5 Daily Rituals to Adopt if You Want to Reach Your Full Potential

Remember all those resolutions your friends made earlier in the year? Most of them have failed by now.

The truth is, there is no point in making "resolutions" to reach success -- focusing on creating daily rituals that will empower you is a much better plan of action.

Our lives are based on what we repeatedly do. Everything we do during the course of the day is a ritual, sometimes without us consciously choosing it to be.

Start implementing the five daily rituals below now to dramatically improve your life. 

Practice Gratitude

Zig Ziglar said it best, “Gratitude is the healthiest of all human emotions. The more you express gratitude for what you have, the more likely you will have even more to express gratitude for.”

We all get busy, there is always another goal to achieve or fire to put out at work or at home. Being constantly on the go makes it easy to lose sight of what you are grateful for on a daily basis. While goal-setting is crucial for long-term happiness, you should also practice gratitude on a daily basis to appreciate what you already have accomplished.

Whether you start this daily ritual first thing in the morning or do it as the last thing of your day before bed, remember how much you have to be grateful for. You can do this one by writing in a journal, letting others know in person, or just thinking about it in your head.

Wake Up Early

We all have the same 24 hours each day, yet some people are ultra-successful billionaires while others are simply getting by. Why is that?

As you begin to study top CEOs, athletes, and other successful people, it becomes obvious that one of the biggest reasons behind their success is that they wake up earlier than most people are willing to. Regardless of profession, people like Richard Branson, Tim Cook, and Howard Schultz are all up by 5:30 a.m., if not earlier.

RELATED: What 8 of the World’s Most Successful People Eat for Breakfast

By creating the discipline to wake up early, you will already be ahead of the majority of the population by giving yourself two more hours in each day. Spend that time on yourself and focus on your toughest problems. Whether it’s reading, exercising, or working towards your goals focus on yourself. Remember, if you win the morning, you will almost always win the day.

Meditate Early in the Morning

Meditation seems to be a recent trend as studios, classes, and online courses are popping up everywhere, but this practice has been around for centuries.

A daily meditation practice can help lower stress, increase happiness, reduce anger, and help you develop an attitude of gratitude. Meditating in the morning is a great way to start your day, as it will reset your mind and body before the eventual chaos of our everyday lives sweeps in. 

Meditation will also help you become more mindful of your thoughts, deal with tough situations better, and start your day on a positive note. Here are five tips for starting off right in your meditation practice.

Read Often

It’s no secret that the most successful people in the world are voracious readers. When Bill Gates and Warren Buffett were once asked about which superpower they would choose if they could have any superpower in the world, they both said the same thing: speed reading. 

Of all the superpowers these billionaires could have chosen they went with reading as it has been instrumental in their massive successes. Bill Gates reads a book a week and Warren Buffett reads nearly five hours per day.

While not all of us have that much time, reading should be a major priority in 2018. With so much negativity and junk on social media, reading is a much better use of your time. Aim to read a little bit each day by starting with 15-20 minutes before work. Another great option is to listen to audiobooks on your daily commute.

As legendary success coach Tony Robbins said, “Leaders are readers.”

Do Something Scary

Most of us like to avoid embarrassment, rejection, and failure. Your brain wants to help you avoid these situations as they can be uncomfortable and scary.

But if you always live in your comfort zone, you will never truly experience life or reach your full potential.

Instead of being scared of rejection or failure, start going outside your comfort zone and watch your life start to change. Most likely, these three things will happen:

1. 1. You will grow, learn, and adapt faster than ever

1. 1. New memories and experiences will be created

1. Watch your confidence soar to new heights

The more often you do something that scares you, the more it will begin to shape who you are as a person. No longer will you be afraid of saying hi to a stranger, signing up for a half marathon or speaking up in a meeting.

Identify something that scares you, and do it as soon as you can. Instead of running in the other direction, face your fears on a daily basis until you become fearless.  

These five daily rituals aren’t anything new, but they are so simple it’s easy to overlook them. The best part is that most of them can be done in 15 minutes or less. If you start each day like this, you will welcome new experiences in your life, appreciate more of what you have, and gain tremendous amounts of confidence.

Make 2018 the year that defines your life forever by incorporating these into your routine. I promise you’ll never need to make another resolution again.