Ayurvedic Morning Routine and Personal Growth Tips That Will Set You Up For A Perfect Day

What’s the first thing you do in the morning when you wake up?

Whether you’re scrolling through your phone or enjoying your morning coffee while reading a good book makes a huge difference on how your day will unfold.

According to Ayurveda, a daily routine (Dinacharya) is essential for maintaining a balance in our body, mind, and soul. Establishing a healthy and consistent dinacharya allows the body to be in sync with the cycles of nature and promotes optimal wellness.

And not only does the routine bring you to balance, it'll also help you to achieve your goals. The most successful people in the world use a disciplined morning routine to create the life of their dreams.

So how to create a holistic morning routine that will set you up for perfect balance and help you achieve your goals?

Let's explore!

Wake up with the sun

Unless you live around the arctic circle, waking up just before the sunrise is a perfect way to start the day. According to Ayurveda, you should wake up before 6am, just before kapha starts governing the day. This Ayurvedic clock will help you find the optimal rhythm for your day.

Visualization

This part is incredibly powerful and simple yet many still fail to use it for their benefit.

When you visualize your perfect future you focus on the feeling of having it all instead of focusing on the lack and therefore attract more positive things (and eventually your perfect future) into your life.

I like to start my day with this 6 phase meditation still laying in bed and listening it from my headphones.

It starts the day with the focus on oneness, gratitude, forgiveness and visualising your perfect day and future. Doing these visualizations will amplify all the things you are grateful for, will help remove all negative charges holding you back, and move you one step closer toward your perfect future.

Once you learn to combine your thought with the emotion of how the ideal outcome makes you feel and manifest from the place of love instead of fear, your visualizations will become extremely powerful.

For example, visualising a new car and a raise just because you want to look better in other peoples eyes is manifesting from fear because deep down you are afraid you’re not good enough as you are and believe material things or status can change that. This type of visualisation will probably take a long time to become your reality because you are manifesting from a low frequency/vibration. Visualizing the same thing just because you simply love the feeling of driving the new car and it brings you immense joy will make it appear a lot faster. This is the reason why people who follow their passion seem to get what they want in life a lot faster than those who don’t.

Tongue scraping

Gently scraping your tongue with an Ayurvedic tongue scraper is an easy and healthy practice to add into your daily routine just before brushing your teeth. This practice eliminates bad breath causing bacteria, draws toxins out of the body, and prepares the digestive system by stimulating the taste buds. Once you're done, make sure you brush your teeth using non-fluoride natural toothpaste.

Oil pulling

Oil pulling is another great Ayurvedic morning ritual to strengthen gums, whiten teeth, eradicate plaque, rebuild enamel, and eliminate bad breath. Its simple: Just hold the coconut or sesame oil in your mouth, swish it around vigorously, then spit it out (somewhere else than in your sink). You can do this for anything between 3-15 minutes.

Neti & Nasya

The nasal passageway is the entryway for prana, our life force energy, to enter the body.

This is why Ayurveda places special emphasis to keep it clean, healthy and clear via the use of neti and nasya.

The neti pot is made from plastic, ceramic, stainless steel, or copper, it resembles a teapot. The pot is filled with a saline solution and then poured into the nostril. The solution flows through the nasal passage, flushes out excess mucus and accumulated debris, and exits through the other nostril. The same process is then done to the other nostril. The ratio is generally a half-teaspoon of salt for every cup of water. Nasya is the same practice but using herb-infused sesame oil instead of salt water to clear, moisturize, and protect the nasal passageways and sinuses.

Drink a tall glass of lemon water

Drinking 30 ounces of warm (or room-temperature) lemon water is the perfect way to aid digestion, maintain optimal hydration levels, flush out toxins and get your first important nutrients for the day.

Feed your mind (with something positive!)

Reading is one of the daily habits that literally makes you smarter and is the way many of the most innovative people in the world start their day. After all, "leaders are readers”.

Have a cup of tea or coffee and take that 15-20 minutes to read. Perhaps find an exciting novel or read positive affirmations - whatever that makes you feel positive and inspired. Or if reading is not your thing, just listen to a podcast, audiobook or watch inspirational videos.

Morning exercise (even just for 5 minutes)

Why exercise is better in the morning?

Because it allows you to enjoy all that energy you created, increased alertness and focus throughout the whole day! It also gets your feel-good hormones flowing and sets you up on a better mood. Even if you just exercised for 5 minutes, will get your cortisol levels up and help you feel more awake ready to start your day.

You can do any type of exercise but Yoga is especially powerful to optimise your hormones, get your prana flowing, reduce stress, and improve circulation, strength, and digestion. You should do a gentle exercise if you're vata, a calming exercise if you're pitta and more vigorous one if you're kapha.

Pranayama

Breathing exercises are another great way to start the day in a balanced way. Calming Nadi Shodana is a great way to balance our energies and the stimulating Kapalbhati is a powerful start to the day for more advanced yogis.

Nadi Shodana

1. Fold your ring and pinky finger of your right hand and place your index and middle finger on your third eye.

2. Gently close your right nostril with your thumb.

3. Inhale through your left nostril, then close it with your ring-little fingers.

4. Open and exhale slowly through the right nostril. Keep the right nostril open, inhale, then close it, and open and exhale slowly through the left.

5. Repeat the cycle 3-5 times.

Meditation

This is the MOST important one. Even if you skipped everything else and kept this you’ll be able to start your day in a perfect way. Just ask anyone who follows a daily meditation practise! Here are tips how to get started with your meditation practice.

Write it down

Goals are scheduled dreams.

So set your intention and goals for the day by writing them down. I love making lists already the night before and then going through them in the morning to make sure I'm on track. As a list-loving virgo, I also have lists for specific weekly and monthly goals. If you don't share the same obsession for list-making, another great way to set the intention to your day is to ask yourself "How can I serve today?" and write it down.

Sum it up

As Benjamin Franklin once said “Wisdom is measured in the routine”.

Wise words are just words unless we embody them and practice what we preach. Whatever your goals are, it’s important to break down elements of these goals into your daily routine.

However, don't forget that a great morning starts already a night before. If you follow these tips to enhance your sleep, you're already getting a head start to your day. And remember, you don’t have to do every single ritual every day. Just envision the type of change you want in your life and choose the things that take you towards that.

What are your favorite morning rituals? I'd love to hear in the comments.