EP: 174 The #1 Thing Most Successful People Do

Successful people have a few things in common. 

Don’t get me wrong, successful people work very hard. 

They’re very intentional, strategic,and sometimes extremely tired, to be honest. 

But one of the things that I have learned over the years is that successful people have one major thing in common. 

And if I could be completely honest, it took me many, many, many years to understand it, and then even more years to adopt it. 

In this article, we are talking about the number one thing that successful people do. 

Now, don’t get me wrong, successful people, they read books. 

Let’s just say successful people, they eat well. 

Successful people, exercise. Successful people go to therapy. 

But one of the major things that I have learned about successful people and what really started to turn my life and my business around is getting up early. 

That some of y’all, I just lost you because you’re just like, “Oh, I am a night owl, I’ve always been a night owl. And I’m always going to be a night owl” 

I get it.

I used to be a night owl as well, because it’s like you can get so much done at night. 

But also we all know that song “The freaks comes out at night”, that also happens at nighttime.

But anyways without talking about that. So I used to be a night owl, right? 

And you’re like, What is going on with her? No, I’m not on drugs. I think I’m just hungry. But I used to be a night owl. 

And it wasn’t until I went into entrepreneurship back in, I think it was 2016. 

I quit my job. 

And I started to try to build a successful business. 

I remember I was being coached at the time. 

And one of the things that he said was that “You’re gonna have to treat your business like a job” 

And so you’re gonna have to get up like you’re going to a job every single day. 

And you’re going to have to be consistent with it like you have a job. 

I remember being like “Is you nuts, I quit my job so that I don’t have to have a job” 

And so I was on a live stream. I was on Periscope at the time and I was trying to build my business. 

And I found myself like half of the day would be gone when I worked out. 

Now it’s like three o’clock, I’m trying to get started with work. 

And it was like I realized as the time was going on that I was actually getting lazier and lazier and lazier. 

I was watching more TV, eating more stuff I shouldn’t be eating and staying up super late and my business was not growing. 

Honestly, I think I had got to a point where I was just like, “Oh my god, the money is dwindling. The money’s going down” 

I’ve got to figure out what I’m gonna do here. 

At the same time. I was battling depression from going through a divorce. 

It’s just the truth. 

One day, I don’t know how long it took. But one day I made a decision. I said, “Okay, I am going to start treating my business like it’s a job”.

I’m gonna get up every morning, I’m gonna put my makeup on, put my clothes on, and I’m gonna get in front of this camera list. 

Don’t get me wrong, I was cute from the waist up. I can’t say that I showered every day. I can’t say I put on pants every day. But I was at least cute from the waist up. 

I was there with some effort, you know, and I would go live every morning at 8:30am. 

And I would teach and serve an audience every single morning at 8:30. 

And I would serve, serve and serve. 

And so what started happening was I started getting into this routine of building my business. 

I started having people depend on “Hey, she’s gonna be live, she’s gonna teach at this time, we’re gonna come and learn from Keenya at this time” 

And then I started being able to get people on my email list and then make sales. 

And so fast forward, I just kind of continue that like even now, you know, I wake up every morning at 5:30. 

Feed my cats, pray, read, write my journal, go to the gym. 

And then usually I am dressed and ready by like 9:30 typically every single morning. 

I’ve had these moments where I’m just like, I’m working this thing like a job. 

But I recognize that the most successful people that we all know or that we all look up to get up early. That doesn’t necessarily mean that they immediately go to work, but they get up early and they get ready for the day. 

They go exercise, get fresh air, drink their coffee, read their paper and they give themselves the day.

For me, I find myself like, I get my day before anybody is pulling on me and asking anything from me. I am getting what I need. 

And I think that if more of us would adapt to that, we will find ourselves being happier with life and more successful. 

And I don’t mean successful in terms of money. I’m talking in terms of life success. 

Just this morning, I was writing in my journal, and I had gotten to the last page in that particular journal. 

And I just said “Oh, wow, I wonder when did I start writing here” And I just started writing in there, July 11. 

So it was like three months of me writing in this particular journal. 

And as I was just thumbing through the pages, I said, look at all the feelings that I’ve had, over the last three months. 

I’ve been able to process them, I’ve been able to get them out, they’re no longer stuck on the inside of me or in my heart or in my head, because I’ve been able to get them out. 

If I was getting up at eight o’clock, I wouldn’t have the time or the space to write and get all of that stuff out of me. 

I think about all the days that I’ve cried sitting there in that spot, because I’m happy because I’m sad, because I’m afraid, whatever, just being able to have that space for that. 

Now, I don’t have any children, but I have animals. 

And it’s like, you know, one of the things I get to do early in the mornings is I have three cats, each of my cat gives like a little bit of my time. It may not be a lot.  But, I’m not rushed at that time because I’m not rushing to something. 

Now, it’s the same thing with someone who has children, you have to spend a little bit of time with each person in your life. 

But if I was getting up just in time to get dressed and whatever, I wouldn’t have any time to spend with the individuals in my life, which are my cats, you know what I’m saying?

When I think about the thought of waking up early, initially, I hated it, because it meant that I would miss out on something at night time. 

That when people are out hanging out, I gotta come in, because I gotta go to bed. 

But one of the things that I have noticed is that I’m getting much better quality of sleep. I’m finding myself taking much better care of myself. 

I didn’t have a nighttime routine to like recently, like a year, maybe. Like a year ago, now I had this regular nighttime routine that I do to just take care of myself, and I just recently ordered an aura ring, so that I can track my sleep and get an even much better quality of sleep.

Because I’m like, when I’m in my waking life, I want the best quality of life all the time. 

If this is also going to make me even more financially successful, then let’s go. I want that as well. 

I just want to share one of the things that we just keep learning from the successful people is that they all have some very similar habits. 

They eat well, they exercise, they treat themselves well, in terms of, you know, the people they have around them, the things they’re taking in, and then waking up early. 

And if you are thinking about doing this, and if you had to choose just one reason to do it, it would be to give yourself some time. 

So before anybody else pulls on you, get something from you, have a conversation with you, if anybody can do anything with you, you first do it with yourself, Does that make sense?

Like it makes me so happy when I’m able to get down to the gym before going to work. I feel good that like, you know, my ring, like my ring in terms of like my Apple Watch is like it’s gonna be done. 

By the end of the day, my body got moving or not stiff. 

I’m going towards my weight loss goals. 

And you know, just moving my body because a body in motion stays in motion. 

I just feel so happy when I’m able to do these little things for myself. 

Like if you have been considering because here we get ready to go into 2023. And we’re going to all start making New Year’s resolutions, which I do believe in. 

And if you’re thinking about creating a new habit for the new year. 

For me, I would encourage you to make it by getting up a little bit earlier. 

Yes, that is gonna mean you’re gonna go to sleep a little bit earlier, but you’re gonna watch the value of what happens when you’re up a little bit earlier and no one’s pulling on you and you get this little space for yourself. 

And if you’re gonna do that, then I would say add in journaling during that time. 

Even if you just write a couple of words in that notebook. 

I can go on and on and on about this. But if you’re going to adopt a new habit in the upcoming year for yourself, your life, your family, my encouragement is to take after successful people and adopt this habit of getting up. 

Even if it’s 30 minutes early, start with 30 minutes, and then you can go to an hour and you’re gonna watch how this is going to change your life.

If you choose to do this. I want to know. 

You can either comment here on this article, or you can let me know by just sharing this article into my DM on Instagram and say, “Hey, I listen to this episode and ABC” 

I want to know what yours is like. Listen, I’m not getting up at 5AM, 5:30 is just fine for me, but I am adopting new habits. 

One habit I’m trying to adopt is that the first thing that I do in the morning is drink a glass of water. That’s a process because I wake up hungry and ready to eat. So that’s a new habit that I’m working on adopting. 

So in 2022, I added a couple new habits. I got Invisalign, so I’m like some listed that are gonna sound kind of gross, but sometimes I’m like, I don’t feel like brushing my teeth at night. 

But listen, I brush my teeth in the morning and I floss in the morning and night. 

All right, it’s fine. Sometimes I didn’t feel like washing my face or moisturizing or putting serum or whatever on my face, so now I do the morning routine with the serum and all that and then the nighttime routine also. 

I take Communion now every single night, pray over myself and then go to bed. 

Also in 2022, I started changing how I sleep and so I got a much better pillow to sleep on. 

I turned my AC down to 63 because when it’s cold the body is able to you know do it does I got a sleep mask so that it’s like super dark when I go to bed and then I also put a tape on my mouth so that I can breathe through my nose while I’m sleeping and not breathing through my mouth and that’s keeping me from having bad breath. 

It’s causing me to not snore and I’m just getting a much better quality of sleep. 

And then I just ordered the aura ring once that comes in, then that’ll be the new habit. 

I have been trying to try the CBD gummies actually, they’re talking about, but they’re kind of weird for me. 

One of them I had a bad dream. The other one is just like, okay, maybe because I take some nerve medicine at night and may not be good with the CBD gummies but we’ll see. 

We’ll keep trying those out for a little bit. We’ll see what’s going on with those. Okay, but these are all new habits that I adopted in 2022. 

And I’ve been sticking to them because they’re working really well for me. 

So I will figure out what’s going to be my newest goal or newest habit I’m gonna adopt in 2023 and I’ll let you know. 

But for now, I want you to think about getting up a little bit earlier so you can be one of those successful people.