Don’t plan your life from scratch

Routines that work, hour by hour, from famous people and the community. Copy one, make it yours, share your own.

Agendolo: Adopt a routine that already works

Don’t plan your life from scratch

Routines that work, hour by hour, from famous people and the community. Copy one, make it yours, share your own.

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Arthur C. Brooks's Daily Routine

Do your best work before lunch. Arthur C. Brooks's morning routine fits the gym, Mass and 4 hours of writing in before noon.

AgendoloOct 22

Ali Abdaal's Daily Routine

Protect your mornings and share your meals. Ali Abdaal's daily routine puts 4 hours of deep work before a 2-hour lunch.

AgendoloOct 22

Michael Sliwinski's Weekly Routine

Give every weekday one job and guard 2 hours of it. Michael Sliwinski runs Nozbe from home with a theme for each day and deep work at 11:00 AM.

AgendoloOct 22

Gene's Power Schedule

For those ready to do meaningful deep work, focus on one project, stay fit, and make time for family.

Gene KamenezOct 13

Eliud Kipchoge's Daily Routine

Get faster by running easier. Eliud Kipchoge's training week is mostly easy runs, a daily nap and lights out by 9:00 PM.

AgendoloOct 1

Anthony Trollope's Daily Routine

Write a novel around a full-time job. Anthony Trollope wrote 47 of them before breakfast, at 250 words every 15 minutes.

AgendoloSep 29

Barack Obama's Daily Routine

Keep a few quiet hours for your hardest thinking. Barack Obama's daily routine: family dinner at 6:30 PM, then 4 to 5 hours alone.

AgendoloSep 29

Casey Neistat's Daily Routine

Finish something every day, not someday. Casey Neistat's daily routine in 2015 had one deadline: a new vlog posted at 8:00 AM.

AgendoloSep 29

Georgia O'Keeffe's Daily Routine

Start slowly and finish work early. Georgia O'Keeffe's daily routine: a half-hour walk before breakfast and supper at 4:30 PM.

AgendoloSep 29

Hayao Miyazaki's Daily Routine

Decide your start time once and never again. Hayao Miyazaki's daily routine in 2013: at the studio at 11:00 AM sharp, six days a week.

AgendoloSep 29

Jane Austen's Daily Routine

For anyone making things in a busy shared home. Jane Austen wrote in the family sitting room, after making breakfast at 9:00 AM.

AgendoloSep 29

Katie Ledecky's Daily Routine

Build a fitness habit that survives a busy life. Katie Ledecky's training schedule barely changes: up at 5:00 AM, a nap between swims.

AgendoloSep 29

Kazuo Ishiguro's Daily Routine

Finish a first draft by clearing a month. Kazuo Ishiguro wrote most of The Remains of the Day in a 4-week sprint called the Crash.

AgendoloSep 29

Mahatma Gandhi's Daily Routine

For anyone whose day fills up before their own work starts. Mahatma Gandhi's writing routine began at 4:00 AM, with silence every Monday.

AgendoloSep 29

Mark Wahlberg's Daily Routine

Fit training and family dinner into one day. Mark Wahlberg's 2018 schedule held 2 workouts, golf and dinner with his family.

AgendoloSep 29

Octavia E. Butler's Daily Routine

Set a daily minimum that doesn't depend on motivation. Octavia E. Butler's writing routine: at least 4 hours of writing before her day job.

AgendoloSep 29

Oprah Winfrey's Daily Routine

For a heavy workload and a calmer day. Oprah Winfrey's daily routine: movement, a meditation at 8:00 AM, a gratitude journal at bedtime.

AgendoloSep 29

Queen Elizabeth II's Daily Routine

For anyone who wants a week that holds steady. Queen Elizabeth II's daily routine: a piper at 9:00 AM, the Prime Minister on Wednesdays.

AgendoloSep 29

Simone Biles's Daily Routine

For hard workers who forget to rest. Simone Biles trained about 7 hours a day for Tokyo, with a nap and every Sunday off.

AgendoloSep 29

Simone de Beauvoir's Daily Routine

Work 7 hours a day and still see your friends. Simone de Beauvoir's writing routine: two shifts with a long social break between.

AgendoloSep 29

Toni Morrison's Daily Routine

For parents with a full-time job and a book in them. Toni Morrison's writing routine began at 4:00 AM, before her children woke.

AgendoloSep 29

Ursula K. Le Guin's Daily Routine

Write all morning and keep the afternoon. Ursula K. Le Guin's writing routine: from 7:15 AM, then reading, music and an early night.

AgendoloSep 29

Winston Churchill's Daily Routine

Get two working days out of one, with a nap in the middle. Winston Churchill's daily routine: sleep from 3:00 PM, then work after dinner.

AgendoloSep 29

Kurt Vonnegut's Daily Routine

Get your 4 hours of writing in before lunch, not after work. Kurt Vonnegut's writing routine in 1965 started at 5:30 AM.

AgendoloSep 29

Albert Einstein's Daily Routine

For productive days with no breathing room. Albert Einstein's daily routine at Princeton: a walk to work at 10:30 AM, then a lunch nap.

AgendoloSep 29

Alexander Graham Bell's Daily Routine

End the day on a question, not an answer. Alexander Graham Bell's daily routine: night work from 9:30 PM, then a problem set in his mind before sleep.

AgendoloSep 29

Andrej Karpathy's Daily Routine

For builders who could keep going all night. Andrej Karpathy works from about 9:00 AM, Monday to Friday, and keeps weekends off.

AgendoloSep 29

Andy Grove's Daily Routine

Audit your day before you fix it. Andy Grove logged one working day, meeting by meeting, in High Output Management, down to a 3-hour staff meeting.

AgendoloSep 29

Brian Armstrong's Daily Routine

Build a side project without quitting your job. Brian Armstrong built Coinbase around a day job, 3 or 4 nights a week from 8:00 PM.

AgendoloSep 29

Brian Chesky's Daily Routine

For people whose best ideas arrive after dinner. Brian Chesky's daily routine: no meetings before 10:00 AM and late evenings for thinking.

AgendoloSep 29

Bryan Johnson's Daily Routine

Go to bed early and the morning becomes yours. Bryan Johnson's daily routine: asleep by 8:30 PM, his health work done before the workday.

AgendoloSep 29

Cal Newport's Daily Routine

For anyone who ends the day busy but behind. Cal Newport plans every minute of his workday and stops at 5:30 PM.

AgendoloSep 29

Daniel Ek's Daily Routine

Spend your first hours thinking, not reacting. Daniel Ek's daily routine: family, a workout and a walk before work starts at 10:30 AM.

AgendoloSep 29

David Heinemeier Hansson's Daily Routine

Do great work in a 40-hour week and sleep in. David Heinemeier Hansson's daily routine: no alarm, and work from 11:00 AM.

AgendoloSep 29

Demis Hassabis's Daily Routine

Have dinner at home and still get quiet hours for hard problems. Demis Hassabis's daily routine: a second workday starting at 10:00 PM.

AgendoloSep 29

Isaac Newton's Daily Routine

Hold one hard problem in mind as long as it takes. Isaac Newton's daily routine was almost all work, plus 6 weeks at the furnace twice a year.

AgendoloSep 29

Jack Dorsey's Daily Routine

Give each weekday one kind of work. Jack Dorsey gave every weekday a theme, from management Monday to company culture Friday.

AgendoloSep 29

Jason Fried's Daily Routine

For people who never quite reach the life after work. Jason Fried splits his day 8 hours for work, 8 for sleep and 8 for himself.

AgendoloSep 29

Jeff Bezos's Daily Routine

Make your hardest calls while you're sharpest. Jeff Bezos's morning routine: no meetings before 10:00 AM and 3 good decisions a day.

AgendoloSep 29

Lex Fridman's Daily Routine

Put hard thinking first and exercise in the middle. Lex Fridman's daily routine runs in a fixed order, with two 4-hour deep work blocks.

AgendoloSep 29

Mark Cuban's Daily Routine

Cut the meetings and make time to play. Mark Cuban's daily routine runs on email, with an hour of basketball every morning.

AgendoloSep 29

Nikola Tesla's Daily Routine

For long working days that need one fixed point. Nikola Tesla dined at 8:00 PM sharp in 1896, with a stack of 18 napkins.

AgendoloSep 29

Paul Erdős's Daily Routine

Give one subject your best 3 hours. Paul Erdős's daily routine was built around mathematics, with some 1,500 papers to show for it.

AgendoloSep 29

Paul Graham's Daily Routine

Group your meetings and give the making one long stretch. Paul Graham's 2009 essay on the maker's schedule came from a day split at dinner.

AgendoloSep 29

Steve Jobs's Daily Routine

Anchor a long week on a few fixed meetings. Steve Jobs's daily routine at Apple: an executive meeting at 9:00 AM every Monday.

AgendoloSep 29

Thomas Edison's Daily Routine

Keep learning after a full day's work. Thomas Edison's daily routine in 1901: a day at the lab, then 4 evening hours of study.

AgendoloSep 29

Tim Cook's Daily Routine

Own your first 2 hours before the meetings start. Tim Cook's daily routine: up before 5:00 AM for email and sales data, then the gym.

AgendoloSep 29

Benjamin Franklin's Daily Routine

For people whose days drift, start with one question. Benjamin Franklin's schedule opens at 5:00 AM by asking what good he'll do.

AgendoloSep 28

Charles Darwin's Daily Routine

Get great work out of about 3 hours a day. Charles Darwin's daily routine: two focused sittings from 8:00 AM, with walks and a nap.

AgendoloSep 28

Charles Dickens's Daily Routine

Think the story over on foot. Charles Dickens's writing routine: 2,000 words by 2:00 PM, then a three-hour walk.

AgendoloSep 28

Flannery O'Connor's Daily Routine

Make 3 focused hours a day enough. Flannery O'Connor's writing routine started at 9:00 AM and left the afternoon for rest and her peacocks.

AgendoloSep 28

Franz Kafka's Daily Routine

For anyone writing around a full-time job. Franz Kafka's writing routine: a long sleep after work, then writing from 11:00 PM.

AgendoloSep 28

Gustave Flaubert's Daily Routine

Keep life orderly so the work can be bold. Gustave Flaubert woke at 10:00 AM and wrote at a round table, afternoon and night.

AgendoloSep 28

Haruki Murakami's Daily Routine

Finish the big project by repeating one day. Haruki Murakami's writing routine: up at 4:00 AM, the same day for 6 months to a year.

AgendoloSep 28

Honoré de Balzac's Daily Routine

Write in the quiet while everyone else sleeps. Honoré de Balzac's writing routine began at 1:00 AM and produced some 90 novels, stories and essays.

AgendoloSep 28

Immanuel Kant's Daily Routine

Guard an hour of thinking before the workday starts. Immanuel Kant's daily routine: wake at 5:00 AM, think and write, then lecture all morning.

AgendoloSep 28

John Milton's Daily Routine

For minds that compose best before dawn. Blind, John Milton built Paradise Lost in his head from 4:00 AM, then dictated it to an aide.

AgendoloSep 28

Kingsley Amis's Daily Routine

Write well without an early start. Kingsley Amis's writing routine: 2 sittings from 9:30 AM, with a pub lunch and a nap between them.

AgendoloSep 28

Le Corbusier's Daily Routine

For anyone crowded out by other people's requests. Le Corbusier painted alone every morning and reached his atelier at 2:00 PM.

AgendoloSep 28

Ludwig van Beethoven's Daily Routine

Finish your creative work before mid-afternoon. Ludwig van Beethoven's daily routine: 60 beans to every cup of coffee, then composing until 2:30 PM.

AgendoloSep 28

Maya Angelou's Daily Routine

Write somewhere that isn't home. Maya Angelou's writing routine: a bare hotel room by 7:00 AM, with a dictionary, a Bible and a deck of cards.

AgendoloSep 28

Pablo Picasso's Daily Routine

Work with a night owl's clock, not against it. Pablo Picasso shut himself in his studio from 2:00 PM and painted on into the small hours.

AgendoloSep 28

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's Daily Routine

Get your best ideas on a walk, not at the desk. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's daily routine: a 2-hour walk, never cut short by even 5 minutes.

AgendoloSep 28

Richard Strauss's Daily Routine

Ease back into work after burnout. Richard Strauss's daily routine on his 1892 rest cure: 4 hours of composing and a 10-hour night.

AgendoloSep 28

Sigmund Freud's Daily Routine

For people whose days belong to other people. Sigmund Freud's daily routine saved his own writing for after 10:30 PM.

AgendoloSep 28

Thomas Mann's Daily Routine

For anyone whose best thinking comes before the inbox. Thomas Mann's writing routine: 3 hours behind a closed door from 9:00 AM.

AgendoloSep 28

Victor Hugo's Daily Routine

Do your hardest thinking before lunch. Victor Hugo's writing routine ended at 11:00 AM with icy water poured over himself on the roof.

AgendoloSep 28

Vladimir Nabokov's Daily Routine

Spread your writing across a long, unhurried day. Vladimir Nabokov's writing routine: 3 blocks, 2 walks and Scrabble in Cyrillic.

AgendoloSep 28

Voltaire's Daily Routine

Get words down by talking, not typing. Voltaire's writing routine: dictating to a secretary from bed and not dressing until noon.

AgendoloSep 28

W.H. Auden's Daily Routine

For early thinkers who want a hard stop. W.H. Auden's writing routine gave his sharpest morning hours to work and ended at 6:30 PM sharp.

AgendoloSep 28

William Styron's Daily Routine

For people whose minds wake late. William Styron's writing routine: 4 hours from 4:00 PM, until 200 or 300 words were done.

AgendoloSep 28

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Daily Routine

Make room for your own work at both ends of a job. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart composed before teaching and again at night, often until 1:00 AM.

AgendoloSep 28