Create Your Ideal Day Protocol

Everyone would like to feel better, live better, and perform better, but very few ever take the time to define how to make that happen. They wake up and hope the day goes well. They hope their habits show up. They hope the important things get done.

As the saying goes, hope is not a strategy.

If you want to feel and perform at your best, you need clarity and a plan. You need to decide and document what a great day looks like for you. Exactly what will you do to make it a great day? In Happiful, we call that your Ideal Day Protocol.

Your Ideal Day Protocol is the blueprint for your best days. It spells out your morning routine, the habits that matter most, how you move your body, what you eat and drink, how you strengthen your relationships, how you wind down, and how you close out your day. 

Once you create it, you no longer try to work from memory or good intentions. Instead, you work from a simple checklist that reflects the actions you want to take, to live the life you want to live.

I love checklists for ensuring that I am consistent in following any process – business or personal. Airline pilots who have flown thousands of flights still use a pre-flight checklist every single time. Surgical teams use a checklist every single time. Businesses use checklists for their key processes. Long ago, I realized in my various businesses that checklists were the key to consistent excellent performance, so I also created checklists for my personal life. I have a checklist for my daily stretching regimen, for my workout, for loading my supplements each week, for packing for a trip, and more. By far the most important is a checklist for my ideal day. I call it the Ideal Day Checklist (IDC), and it’s incredibly powerful. I print it out every weekend and follow it every single day, checking each action off as I complete it.

Depending on the day, I may not hit every single one of the 39 items on my IDC (especially when on vacation). But the closer I get to completing them all, the better I feel, the more I get done, and the more I live as the person I want to be. BTW, I don’t put everything I do each day on my IDC. For example, I don’t need to include shower, brush teeth, vacuum cat litter, take supplements, etc. – those are all ingrained habits that will happen no matter what – but I include all the important actions that I might skip.

What goes into your Ideal Day?

Your Ideal Day Protocol brings together all the elements that help you thrive.

Morning Routine
Your morning routine sets your direction for the day. Mine includes movement, gratitude, meditation, reviewing my values and goals, visualization, stretching, breathwork, and a 90-minute work block. The morning routine is a keystone habit for the Happiful system.

Daily Habits
These are the behaviors you want to live by. Mine includes an exercise session, another 90-minute work block, an activity from my Happy List, reaching out to a friend, reaching out to a family member, and 30 minutes outdoors.

What You Eat and Drink
Your nutrition impacts everything in your life. So your Ideal Day Protocol outlines the nutrition habits that keep you feeling good and enhance your health, including both what and when you eat. When you capture these in writing, you reduce the likelihood of impulsive choices that make you feel worse later.

Evening Routine and Daily Shutdown
Your evening routine brings the day to a close with purpose. It prepares your mind for rest and sets up the next day for success. Mine includes my Daily Disconnect (all electronics off), cleaning up my workspace, creating my plan for the next day (filling out the Happiful Planner), and reading for personal or professional development. I don’t have my Pre-Sleep Routine on my IDC only because I put away the IDC when I end my workday, but you should definitely define your Pre-Sleep Routine, and if you put it on your IDC and check it off as you go, you’re more likely to follow it every night. 

When you combine these pieces, you create a day that supports every part of your life.

Why writing it down matters

In the Happiful system, we rely on tools that make your plans real and visible. When it is written, it becomes concrete and specific instead of vague and abstract. And when something is visible, you are far more likely to follow it.

This is why the Ideal Day Checklist is so critical. It is the form that captures your protocol and turns it into a simple, daily implementation tool. The IDC brings together your Morning Routine, Evening Routine, Weekly Routine, and your most important recurring Daily Activities, and it keeps you accountable to the actions that drive your goals.

Just as important is the Happiful Planner, which works alongside your checklist. The Planner is designed to help you create a better to-do list and guide you to several beneficial practices each day. It brings clarity to your priorities and gives you a written plan that stays in front of you all day, instead of hidden behind a screen.

Together, these two tools turn your Ideal Day Protocol into action. They ensure you live how you actually want to live. Because you read this blog, I'm making these available at a special price. Normally $49, you can get them for just $10.

Start living your Ideal Day

Your Ideal Day Protocol creates a structure that supports the life you want. It makes your best days repeatable. 

When you decide what a great day looks like, document it, and begin living by it, everything gets better. Your habits improve. Your productivity increases. Your relationships deepen. Your health gets better. You feel a greater sense of control.

You deserve to experience more days that feel like your best days. Your Ideal Day Protocol is how you create them.

Download and customize The Ideal Day Checklist for just $10

Download The Happiful Planner for just $10