to zero. Go about this two ways:
First, make your morning decisions the night before:
what clothes to wear, what breakfast to eat, what
route to take to work, and so on. Second, routinize
as much of your morning as possible. Really, there’s
no need to vary your breakfast, timetable, or
bathroom ritual from one morning to the next.
8. Cuddle with your kids. Few things are more
stressful in the morning than waking up an overtired
fifth grader or a snoring high schooler. Yet this is one
of the few times you can catch your child still
vulnerable. Sit on his bed and gently smooth his hair
as you softly waken him. Or, if you’re dealing with a
very young child, lie beside him and gently hug him
awake. Such a moment will send a quiet surge of joy
through your entire day and will become all too rare
in all too short a time.
9. Spend 5 to 10 minutes each morning listening to
music or sitting on the deck or porch just thinking.
This allows the creative thinking that takes place
during the night to gel and form into a plan of action,
grounding you for the day.
10. Wake to the smell of coffee. Really great coffee.
Buy the absolute best coffee you can afford — fresh
beans are preferred — and put twice the amount
you’ve been using into your coffee maker, the one
you bought specifically because it has an alarm that
can be set to start brewing times. The strong scent
of strong coffee will pull you out of bed like a
fishhook in the back of your pajamas. Plus, if you’re
going the caffeine route, morning is the best time for
it. Caffeine is a central nervous system stimulant
that acts in many ways like other stimulant drugs
such as amphetamines, waking you up and
increasing your muscular activity. Even better: A
study of 18 men found that caffeine improved clear-
headedness, happiness, and calmness, as well as
the men’s ability to perform on attention tests and to
process information and solve problems.
11. Brush your tongue for one minute. There’s no
better way to rid yourself of morning breath and
begin your day minty fresh and clean. After all, more
than 300 types of bacteria take up residence in your
mouth every night. You think a quick brush over the
teeth is going to vanquish them all?
12. Take a baby aspirin. There. You’ve just
significantly reduced your risk of a heart attack. In
one study of 220,000 doctors, those who took an
aspirin every day for five years slashed their heart
attack risk nearly in half. Of course, check with your
doctor first to make sure this is okay for you.
Wake up on the right side of the bed and ease into
your day with a positive, calm attitude.
from Stealth Health
13. Use real sugar in your coffee, or drink a cup of
orange juice. When researchers at the University of
Virginia tested the memories of healthy 60- to 80-
year-olds, they found those who had a small amount
of sugar in the morning (the experimenters
compared sweetened to unsweetened lemonade)
even before breakfast had better memory recall that
day on into the following day. We’re talking small
amounts, however, about a teaspoon or less; so put
down that doughnut.
14. Check your morning calendar. This is the large
calendar or white board you’ve hung in a prominent
position in your kitchen. On it, you write everything
you need to know for that particular day, from kids’
activities to whether the guy is coming to service the
furnace to whether it’s time to pay bills. Check it out
carefully while you sip that first cup of coffee or
morning tea; it will help you structure your day in
your mind and avoid the stressful effects of
forgetting something important.
15. Swallow 500 mg of calcium citrate. Your body is
better at absorbing this form of calcium than the
other commonly used form, calcium carbonate,
found in antacids like Tums and Rolaids. You’ll need
at least another 500 mg before you go to bed.
16. Drink eight ounces of water. You’ve been fasting
all night and you wake each morning dehydrated.
17. Create a checklist for your kids. If you don’t
have kids, skip this one. But if you do, this is a
biggie. To cut down on morning chaos, hang a white
board in the hallway or kitchen and list all the things
that must be done before the kids can leave: brush
teeth, eat breakfast, get backpack together, make
bed, and so on. Have them check off or erase each
item once it’s completed. You can do the same thing
with lists printed out from your computer. Set a
consequence: If all items aren’t checked off 5
minutes before you need to leave, there’s no TV,
PlayStation, dessert, or computer time that night.
18. Keep a wicker basket for yourself and each child
by the front or back door. Into it go your keys, wallet,
purse, and the child’s backpack, papers, gloves,
hats, etc. This will prevent that frantic last-minute
scouring of the house as you look for lost items.
19. Split up in the morning. That means you use
one bathroom and your partner uses another. Even if
you are still madly in love, bathroom time should be
private time. It makes for a calmer, less stressful
start to your day.
20. Wash more efficiently. We spend an average of
about 12 minutes in the shower. That’s fine when
you’re preparing for date night. But in the morning,
you need to get in and out quickly. If you’re not into
showering the night before (we do understand about
bed head) try using two-in-one products like a
cleanser that both cleans and moisturizes or a
combination shampoo and conditioner. When you
wash your body, just hit the hot spots, i.e., your
groin and underarms. Everything else can just be
rinsed off. The health benefit: reducing stress by
saving time.
21. Prepare an emergency outfit in your closet.
Include socks, jewelry, hose, etc., so on those
mornings when you sleep through the alarm or
simply need an extra 10 minutes, you can just pluck
it off the hanger and go.
22. Dry more efficiently. Start with an oversized,
100 percent cotton bath sheet for maximum blotting.
Towel-dry your hair and let it air-dry while you do
your makeup or put on your underwear. Then, if you
use a blow-dryer, make it a high-energy one, at least
1,600 watts. Anything else is just wasting precious
time.
23. Hop on the treadmill for 30 minutes.
Studies find that people who work out in the morning
are more likely to stick with their exercise regimen
because they get it out of the way and don’t have all
day to come up with diversions and excuses. Plus,
you will produce endorphins that will last most of the
day.
24. Kiss all the people you love in your house
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