I always hated when my parents told me to make my bed. It wasn’t so much that I didn’t want to do it, but more so that I was sick of them telling me to do so and I wanted to rebel against them. It wasn’t until I was a young adult that I understood the power of making my bed.
To some, making your bed may seem like a simple chore. It was to me growing up. However, there is some magic behind making your bed in the morning. Throughout every day, we are faced with a number of challenges. These challenges come from everywhere. From work to making food to putting on clothes to brushing our teeth. These are challenges, no matter how big or small, that we must overcome to get us through the day. So, what is the first challenge we face every single day?
The first challenge we face is the decision to make our bed. After waking up and getting out of bed, we have a decision to make. One option is that we can leave the bed as is. In my case it’s like a war zone the way the covers are tossed around the room. Or we can achieve the first challenge of the day and make our bed.
Let’s talk about the effect of not making our bed first. Let’s say we leave the bed as a mess and go on about our day. Well, if we can’t complete this small challenge, imagine what else we will give up on. Giving up on one of your daily goals decreases your momentum throughout the day and will only hold you back. You are starting the day off with a loss. You bailed on the first challenge of the day. After leaving your bed a mess, chances are you went on with your day and things didn’t quite go your way. Now imagine having a rough day where all you want to do is to go home and climb in your bed. And when you get home you see that your bed sheets are a mess and all over the place, stopping you from climbing in bed the way you imagined doing so. This could lead to even more anxiety and frustration as things will seem like they are just getting worse for you.
Now let’s change the scenario. Let’s say you wake up and make your bed in the morning. You just completed the first challenge of the day. Regardless of how small the challenge was, you completed the challenge and got your first win of the day. Although this is just a small thing to do, it does have a psychological effect on our brains. It makes us feel useful and accomplished. After all, we did accomplish the first challenge of the day. Doing so will fill us with a calm and easing energy that will set our minds in the right place for taking on our day. One win leads to another, and another, and another. If you’ve heard of the snowball effect then you are aware that the snowball must start smart, then it starts to get bigger the more it rolls on and gains momentum. Making our bed is the small snowball in this scenario. We need to start small, then the momentum we get from that win will give us momentum to take on bigger tasks.
Let’s say you happen to still have a bad day even though you made your bed in the morning. Well, at least you’ll have a freshly made bed to come home to. This gives you one less headache to worry about and allows you to climb in bed the way that you’d like to. Perhaps coming home to a nicely made bed will make your day a little less bad.
Making your bed in the morning may seem like a small tasks and guess what? That’s because it is. However, lots of people choose to neglect this small achievable tasks. Making the bed in the morning allows us to get our first win of the day and to set the day off right. This gives us momentum to take on greater things throughout the day. And if it all goes wrong and you have a bad day, then at least you’ll have a nicely made bed to come home to. The power of making your bed in the morning is small but powerful.
Let me know what you like to do in your mornings to start the day off right.
Dabbl 