I’ve made it no secret that one of the reasons I get up early during the week is because I’ve got an awesome running partner. Knowing that there is someone else to workout with makes it much easier to get up and get moving. The days that we don’t run have included a lot of sleeping a little longer on my part. Today was not one of those days.

One of our learning sessions today was an awesome speaker and writer, Jocko Willink. He’s written two of my favorite leadership books Extreme Ownership and The Dichotomy of Leadership. The books are great, but his speaking and presentation skills are better.

Following Jocko on Twitter is a way to see how discipline is done. Each morning he takes a picture of his watch at an early hour as he’s about to hit his workout. Seeing as I would be seeing Jocko on live stream later in the day it only seemed fitting to get up and moving early. Taking a cue from him I took this picture before I got out of bed and got moving:

Instead of rolling over and going back to sleep I got up. I made the bed. I brought my bike and bike trainer upstairs and proceeded to knock out an hour of exercise on it.

That little extra swagger gave me a little more confidence throughout the day. The extra workout got my blood pumping and my brain going. It really helped me set the tone for most of my day.

Jocko’s presentation was outstanding and he gave us a handful of very useful leadership & self-leadership tips to help us all improve our performance at work and in life. One of the points that stuck the most is one that I’d already tested this morning… Discipline equals freedom. Be disciplined in what we do and we have the freedom to more.

I’m grateful for the extra motivation to get up and moving early today, I just might do it again sometime 😉

Thanks!!!