Just as it’s rare for anyone to experience overnight success, it’s also rare for our lives to crumble to pieces in an instant. Most unproductive or unhealthy behaviors are the result of slow, gradual choices that add up to bad habits; a wasted morning here, an unproductive morning there.
就像很少有人能一夜成名一样，我们的生活也不太可能在顷刻间支离破碎，许多低效或不健康的行为习惯都是由这种缓慢而持续的选择叠加而成的。早上起来在这里浪费点时间，在那边拖延一阵。
The good news is that exceptional results are also the result of consistent daily choices. Nowhere is this more true than with your morning routine: the way you start your day is often the way that you finish it.
但好消息是，如果每天坚持健康正确的选择，就能产生与众不同的结果。从早晨的例行程序开始做改变最合适不过了，通常你以什么样的方式开始一天，也会以同样的方式结束这天。
What you do each morning is an indicator of how you approach your entire day. It’s the choices that we repeatedly make that determine the life we live, the health we enjoy, and the work we create. Here are the strategies that I’ve found to be most effective for getting the most out of my morning.
你每个早上的作为影响着你一整天的生活方式。你平时反复做出的选择最终会决定你的生活、健康和工作。我认为，以下这几种方法能很有效地利用好上午这段时间。
1. Manage your energy, not your time.
分配好你的精力，而非时间。
If you take a moment to think about it, you’ll probably realize that you are better at doing certain tasks at certain times. For example, my creative energy is highest in the morning, so that’s when I do my writing each day.
如果花些时间想一想，你可能会发现你在某一段时间能更好地完成某些任务。比如说，我在上午最富有创造力，所以我每天会专门在这段时间里写作。
By comparison, I block out my afternoons for interviews, phone calls, and emails. I don’t need my creative energy to be high for those tasks, so that’s the best time for me to get them done, and I tend to have my best workouts in the late afternoon or early evening, so that’s when I head to the gym.
相比之下，我会在下午做采访、打电话，回邮件。这些事情不需要太多创造力，因此把它们放在下午做会更好。我在傍晚前后更适于锻炼身体，所以选择这个时间段去健身房运动。
What type of energy do you have in the morning? What task is that energy best suited for?
你在早晨哪方面能力最强?在这段时间里做什么事情最适宜?
2. Prepare the night before.
前一天晚上做好准备。
I don’t do this nearly as often as I should, but if you only do one thing each day then spend a few minutes each night organizing your to–do list for tomorrow.
其实我应该多这样做几次才对，要是你第二天有不止一件要做，还是在头天晚上花几分钟列个清单为妙。
When I do it right, I’ll outline the article I’m going to write the next day and develop a short list of the most important items for me to accomplish. It takes 10 minutes that night and saves 3 hours the next day.
我这样做时，会列出我第二天要写文章的提纲，再记下几个需要完成的重要项目。这一晚上花10分钟，就能为第二天省下3个小时。
3. Don’t open email until noon.
中午之前不要查邮件。
Sounds simple, yet nobody does it. It took me a while to get over the urge to open my inbox, but eventually I realized that everything can wait a few hours.
听上去挺简单，但没人这样做。我要花很大力气才能抑制打开收件箱的冲动，但最终发现所有事情都可以等几个小时再处理。
Nobody is going to email you about a true emergency (a death in the family, etc.), so leave your email alone for the first few hours of each day. Use the morning to do what’s important rather than responding to what is “urgent.”
没有人会发邮件通知你紧急事件(比如说家人去世等等)，所以每天早上的几个小时还是不要查邮件了。应该利用早晨做重要的事情，而非回复那些貌似紧急的邮件。
4. Turn your phone off and leave it in another room.
把手机关掉放到另一个房间里。
Or on your colleagues desk. Or at the very least, put it somewhere that is out of sight. This eliminates the urge to check text messages, Facebook, Twitter, and so on. This simple strategy eliminates the likelihood of slipping into half–work where you waste time dividing your attention among meaningless tasks.
