How to improve everyday life

In my experience, the easiest way to manage everyday life better is to revise the many small activities we do every day instead of setting a huge goal. Whether it's a morning routine that gets us well into the day or eating a banana instead of a candy bar.

However, I don't want to claim that I master my everyday life perfectly in all aspects, but I think that I have one or two useful approaches that are worth sharing.

How to improve your everyday life

The best way to improve your daily life is to do everything you can as soon as possible. Doing something as early as possible gives you more time later to do things you enjoy, but also gives you the opportunity to do more productive things.

For the sake of simplicity, let's start in the morning: To ensure the smoothest possible flow of the day, it is of particular importance to get a rhythm. In other words, it helps if we get up at the same or at least a similar time. For me, that's usually 5:45 am during the week and ~8:00 am on weekends.
It's tempting to start the day with a few presses of the snooze button. However, I have found that the best way to start the day is to get up with the first alarm clock I set.

Once out of bed, I get dressed, splash some water on my face, brush my teeth, and head to the kitchen. There I fix myself a snack and make myself a coffee before heading off to work.

As you can see, I don't do a workout, meditate and read a book in the morning. The important thing here is to "improve" your morning so that it's better than the average morning where you snooze five times, then can't make a snack because of time constraints, and so on.
It's not about being the absolute best version of yourself, but a better version than before.

The power of habit

*Ginger tea with fresh lime and a little honey - refreshing chilled as well as hot*

Who hasn't experienced it: at lunchtime you treat yourself to a particularly large piece of cake with your coffee, after a hard day's work you treat yourself to an after-work beer, or you simply take too long a shower because it's so cozy. In and of itself, there is nothing profoundly reprehensible about all of this. However, I've found that it's the little everyday habits that cost us a lot of momentum and energy.
But that is not a bad thing. Rather, it is an opportunity that is worth taking advantage of.

What do I mean?

Well, instead of the cake, we can have a small cookie with our coffee, instead of a delicious cold beer, we can drink a soothing hot tea (especially in winter, tea is madness), and even the shower can be kept shorter simply by using an alarm clock.

Even if each small change in itself does not seem like something world-changing, the sum of all the habits we improve a little bit is usually bigger than we can imagine. If we try to realize too big tasks right from the start, it is often better to leave it alone because we capitulate from the sheer size of the task.

Of course, I don't know what your little habits are, but I'm sure you do. And I'm sure you know how to optimize them, even if only a little bit.

Do what needs to be done

Whether it's cleaning the bathroom, writing a job application, or getting a workout in. We like to use all kinds of excuses to not do what we know we would feel better about if we did it sooner.
I have found that it is very calming and relieving to complete the tasks you set for yourself as quickly as possible.

On the one hand you have a clear head, or in other words you don't have to worry about things anymore because they are already done. Let's not kid ourselves, every time we put things off, we worry or think about them every time we think about them. However, if we do the tasks as soon as possible, we have the capacity in the brain free to devote to more beautiful thoughts.

I don't mean that you do your tax return on the first possible day, or play an instrument every day for 5 hours or do sports. As I said at the beginning of this article, it is the small changes that already bear fruit.
So whether you have the clothes that are lying on the chair in the corner. The empty tempo pack that has been lying behind your screen for 2 months. The plate that's been sitting on your desk for 3 days. Whatever it is, try to get it done as soon as possible so that it doesn't bother you anymore and you can devote your energy to more important things.

Raise your standard

If you have been trying to improve for a while, i.e. you have optimized your habits and you do most of the things that are on your mind as early as you can, it can happen that you reach a plateau. You feel a little better than you did 3 or 4 months ago but you don't seem to be getting anywhere. Don't get me wrong, this is not a point you reach once, I myself am often satisfied with my current situation but think there is still room for improvement. You constantly come to these points where it feels like stagnation.

At some point you can't clean up your apartment, go for a walk or eat 4 apples for breakfast to become even healthier.
Now it is important to focus on the aspects where there is potential for improvement. So if we do one more pull-up when exercising or learn to cut vegetables faster when cooking. Whatever it is, there are always opportunities somewhere to raise our standards. You just have to know where to invest your time and energy.

However, you should also not be too cerebral, striving only for self-optimization. Most of the time we know intuitively what is good for us. We just have to overcome our inner pig dog, leave our comfort zone and follow our inner compass. After all, we know best what is good for us and where our strengths and weaknesses lie.