Morning Routines of Notary Leaders
If you have been a reader of my blog posts for any length of time, you have probably noticed that I am a big fan of morning routines. I have been an on and off again practitioner of Hal Elrod’s Miracle Morning. The Miracle Morning is a book, and it's about Hal’s journey to health and happiness by taking control of the time he had control of, his mornings. He has now written dozens of Miracle Morning books for many different types of people and careers. One of my favorites is The Miracle Morning for Entrepreneurs. Clearly, as an entrepreneur, I find it speaks directly to me and my purpose. Click here to learn more about Hal Elrod and His Books.
Today I want to talk about morning routines again. This time, however, I want to give you a glimpse into the morning routines and practices of some of the most influential leaders of our Notary industry. I am going to feature three people. Three people I love and who I give a massive amount of credit for where I am today in my Notary career. You will recognize their names if you’ve been here for even a minute. Bill Soroka, Laura Biewer, and Jen Neitzel.
These three Notary titans have their own platforms for training and developing notaries, but together, they form the co-founding team of NBB, Notary Business Builders. We will get into NBB a little later in this blog, but I would like to start with Bill Soroka and his morning routine.
Bill Soroka, NotaryCoach.com
Bill Soroka is the owner of NotaryCoach.com and Sign and Thrive Notary training platform, a book of the same name, and so much more. I was curious about what his morning routine currently looks like. He has been churning out books, content, training courses, and so much more, some things that I am not allowed to share at the time, and I wonder if he has had to make adjustments from the standard Miracle Morning routine. Boy, I was not disappointed. Reading his morning routine that he graciously emailed me immediately made me want to re-evaluate my own. So, let's take a look at Bill Soroka’s current Morning Routine.
Bills' current morning routine is inspired by Hal Elrod's Miracle Morning, Robin Sharma's The 5 am Club, and many more.
The night before, he makes sure he has a large canister of water next to the bed, and he reviews his schedule, putting his mind at ease that he knows what is coming.
Wake up between 4 am-6 am, depending on when he goes to bed. He aims for between 7-10 hours of sleep.
First, what Bill doesn't do in the morning:
No phone for the first two hours eliminates social media and text messages.
Absolutely no email for the first productive hours of the morning.
No news.
Bills Morning Routine- Bills Words:
Shower immediately. It's even better than a cup of coffee for me.
Put shoes on. This one act keeps me more active, and I walk a lot more.
Read something inspirational. I usually read the Motivation Manifesto by Brendan Burchard, The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle, The Practice by Seth Godin, or one of the
Stoicism books by Ryan Holiday. Or, it could be a personal development book I'm into. Right now, it's Joe Polish's “What in It For Them.”
Walk the dogs (it doesn't matter how long the walk is, as long as my heart rate gets up), row, or ride a stationary bike.
Write out/journal my Daily Affirmation Statement. This exercise is becoming more and more powerful in keeping me focused on what's important AND keeping me motivated on days when motivation doesn't wake up with me.
With that exercise usually come ideas and clarity of the next steps, so I map out my day, handwriting each appointment into my Full Focus Planner (from the Google calendar) and setting the day's Top Three priorities.
I jump into my most creative work first and eliminate distractions as much as possible.
Every 50 minutes or so, I take a break.
LOTS of water consumed throughout the day (top priority, and I never leave home without it).
Three cups of black coffee each morning, but no food until 11 or 12. Food is high in protein, usually scrambled eggs and cheese.
Followed by a daily Athletic Greens drink.
Ok, now, if you don’t feel as inspired as I do by reading his morning and evening routines, I am unsure what to say. When I read his email, I started thinking about my phone usage in the morning. I already don’t watch the news in the morning, but the phone… that is going to be something I think about seriously.
Now seeing Bill’s morning routine didn’t surprise me, as I know him pretty well, and I am aware of the authors he enjoys and also some of the struggles he's encountered. Reading his list looks like the morning routine of a creative, thoughtful, engaging, and powerful writer and leader. Good thing because that is what he is.
Laura Biewer- Coach Me Laura
Ok, let's look at Laura Biewer’s morning routine. Laura is the owner of At Your Service Mobile Notary and Coach Me Laura- a notary training platform. Among the many other things Laura Biewer is, she is now a new yet, best-selling co-author with Bill Soroka of the industry-rocking book, “Beyond Loan Signings.” I am not going to talk too much about that book here, as a full book review is coming in the next few weeks. Needless to say, Laura is a Notary Industry Titan, and how she spends her mornings might teach all of us a few things.
Laura’s Morning From Laura:
My morning routine includes getting up at least an hour to 90 minutes before my husband to have quiet time to read inspirational material, think and/or write happy thoughts and gratitude, thank you cards, and have coffee or tea. I check the calendar for what is coming and check emails for follow-ups. I then have breakfast and engage in physical movement!
Creating Classes:
I am most creative, so early mornings, say 5 am, are good times to research, outline, and write classes.
Books I like to read a chapter in the morning are:
“Boldly Going on your inner voyage”-by Mark Haskett,
“Intentional Living and Today Matters”-by John C Maxwell
“Keys to Success”- by Napoleon Hill
I really love Laura’s morning routine. I appreciate the efforts to take time when the house is quiet to focus on yourself and what you want to do as much as what you need to do. Knowing how busy Laura is, I often wondered when she had the time to create content for classes, many or most of which are being taught within the walls of Notary Business Builders.
If you notice, you should see some repeating factors in Bill’s and Laura’s morning routines.
Waking up early
Reading
Writing
Moving
If you interviewed the most successful people in the world, many of them would have these steps or actions as a part of their morning routines. Let's hop on over to take a look at Jennifer Neitzels morning routine.
Jennifer Neitzel, Signing Agent Marketing
As said before, Jen Neitzel owns Signing Agent Marketing and is a co-founder of NBB, Notary Business Builders. Jen provides some of the most powerful content and class for NBB and her Signing Agent Marketing Members. She specializes in marketing and teaching notaries around the country how to market their notary businesses—knowing that Jen is a mom and wife and wearing the varied hats she wears as a business owner and co-founder, I imagine there are some nuggets in her morning routine as well.
Jen’s PM Routine:
I go to bed early because I’m one of those people who require a lot of sleep. 8 hours isn’t enough for this girl! I usually wind down by 9:30 pm, and my morning alarm is set for 7 am. I use the bird chirping alarm, so I feel like Cinderella when I wake up in the morning!
Jen’s Morning Routine:
7:15 am to 8:00 am: After brushing my teeth and drinking a glass of water to rehydrate my body, I get into my walking clothes and either head out for a 30-45 minute walk in my neighborhood or, if it’s really hot, raining, or too cold, I go to the gym. I do not enjoy sweating, and walking in the Texas heat makes me feel like a sweat sprinkler with the hose turned on high. My gym membership keeps me from making excuses about the weather. Exercise has become a top priority since the last year of health issues, and I am finding it easier to do every day! I spend this time listening to an inspirational podcast (usually Mel Robbins or Jay Shetty - his voice is so soothing). I don’t engage with my phone for anything except a podcast first thing in the morning.
8:15: I come home from the walk/gym and make breakfast. I’m usually starving at this point, so it’s something quick like a half avocado with two scrambled eggs with whatever leftover veggies or meat we have in the fridge from the night before. I’m in my tea era and will have hot green tea with breakfast. I only drink coffee now when I need to get my brain to focus (usually in the afternoon).
8:45: I meditate for 15 minutes before I get in the shower and start my day. This is the time that I use to say my daily affirmations. The current one I stole from Bill is, “The universe is unfolding in my favor.” I say this to myself as I work to get to a quiet space for meditation. My brain has difficulty being quiet, and the affirmation helps me to get to that quiet place necessary for meditation. I also say my affirmation of choice to myself throughout the day.
9:00: I shower and get ready for YES!
9:45: I am at my desk preparing for a call or working on my business.
I am so grateful that these amazing leaders in our Notary industry were willing to share their morning routines with us. Now that we have seen all three, there are definitely similarities. I love seeing that all three of them practice some sort of morning meditation and use affirmations. That might seem very hooey to you, but the truth is, it's a scientific fact that implementing these steps into your day has a serious impact and benefit starting from day one, but after continued practice, you can see big changes in the way you think, feel, and even respond to stress.
Jen mentioned she struggles to quiet her mind; I struggle with the same thing- and having one affirmation to repeat over and over again to get your mind into a place where you can control it is a brilliant way to supersede the difficulty of finding that mentally quiet space.
I want to share with you Hal Elrod's morning routine recipe. I still encourage you to buy the book and read the whole thing, but to get you started, here is the recipe:
Silence- Take 1-5 minutes or more to be silent, pray, and meditate, but do it in silence
Affirmation- Check out this article from Hal regarding affirmations. Click here for the article.
Visualization- This article from Better Up does a great job of showing you how to hone your practice of Visualization. Click here for the Better Up article.
Exercise: This can be your morning workout- for me, it's my daily yoga practice; my husband and son use it to stretch before their main workout.
Read: Self-explanatory. Read ten pages or one chapter during this time.
Scribe ( write)- This is a great opportunity to start a journaling practice. I use the 15-minute journal that focuses on gratitude. You can get that journal here.
Hal Elrod developed this routine after interviewing a large number of the most successful people in the world. All of them did at least one of the six savers. Hal put them all together.
Let's talk about NBB- Notary Business Builders. It's the largest community of notaries, trainers, coaches, and courses to ever exist in our industry. I have heard an NBB member refer to it as a Notary university, and I would agree with that example. It's also an immensely tight-knit family that has so much more room for you. There is a membership special; you get NBB and all that encompasses for $58 per month. If you want to hear more about NBB, check out the video clip from my interview with Bill Soroka below. To learn even more about NBB, click here.
NBB portion of Bill and Jen Cooper Interview. See the Full Interview here.
I hope you found this peek behind the curtain of our amazing Notary leaders not so secret, secret to their productive and successful careers. I would love to hear your thoughts on these three routines and possibly your favorite morning routines. I will share mine someday, but today I wanted to highlight these amazing people for you and me to learn from.
Until next time
Jennifer K. Cooper- JKC Mobile Notary
