How Making Your Bed Can Change Your Life
Make your bed.
Yes, we know you’re not basic—and you may already make your bed every day, as automatically as flossing. But these endless hours of confinement have us recalibrating toward smaller achievements—even the ones that should be table stakes, like the triumph of a successful grocery run (cues Rocky theme and pumps fists in the air). One of our favorite celebrations of small things is Admiral Bill McRaven’s Make Your Bed: Little Things That Can Change Your Life...And Maybe the World. We asked him why now, more than ever, we should start our days with simple wins.
A made bed anchors
In times of crisis or stress, it’s important to have something that anchors you, that gives you some small sense of control in your life. When I was in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan, I woke every morning knowing that the day would be filled with seemingly intractable challenges, with events on a trajectory I couldn’t control. But, as difficult as the times were, when I got out of bed, I would go to the gym, come back to my tiny little “hooch” and immediately make my bed. The act of making the bed was the first task of the day and it gave me a small sense of pride. The room looked clean and tidy. It made my mind feel “neat and organized,” my morale was better and I knew no matter how difficult the day turned out to be, I would return to a bed that was made—and that was reassuring.
One evolution at a time
This is one of our important sayings in SEAL training. We start off as “Tadpoles” hoping to evolve into “Frogmen” (the nickname for the precursor to the SEALs). The saying is meant to convey that you have to take each event of the day and do your best—then move on to the next one, and the next, and the next. Then at the end of the day, you will have completed the training. If you look too far in the future, the thought of the long days, weeks and months will crush your spirit and make it difficult to get through training (or, say, quarantine). So be content with each small accomplishment. Do every task well, then move on to the next. You will find by the end of the quarantine that you have accomplished a lot and done it all well.
Routines are essential
It matters little what your actual routine is—just that you have a constructive one (get up, get dressed, get clean, get moving). Schedule time for learning, for work, for family, for fun, for health. Routines give life structure. Varying your routine is helpful, too (as long as the variation doesn’t involve doing nothing).
