This article is written by Ramanuj Mukherjee, CEO, LawSikho.

My most productive time in the day is the morning. And morning is the time I end up wasting very often, because I have the whole day to work, right?

When I was younger, I mostly worked late at night. I found that time to be serene and less distracting. Also, as I didn’t get the work done the entire day, sometimes I was just forced to work hard late at night.

I even got convinced that I am not a morning person, but someone who needs to stay up late and work. I called myself a night owl.

However, entertaining such fantasies while I was in college was easier. As I began building a business, working late at night has not remained a valid option at all. 

Through a journey of self-improvement, I had to learn how important sleep is. I learned that I function the best when I have great sleep. 

I began measuring my sleep. You can use a band or a sonar app on your smartphone to track the quality of your sleep. Sleepscore is a great app for this. If you have any smartphone, you also have this.

Anything that you measure improves. When I began to measure the quality of my sleep, I began to realize how important it is to sleep earlier and not skip sleep. Within a few months, it was clear that a major key factor of my productivity was sleeping on time.

This was followed by the discovery that if I do not swamp myself with emails, WhatsApp messages and Twitter in the morning, I get tons of work done in those early hours of the morning. 

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I have been since training myself to do my most important and difficult work first thing in the morning. I know about this concept since I was in college, but I am really beginning to get success in implementing it only now.

Just knowing something barely ever helps us to benefit from that knowledge. Practicing what you know, when it goes against your existing habits and patterns, is quite hard. 

Anyway, understanding that mornings are a great time for me to do the most cerebral tasks has led me to do most of my writing work in the morning. I also do the planning, strategizing and reading in the morning. I meditate the first thing when I wake up. I also work out in the morning. 

On the best days, even before its time for me to get to the office, I have already got some serious work done! Tim Ferriss wrote in this bestseller the 4 Hour Work Week the importance of doing a very important task every day before 11 am in the morning.

If you could do only one thing in a day, what would that be?

Well, do it before 11 am in the morning. That is his topmost productivity advice. 

If there is one person who had the single biggest impact on the world of finance or Wall Street, it was Mike Milken. He was called the junk bond king, a formidable power in corporate America who rewrote the rules of engagement and caused many upheavals. There are several Hollywood movies that have been made about his exploits, or around characters that loosely resembled Mike Milken. Laws had to be written to rein in the destructive power he unleashed on USA Inc. He went to jail at a point for some securities fraud, but irrespective of that, nobody denies his impact and the titanic dimensions of what he built.

What were his work habits? Quite peculiar. Mike Milken, the topmost executive of an investment bank that he built from a non-descript unknown organization to the biggest one on wall street of the time, went to work at 4 am in the morning. By the time his colleagues will begin to stream into the office, he was done with half the day’s work!

Steve Jobs woke up like clockwork every morning at 6 am, and began his work by 630 am, no matter where he worked – Apple, Pixar or NeXT. He arrived at the office usually by 8 or 9 in the morning, but by that time he already had one or two hours of work done!

However, most of us have a lot that we can improve about our mornings. 

One thing that is very important is to start the day strong, ideally with meditation or a brief work out. I also love to read or write in the morning and set my brain on fire with the most exciting ideas. 

The biggest setback I face is sleeping late. The days on which I do not sleep within a reasonable time are the ones that lead to unproductive mornings. I recognize that it is worth spending some late nights socializing with my closest friends whose company I love, but I also need to keep on check how often I do it.

I know exactly what impact late nights have on my productivity on the following day. I simply can’t afford it.

Way too many people complain that they cannot do the most important work of their life, things that would lead to real progress because they do not have enough time. If you are one of those people, do look at how you spend your mornings. You may discover something interesting there.

Want a course that you can spend 1 hour every morning on, and tremendously grow yourself as a powerful lawyer? Check out these courses in which we are taking enrollments:

DIPLOMA

Diploma in Intellectual Property, Media and Entertainment Laws

Diploma in Advanced Contract Drafting, Negotiation and Dispute Resolution

Diploma in Cyber Law, Fintech Regulations and Technology Contracts

EXECUTIVE CERTIFICATE COURSES

Certificate Course in Labour, Employment and Industrial Laws for HR Managers

Certificate Course in Capital Markets, Securities Laws, Insider Trading and SEBI Litigation

Certificate Course in Media and Entertainment Law: Contracts, Licensing and Regulations

Certificate Course in Prevention of Sexual Harassment at the Workplace

Students of Lawsikho courses regularly produce writing assignments and work on practical exercises as a part of their coursework and develop themselves in real-life practical skill.