Morning devotion

On my morning routine

I’m Bryan Kam. I endeavour daily to make philosophy accessible and relevant. I write this newsletter, host a podcast called Clerestory, and I’m writing a book called Neither/Nor. I also host a book club, writing group, and other events in London. My work is concerned with how abstract concepts relate to embodied life, and how to use this understanding to transform experience.

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I have an odd morning routine which I’ve slowly built over the past eight years. I had a conversation with my friends Rita and Pen about morning routines this week, and for some reason I thought I’d describe what I do in writing. Possibly my last few posts have been too theoretical, so I feel the need to write something more about my experience, weird and theoretical though it is. Also, in conversation I always forget part of my routine, so here I’ll try to explain it all.

I wake up at around 6:30am, do a short guided meditation for 10-15 minutes to replace my anxious thoughts with those of someone somewhat more sane. Most of this is on Insight Timer, where I do different courses and listen to talks.¹ During the meditation, I stretch and try to sit in lotus for a little while on the living room floor, which I can only do for a few minutes at a time.

When the meditation ends, I prepare to write my morning pages. First, I roll dice to find out which verse of the Dao De Jing I’ll be reading.² Then, if I’m cold, I’ll make a hot water bottle and put it on the desk chair. Finally, I then make white tea. I turn on lights in the office, light a candle, and sometimes also put on an aroma diffuser (normally peppermint, since I read somewhere it helps memory).

Before me on the desk I have four different coloured Muji pens, including a refill for the one that’s lowest. I have a graph Rhodia No 08 pad for making todolists, and a lined medium A5 Leuchtturm note book. They’re ~250 pages, so I fill about four per year. My house is quiet, but since I like it really quiet, I put on hearing protector earmuffs, which I think are designed for mining and construction.³

Then I sit to write.

The morning pages are a practice from Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way. My friend Georgie ran a group which read this book together, in 2022, so I’ve been doing them since then. She’s running another one now, and we’re reading Week 10. The Artist’s Way is a 12-week “creative recovery” course with two primary practices: writing three pages of stream of consciousness thought every morning, and taking a two-hour solo “artist’s date,” which is something out of the ordinary to top-up creativity.

The morning pages are, for me, three Leuchtturm A5 pages of longhand stream of consciousness thoughts. The morning pages take me about 45 minutes. They change over time, but right now I have an odd rhythm. I write a line or so with my right hand, then a line or so with my left hand, then I switch back to my right for the rest of the writing. I tend to write for a page or so about yesterday.

Then I stop writing. To my left I have a stack of Taoists texts. Right now, I read from Zipyorn’s translation of the Zhuangzi — one or two passages from wherever I left off. Often I’ll re-read yesterday’s then read a bit further. Then I look up the passage of the Dao that I rolled and read it in seven different translations, for which I have physical books.⁴

I write about my understanding of what’s going on in the Dao and in the Zhuangzi, then I continue for the final two pages. Often these pages stop being about the past, and begin being about the future, but that’s not really a rule I have. I just notice that usually the first page is about the past, the second is about the present, the third is about the future, even if I don’t intend that.

After that, I make coffee. Since it’s a moka pot (stovetop “espresso”), I take off the earmuffs so I can hear when it’s boiled. During that wait, I lie on the couch and read from spiritual books with polar opposite perspectives on psychology — currently Harry Tiebout, who emphasizes humility, and Nietzsche (Zarathustra), who decidedly does not.

I re-read my past morning pages, usually from three months ago, but now (because we’re at the point in The Artist’s Way where you’re meant to go back and re-read your morning pages) I’m reading ones from January. I often put on a different aroma during this time (today basil and eucalyptus).

After all that preparation, I get the coffee, froth the milk if I’m in the mood, and then I sit down at a different desk in the living room to do my “real” work. (Except some days, like today, I stay lying down on the couch instead of working at a desktop.) That work can be writing, editing, or reading. Today, for example, I’ve gone straight into writing this piece.

Other days I go straight into reading a difficult text. Lately, that’s Luria, Vygotsky, Wittgenstein, Durkheim, Kuhn. Earlier this week, for example, I finished Thomas Kuhn’s Last Writings. It’s challenging stuff, but a work of such profound genius that it can’t really be read later in the day. If you only know Kuhn from The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, he changed his approach pretty substantially in the late 1980s and 1990s, but I haven’t yet met anyone who’s read these last writings, which were published in 2022.

On still other days, I edit. Right now I’m writing an academic paper, so yesterday morning I was editing during the work slot, which only lasts an hour or two.

What else am I reading?

A lot.

In January I decided I’d better start keeping better track, so now I’ve made a Substack page which I update as I go:

During this whole routine, I don’t look at messages or screens, except for the guided meditation, on an old phone locked down for that purpose, with no notifications on it. If I’m writing on a computer, like today, I make sure not to look at anything until the work is done.

So by the time I get online, look at my phone, check my notifications/messages, and start my dayjob, I’ve normally done the work that I consider most important for the day.

This routine may seem elaborate, but for me it’s a good way of bridging theory and practice. I do bits of it in different rooms and positions. For me, it brings together meditation, ancient philosophy and modern writers, creativity, and focused work. I like the weird contrasts and alternations of it.

What began years ago as a way of coping with anxiety and depression — the brief meditation which still starts off the routine — has really transformed my daily experience. For me it’s the practical application of the theory I’m working on in Neither/Nor. And because it’s uninterrupted, it always means that by the time I start interacting with other people, I’m grounded and have worked on what I consider my own most important contribution.

But I’m not rigid about it. When I travel, I usually have to adjust it substantially. I still do the meditation, morning pages, and read a random passage of the Tao, but most of the rest has to go. And as I’ve mentioned, it has evolved over time, so I’m always curious to hear what other people do.

What is your morning routine like? I’d love to hear from you in the comments.

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Best,

Bryan

1. I don’t always use guided meditations; after I’ve followed them for a year or so, I’ll switch back to timed unguided meditations for a year. But right now I’m doing guided.

2. I roll four three-sided dice then use a chart I made to find out which of the 81 verses I’m reading. If you want an easier way to consult a random passage of the Dao, I made one for you:

3. I feel slightly worried that this sounds like an advert, but I always like to know about other people’s tools are, so I’m just linking if you are curious. Also, I know that it’s disappointing that I don’t use a fountain pen. Yes, I have them, but I really like extra fine lines (0.38mm) and I can never seem to get fountain pens to flow perfectly if they’re that fine.

4. These are: Lau, Star, Ames/Hall, Derek Lin, Addiss/Lombardo, Feng/English, Trapp. Yes, I’m aware that Le Guin and Stephen Mitchell have also done translations.