7 Things You Should Do to Stop Having Bad Days

Have you ever heard someone say, “I had a bad day”?

Do you sometimes find yourself telling others, “Leave me alone, I’m having a bad day”?

I used to do the same before, but after having too many “bad days,” I started wondering, “Is there a way to make every day better?”

After reading many books, studying daily habits of the most successful people and after practicing these methods in my own life, I’ve came up with 7 things that can make you have a good day:

1. Wake Up on Time

You need to wake up on time every day (including weekends)! Make sure that you have enough time to eat your breakfast and to plan your day. The worst thing you can do is to start your day being in hurry and running late. If you do that your body will be under stress. If you repeat this every day, you even risk ruining your health because of too much stress every morning.

2. Write Down the 3 Most Important Tasks of the Day

The first thing you need to do in the morning is to write down the 3 most important tasks of the day. You can think about them while brushing your teeth and preparing your breakfast, but it is very important that you write them down somewhere! Keep that in mind!

For example I’m using Microsoft OneNote on my laptop or ColorNote app on my Smartphone to plan my daily tasks, but you can use whatever works for you. A piece of paper is better than nothing, but I suggest that you have at least a small notebook to make the act of writing your daily tasks more important.

3. Remove All Distractions

When you are working on your most important tasks of the day, it’s very important that you remove all distractions. For example, you can turn off email notifications, instant messaging applications and even mute your mobile phone. You need to stop routine habits like checking your Facebook, Twitter, daily news, other emails etc.

You need to be focused on your important tasks and work hard to finish them.

One of the biggest mistakes people make is to use the entire day working on tasks which are urgent, but not important! These tasks are usually urgent because they weren’t completed in a timely manner.

If you use the morning to define your 3 most important tasks of the day, the next step is to work on these tasks. Everything else can wait. Very rarely you will have some emergency which will require you to stop working on everything else.

You need to be in control of what you are doing and when you are doing it! This is why you need to make sure that you remove all possible distractions and find a good and peaceful place where you can work.

4. Don’t Procrastinate

It’s very easy to postpone some important task for later, even if it’s just until “tomorrow,” but when you do that, you are simply postponing the inevitable. You will end up making it even harder to finish since you will be rushed for time, you will constantly think about what you need to do, feeling guilty because you didn’t do it.

My most frustrating days were those when I decided to finish something important later or “tomorrow,” and then I didn’t even do that. My most fulfilling days, on the other hand, were those when I managed to finish all of my important tasks during the day, or even better, when I finished them immediately in the morning.

5. Focus on the “NOW”

I realized that my most productive and efficient days were those when I was not thinking about the past or future, but when I was focused on the present and only on the task that I was doing at that moment. Sometime in the future, the current moments will be your past, so think of every moment like an opportunity to create your future. Make sure you are doing in each moment what you know you need to do.

You have probably experienced moments when you were working but your thoughts were somewhere else. Maybe you were thinking about what you were going to eat for dinner, or you might have been thinking about your holidays or about a conversation that you had with your friend. You were focusing on these other tasks instead of focusing on what you were doing at the time. Switching focus between so many different things can cost you a lot of energy, so it would be a better idea to keep your energy and concentration on your current task so you can finish what you are doing.

You need to set aside a time in the day to do your planning. It would be best to do this first thing in the morning so that you have the rest of the day to complete any tasks you have planned.

My best days are those when I manage to do more than usual and I can do that only when I am completely focused on what I’m doing “now”.

6. Eat Healthy And Do Some Physical Exercise

“You are what you eat.” Your productivity and daily efficiency will depend a lot on what you eat. You need to drink at least 8 glasses of water every day and you need to avoid food with added sugar, deep fried food and food high in trans-fat (fast food, snack food like chips and cookies). You should also limit food high in saturated fat (like butter and product made from whole milk). You probably already know what foods you need to avoid, but it can be difficult to follow through on this because junk food can be very tasty. The good news is that you can always find healthy and tasty food.

My favorite food is salmon, Fuji apples, mango, avocado, different kind of salads, sweet potato and asparagus. You can experiment with your meals and find healthy food that you enjoy.

It’s much better that you eat smaller portions throughout day rather than one big portion at one time. You can become tired and sleepy after eating too much since your body needs to digest all that you have eaten. I always feel much better when I carefully choose what I eat.

Daily exercise is also important for having a productive day. It’s recommended to exercise at least 3 times a week, a half hour per day. If you don’t exercise at all, short walk or some 5-10 minutes exercise at home is good for the beginning. For example, I go 2 times per week to a gym and once per week I take yoga class or Zumba aerobic. On other days, I take the time to do 5-10 minutes exercise at home. If I don’t have any idea which exercise to do, I search on YouTube. You can find free videos of all different types of exercises on this site.

It’s always very hard to force myself to exercise, especially when I’m working a lot and when I feel tired. When I do exercise, I feel much better and I am always glad that I didn’t give up on exercising.

You can always find some sport/activity that you like and have fun while exercising. It will re-energize you.

7. Do a Daily Review Before Sleeping

Another thing you need to do to increase your productivity is to review all of the tasks that you’ve finished that day. Think about what you have done well and what you can do better the next day!

If you fall asleep after thinking what you can do better the next day, it’s more likely that your brain and subconscious mind will work during night to find even more ideas.

Make sure that you have enough sleep and start your next day fresh and ready for new challenges!

Review once again all the steps with this Stop Having Bad Days Infographic:

Written by Eva Lu

Eva Lu is an ex engineer who decided to give up her successful career and dedicate her life to inspire and motivate others to find the best in themselves. She founded the “Mind of a Winner” website because she strongly believes that success is a skill developed by persistent people and her passion is to motivate others to become persistent enough. Her inspiration and her mentors are self-made millionaires who helped thousands of people to change their lives and who managed to build careers with their passion and vision towards doing something what they love. She also helps young entrepreneurs with business advices and encourages them not to give up on their dreams. She teaches them how to turn dreams into clear visions and ideas, and ideas into actions and results.
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