How a $7 Alarm Clock Makes me more Productive
Having a morning routine
No matter if you are a morning person or not, having some sort of morning routine can be beneficial.
Starting the day right helps make the rest of the day go smoothly and puts you in the right frame of mind to deal with anything.
Productivity people always talk about a morning routine, you can read or listen about the morning routines famous people have set in place on lots of websites and a bunch of podcasts.
Doing something as simple as making your bed as soon as you wake up can give you a sense of accomplishment, which starts your day in a positive way.
What do you do first thing?
For most people the first thing they will do when they wake up is reach for their cell phone, check for updates on various apps, and may start scrolling news and news feeds to catch up on whatever has happened since they last put the phone down. This is a habit, and habits can be broken.
How a $7 dollar alarm clock helps me be more productive.
After looking at how my own days were going, how I was feeling and how productive I was during the day, I soon came to realise that for me, if I didn’t check my phone first thing in the morning, my day wasn’t set by something I read, I felt much better and for some reason I was more productive.
Maybe this was due to not using brain power on entertaining but not necessarily important things.
As a morning person I know the most productive time of my day is the first half of any day, for people that are night owls, the phone checking in the morning might not effect you in the same way it does to me.
I started not checking my phone when I first got up in the morning, sometimes I wouldn’t check it for hours. This works fine when I didn’t have anywhere to be, but what happens if I needed an alarm clock?
Using this multipurpose piece of technology called a cell phone would allow me to set an alarm, in fact multiple alarms if I needed. But sometimes, after turning off that alarm, or maybe hitting snooze, you fall into the habit of opening things, reading things, responding to things. A solution had to be made.
I started the hunt for an alarm clock. There weren’t too many specifications I was after, I was just wanting something to tell the time and be able to set an alarm, anything else would be a bonus for me.
There are many different types you could get, at varying range of prices. In the end my search led me to Kmart where I purchased a $7 alarm clock, which comes in one of three colours, Blue, Pink or White.
Features of the $7 Kmart Alarm Clock
- Big numbers for the time
- Has a bright backlight
- Backlight can be on all the time and adjusts to the light in the room, or turned off and only works when you press the button on top
- Shows the temperature
- Shows the date
- Shows when the alarm is set for
- Runs off of 3 AAA batteries
Features I wish it had
I wish there was a black version of this clock, I got the Blue one, but I think I would like a black versions more and I wish it had either a different sound for the alarm, or the ability to pick between a couple. This alarm clock will wake you up, and the alarm is a decent sound, it’s just not a nice sound, which I guess is good, but I think it could be a bit better.
How Mornings Are Now
With the alarm clock now sounding the start of the day, and the cell phone banished to the other side of the room, I now no longer start the day wasting brain power on random stuff that can wait until later. Instead I am starting the day productive and getting through much more work now, all due to a combination of a $7 alarm clock and planning what I am doing with my Bullet Journal.
How are your mornings going?
Do you struggle with mornings? Or are you mastering them? Let me know by leaving a comment, I’d love to hear how things are going with your own journey.
