Episode: 158
3 Small Decisions That Make You Feel Incredible: Do This Every Morning After Waking Up
a Solo Episode
Own your mornings.
Learn 3 science-backed strategies to instantly boost your energy and transform your mornings.
Three tiny decisions will instantly boost your energy as soon as you wake up. If you make them right, you OWN your mornings and start your day feeling incredible.
They will make you healthier, improve your relationships, make you more productive, and strengthen your mindset in just a few minutes.
Listen on:
Easy decisions make your life hard. Hard decisions make your life easier.
Mel Robbins
Featured Clips
Transcript
Mel Robbins (00:00):
False confidence, it's killing your mornings. I'm serious about this. False confidence is showing up in three places every single morning, and it's very sneaky by the way. And when I put a spotlight on these three sneaky moments every morning, it empowers you to make a different decision. Starting tomorrow morning, decisions that will make you feel incredible. And every single morning that you wake up these same three decisions, it's going to be there. And you know what else is going to be there? False confidence.
(00:35):
And after our conversation today, you get to decide because you're going to know the consequences of each one of these decisions. Hey, it's Mel. What if I told you the only thing standing between you and waking up tomorrow and feeling incredible is just three simple decisions? I mean, I'm talking about three decisions that are so small you don't even realize that you're cruising right by them every single morning. You're making the same mistakes I used to make. You're doing the exact opposite of what you should be doing in these three situations, and it's making you feel tired and unproductive, and it brings on the afternoon slump. It makes it harder to fall asleep at night and it impacts your mood and energy in the morning. And look, I know exactly why you keep making these same three mistakes because I used to make them two.
(01:28):
They're so small, that's why they're easy to miss. But that means these mistakes are also easy to fix with three simple decisions that will make you wake up and feel incredible. Hey, it's your friend Mel, and welcome to the Mel Robbins podcast family. I am so excited to be talking to you today about three simple decisions that will make you feel incredible. And these three decisions are so, so easy to miss, but boy, do they have a massive impact on your life. And it is easy, isn't it, to underestimate the power of a decision. If you really stop and think about it, your life is the sum of all the decisions that you make. And so I want to acknowledge your decision to listen to a podcast today that could empower you to start to feel incredible in your life. I mean, that says a lot about the kind of person that you are.
(02:25):
And in order to set up our conversation about these three simple decisions that will make you feel incredible, I just want to underscore how important. It's that you don't just listen today, but that you take action and you try what I'm about to teach you because you don't change your life by just thinking about changing it. You change your life by doing something, and that's what we're going to talk about today, the decisions that you make to do something or not. And so many times in life you'll find yourself stuck in this gap between knowing what you need to do versus doing it. Knowing isn't enough, and I can give you a bazillion examples of this.
Mel Robbins (03:15)
You can know what you need to do in order to be healthier. You know that you need to exercise, yet you don't make the decision to do it.
(03:25):
You may know that you need to work on your resume if you'd like to get a new job, yet you don't make the decision to sit down and work on it. You may know that you need to call a particular person back. It's going to be a difficult conversation. You think about it all, but you don't do it. There's this huge gap between knowing something and making the decision to do it. And one of the reasons why it can be really hard to bridge this gap is because you don't feel motivated. You don't feel motivated to exercise, you don't feel motivated to work on your resume. We're going to talk about the other reason why you can get stuck in this gap of knowing what you need to do but not doing it. And the reason why you can get so stuck is false confidence.
(04:11):
You have this false confidence about what you're capable of or how your decisions are going to impact you. And I'm going to give you an example that I know that you are going to relate to and then we're going to get down to these three decisions and how false confidence is a part of this. It happens to me all the time. In fact, false confidence just swooped in and bit me in the rear end last week. Let me tell you how it impacted my decision. So I was out in Vegas for work and I was there because I was giving a speech for Keller Williams, a big real estate company. There were 17,000 people in the audience, and after the speech and the meet and greet and all that stuff, my team and I, we went out and we had a great dinner together. We were celebrating, we were wrapping up a great week and it was an early night.
(04:55):
I love an early night. And so we all kind of piled into the Uber and we were heading back to the hotel and we were getting back to the hotel. It was only 8:45 PM I mean that's kind of amazing. I'm not one of these people that needs to close down the night in Vegas. And I also had a plan. I had been looking forward to going up to my room after dinner and I was going to run a hot bath, and then I was going to soak in the tub and the hotel that I stay in always gives you these little packets of salt. And so I can pour the salt in the tub and I can soak in the tub and it's quiet in my hotel room. There's no dogs, no family. I could just relax and then I could pack up my stuff beforehand.
(05:32):
So then I would climb into bed, I'd get a good night's sleep, and then I'd wake up early enough to be able to get a workout in and still get out the door for my 6:30 AM flight. I mean, I was so excited. But as we're heading back to the hotel in the Uber and we're cranking the tunes and the group was rocking on the high of an incredible week in Vegas and the great dinner that we had, I just didn't want the day to end. I mean, do you know how hard it is to say while you're getting out of an Uber, this is great. What a great week. I love you guys. I'm going to give you a hug right now because I got an early flight. I'm going to head upstairs and in the long run you know that saying goodnight is the best decision.
(06:19):
Why? Because it's going to make you feel incredible tomorrow morning. But then someone in the group says, as you're pulling up to the hotel and you're starting to say goodnight, what? You're not going to bed are you? Come on, we're in Vegas. Hang out a little. Let's have a nightcap. You've been in a moment like this a thousand times, haven't you? Do you stay out a little longer and hang out with your friends or do you call it a night and you get a good night's sleep? Now sitting here listening to me, you're like, oh, you got a good night's sleep. No, you don't. No, that's not the decision that you make. Come on, let's weigh the options here. You're having a great night. Do you join your friends and having a drink or smoking a joint or eating that dessert or do you say no because you've either had enough or it's just not your thing?
(07:21):
That's the decision. And the mistake that you and I make is we base the decision on how it's going to feel right now instead of making a decision based on how it impacts you in the long run. It is so easy to say, oh, you're right, I'll stay out a little bit longer. But easy decisions make your life hard. When you learn how to make a hard decision, life gets easier. And that was the exact situation I was in last week in Las Vegas. I could have easily said, you guys go have some fun. I need to go to bed. I got an early flight. I want to go take a bath. But see, here's what happened. False confidence comes swooping in. This is not about motivation. This is about false confidence. It swoops right in that moment when your emotions are all swirling around and you literally think that your decision in the moment will not impact you in the future.
(08:25):
And as I say to my friends, oh, you're right, I'll just stay out a little bit longer. What happens? Oh my God, next thing you know, it's freaking midnight. You've talked about nothing. Your flight hasn't changed. It's leaving at six 30 in the morning. You still have to pack. You haven't taken a bath. You're definitely not exercising in the morning anymore. But somehow when you said, oh, sure, I'll just stay out a little bit longer, you had this false confidence that you could somehow handle it all, that somehow time would freeze for you. Just you awesome human being, Mel Robbins and that this decision in the moment to just scrap all the plans that you had, it's not going to impact me tonight or tomorrow morning, that somehow, Mel, you're the only human being who's not going to be affected by staying up too late.
(09:14):
Of course, I was affected by this decision. I didn't take my bath. I still had to get up at 5:00 AM but this time not to exercise. I had to pack. I mean, I was racing around like a lunatic in that hotel room at 5:00 AM trying to get myself packed up so that I could catch the flight on time. I didn't feel incredible. I felt horrible. I was mad at myself. I had that feeling that I'm sure you felt before where you're exhausted and now you're on the way to the airport and you're like, why the hell did I do that to myself? I could have felt so different right now. And there's so many examples of false confidence. I mean, it's everywhere in life. And one other thing I want to underscore here is that it is so easy to see this in other people.
(09:59):
The true skill is catching it in yourself, which I did not do in Vegas last week. You can see it in other people. For example, I'm sure you have a friend, we all have a friend who literally you cannot understand why they continue to date losers, people that treat them like garbage. And your friend will be like, I know. I know, I know. He doesn't give me the attention I deserve, but he's trying to improve and you can spot their false confidence a mile away. You're like, you're deluding yourself. You are not a special princess. You are not going to turn this frog into a prince. He's not going to magically turn from a person who treats you badly to a person who treats you well and you know it, but you are falsely confident. Boom, you can see it in someone else. Maybe you spot this false confidence in your boss.
(10:48):
Every time they walk into a meeting, they're like, so we're going to add this huge project to your workload and it's due a month and no, I'm not hiring anybody else, but we can get it done. You're thinking, what planet do you live on? Like you are deluding yourself with this false confidence or your sister declares, I'm going to lose 30 pounds, but she's not changing her diet or exercising at all. I mean based on the way the world works, that's not going to work. But false confidence, it always convince you that the laws of nature and science and common sense, well, they don't apply to you. You can just declare this stuff and suddenly time shrinks or your body does or people magically change around you that even though it is the wrong decision or the wrong approach for anyone else on the planet to do it somehow, somehow it's going to work for you. I mean, I do this
Mel Robbins (11:42):
All the time I literally say, you know what? I think I'm going to clean out my closet over lunch today because I think I can get it done in 30 minutes. Oh yeah, Mel, exactly. You know what happens in 30 minutes, I tear everything apart and then I've got a gigantic pile on the floor of my closet. False confidence is what created that. Yeah, Mel, you're the exception. You're the one person that can clean out an entire closet in 30 minutes flat and get everything hung up, color coordinated and folded perfectly like you're at a store at the mall. Time stops. For you, Mel Robbins, a night of partying won't give you a hangover. Your metabolism is superhuman. This is false confidence. It's when you ignore common sense, the research, the science, what you know to be true. And in fact, researchers and psychologists have a word for this because it's such a well-established cognitive bias. It's called the overconfidence effect. It's like this magic potion that we drink where you delude yourself into thinking, oh, if I were giving somebody else advice, I would tell them to go to bed at 8 45 so they can catch their flight and exercise and take a bath and get a good night's sleep.
(12:50):
But if I am in this situation, I can make a decision and those same rules do not apply to me and they will not affect me. And I'm explaining this concept of false confidence because it's killing your mornings.
Mel Robbins (13:05)
I'm serious about this. False confidence is showing up in three places every single morning, and it's very sneaky, by the way, very, very sneaky. How this false confidence is showing up in derailing your mornings. And when I put a spotlight on these three sneaky moments every morning, you're going to get it immediately. And once you see it, this is the cool part, it empowers you to make a different decision Starting tomorrow morning, make a decision that is based in science and research and evidence and common sense decisions that will make you feel incredible. And every single morning that you wake up these same three decisions, it's going to be there and you know what else is going to be there? False confidence.
(13:56):
You have to make these decisions every single morning because what you decide to do every morning in these three very simple, very sneaky moments, the decisions that you make either create an upward spiral or a downward one. And after our conversation today, you get to decide because you're going to know the consequences of each one of these decisions. We're going to go deep into the research after we unpack all three decisions, but let me just highlight what's available to you and why these three simple decisions make you feel incredible. Because based on the research, these three simple decisions improve your mood. They make you feel more in control, they give you more energy and focus helps your gut health. It'll lower your stress and anxiety and depression. It supports you in getting a better night's sleep at the end of the day, and it helps you up and feel more energized and present and boost your mood.
(14:54):
How fricking cool is that? And so here's what we're going to do. I'm going to set up each one of these three decisions kind of the same way that I set up the scenario earlier where your friends are wanting you to stay out later where I want to put you right at the scene because I want you to really stop and consider these moments and the decision that you have to do something or not. These are not life and death decisions. You're an adult. You get to choose just like you get to choose whether you stay out or whether you make a decision to go up and take care of yourself and on your face may seem kind of obvious, but do me a favor and don't dismiss the power of what you're about to learn simply because these decisions are super simple and these three moments every morning just pass you by right now.
(15:43):
I want you to really understand the depth and the implications of each one of these three decisions, whether it's a positive implication or the negative implication, because I think it's a mistake to not make these decisions, alright? Because when you really allow yourself to consider and discern what I'm saying, I know it's going to motivate and inspire you to try this in your life. I don't want you to just listen to this. I want you to do something that's how you change your life. And one thing that I need to do right now is take a quick break so we can hear a word from our sponsors. I love our sponsors because they allow me to bring this to you at zero cost. So take a listen and make the decision to stay because I'm going to be waiting for you after this short break and we're going to jump right into these three simple decisions when we return.
(16:33):
Welcome back. It's your friend Mel Robbins. Thank you for deciding to stay and listen through the commercial break. I really love you for that. You and I are talking about the three simple decisions that you need to make that are going to help you feel amazing. The first decision that you need to make in order to feel incredible is what you decide to do when the alarm rings every morning. Let me put you at the scene. Imagine someone who is lying in bed, okay? You can just picture them in their bed. The alarm rings and it rings an hour before they need to get up and get out of bed because this person, person a loves, loves to hit the snooze button, their routine. When the alarm rings is...
Mel Robbins (17:30)
Hit the snooze, drift back to sleep, let the alarm ring again, hit the snooze, drift back to sleep, hit the alarm again, drift back to sleep. And they do this literally until they have no choice but to drag themselves out of bed. They're rotting away in bed for an hour every morning. That is person A. Then I want you to imagine person B when the alarm rings, you see them go, they don't want to get out of bed, but they throw off the sheets, they roll out of bed, they stand up, they walk toward the bathroom and they start their day. Now, I want you to just stop and think for a minute and think about this moment.
(18:17):
Which one is the better decision? If you think about decision A to hit the snooze alarm over and over and over again versus person B, the person who just makes a decision, even though if you like to just roll out of bed and start the day, which person would you hire? Which person would you want to date? Which person do you wish you were? If you had a thousand dollars and you could place a bet on which person was going to have a better day, who would you put your money on? I mean, from a common sense standpoint and a logic standpoint that making the decision to get out of bed is the harder decision in the morning, but it makes your life easier and better in the long run. And this is the thing about a decision. You can see it objectively, but false confidence skews your decision making because lets you and I climb into bed right now, okay, let's climb into bed and let's really experience how false confidence makes person A do what they're doing.
(19:30):
I used to do this. I literally used to be like, okay, well if I have to get out of bed by seven o'clock, then I'm going to set the alarm at six. That way I've got about four or five snooze in me so that I can slowly sort of coax myself awake because I'm not a morning person and I don't really like to get out of bed. And so if I just sort of coax myself out of bed, then by the time I've hit the snooze button four or five times and then I really have to get out of bed at seven, I got no choice, then I'll be ready to get out of bed. When you're that kind of person, when you set the alarm an hour earlier than you need to wake up because you know are so bad at waking up that you've got to hit the snooze button that many times, are you making your life easier? No.
(20:14):
Think about what it feels like to be in that bed with me right now because every time that alarm rings and then you hit the snooze button and then you drift off to sleep again, and then the alarm goes off, you have to go through that whole process of, oh my god, awake, and then the resistance, and then the hitting the snooze and then the falling back asleep and only falling back asleep for nine minutes and then the alarm goes off again. And then, oh my God, here we are in this and yet and yet we're in that bed. And the alarm goes off. And here's the false confidence. That confidence is in the bed with you and it's basically luring you into making a stupid decision because somehow as you're laying in bed and you know that hitting the snooze button four times and rotting away in that bed for an hour, that it is not magically setting you up for success.
(21:09):
Of course, it's impacting your mood and your productivity and your sense of control, and it makes you feel terrible, but false confidence kicks in and you literally believe that this is the best way for you to get up that this is the great idea. Oh, starting the day with a decision to procrastinate, getting out of bed, that's a good idea. I wouldn't recommend it to a friend or to my sibling. I wouldn't want to hire somebody or date somebody who starts their day like this. But for me, my false confidence is telling me that this does not impact me. And I say this because this used to be me. I used to be person A. Not only did I not feel motivated to get out of bed, I deluded myself into thinking that this wasn't a big deal. It's a huge deal. The decision that you make when the alarm rings every morning is a huge deal.
(22:12):
Let me explain. Shocking research to you. Laying in bed increases anxiety and depression five fold compared to pushing yourself out of bed when the alarm rings. This is research based. So if anxiety and depression is what's keeping you in bed longer in the morning like it used to keep me in bed longer in the morning, you better pay attention to this. This will change your life laying in bed, rotting in bed, hitting the snooze alarm. It is making your anxiety and depression worse. This comes from research at the University of South Carolina. They conducted this study that was published in the Journal of Sleep Medicine and Disorders, and here's what I love about this study. They used...
Mel Robbins (23:00)
All kinds of tools to measure what was happening. This isn't just a study where they limited the research to asking people how they felt. Yeah, they asked them how they felt, but they actually had all this tech to determine what was going on in people's bodies from sleep trackers to physical monitors, to questionnaires to heart and rate, blood pressure tracking to blood work, all of which was tracking what was happening.
(23:21):
And in the study, here's what they did. They forced one group of people to lay in bed longer than they usually did, and then another group of people to get right out of bed when the alarm rang. Here's what they found for the people who laid in bed longer, depression and anxiety went up, fivefold compared to the group that got out of bed when the alarm ring inflammation which was measured by blood work went up twofold for the people who laid in bed. So that false confidence that's saying, oh, well, laying here, it actually makes me feel good. I really need to lay here. This is what my false confidence lied and told me. It's affecting your mental health and your wellbeing, period, making the decision to get out of bed when the alarm rings improves your mental health, it improves your wellbeing. It has such a positive impact, it actually lowers inflammation.
(24:16):
And let me hit you with another piece of research. If you're somebody that's a chronic snoozer, research shows that you waste four work weeks a year by snoozing. This comes from a study that was done by researchers at the University of Notre Dame. It was published in the prestigious Sleep Journal from Oxford University Press. And this study, it is the jackpot of snoozing information. It is the biggest study ever done on snoozing. They had people in the study wear wearable technology for over a year. And there's so much to unpack from this study that I'm going to do an entirely separate episode on the topic of rotting in bed and snoozing because this is a thing and I really want to dig deep into the research, but for the purposes of the decision I want you to make starting tomorrow the decision to wake up when the alarm rings and get out of bed, I want to share one key finding. The average time that people spend snoozing before they get themselves out of bed is 26.93 minutes. That's 27 minutes. That totals 164 hours a year. That's more than four work weeks of time. This is proving my point that an easy decision in the moment, which is to stay in bed or hit the snooze button, makes your life hard, but a hard decision to get out of bed when the alarm rings makes your life easier. What would you do if you got the equivalent of a month off of work?
(25:54):
What would you do with that time? Because that time is available to you if you change your decision tomorrow morning by simply getting out of bed when the alarm rings, you get four weeks of time back over the course of the year. So do not let your false confidence win. When that alarm rings tomorrow morning, make the hard decision.
Mel Robbins (26:22)
Because you know the impact that it has. It will give you so much time back. It reduces stress and anxiety and depression. It reduces inflammation in your body. It makes you feel more focused. It makes you feel more productive and in control. And look, this is simple, but it's not easy, which is why I am hammering this first decision and I want to underscore something false confidence. It's not only a real thing, it is so damn sneaky it even sneaks up on me.
(26:54):
And I'm the one teaching you about this. Let me tell you what happened to me this morning. I woke up and it is our daughter Sawyers 25th birthday today. And I knew we were going to be recording this episode. And so I got up really early today because I wanted to be awake before she got up, and I wanted to surprise her with having a big birthday playlist playing when she came down the stairs because we stayed up late last night and we assembled this huge balloon arch and we had all these decorations downstairs that she was going to walk down to. And so my alarm goes off. I immediately get out of bed, I walk into the bathroom, I turn off my alarm because my phone is never near the bed. And so I immediately went to my phone and I looked on the find a Person app and I was like, oh my God, she's out in the woods about two miles away with my husband Chris.
(27:45):
I could see that they had gone for a big hike in the morning. And you want to know what? Boom, false confidence slides right in. Ooh Mel, you've got time. You don't have to be up this early. You could go back to sleep. It was like a siren calling me to the sea. And I found myself hypnotized by this false confidence. I'm like, Ooh, yeah, she's already seen the decorations. I have time. I could climb into that bed and I could open up my Spotify app and I could start to put together a birthday song playlist. I have time and I would rather be in my bed right now. And so I put a hand on the top of the bed and I pull back the sheets and I go climb into the bed and I start to put my feet in and then all of a sudden I'm like, whatcha doing?
(28:47):
Whatcha doing? Mel, you are not person A. You are not going to sit here and rot in this bed. You are person B. You made a decision to get up. Get out of here. False confidence. Shut up, go away. And let me tell you something, I hopped out of that bed and thank God I did because after I hopped out of the bed, I walked into the kitchen and all of a sudden my phone updated and I saw the tracker and oh my God, she was halfway up the driveway. Thank God I didn't get back in bed because I would've missed the moment. I had just enough time to cue up Katie Perry's birthday song and have it blasting so that when she walked into the room after the walk, I was like, ready, game on. Let's go. And I'm telling you this, why you're not a robot and neither am I false.
(29:37):
Confidence is a cognitive bias. It is hardwired in your brain and it is so sneaky. Oh my God, it is always going to be there around the alarm. It will always be there. I want you to expect it because this is the power of a decision. You override false confidence with the decision that you make to get up when the alarm rings. I want you to be person B because I want your life to be easier and hard decisions in the moment. Make your life easier in the long run and hard decisions in the morning when the alarm rings makes you feel incredible for the rest of the day. And boy, oh boy, do I wish I knew this decades ago. I rotted my life away in a dorm room and during law school and in my twenties and my thirties and part of my forties because I did not know this information.
(30:34):
So please, please, please take time to share this with the people that you love. Alright, stay where you are, okay? Because coming up next, decision number two, it's all about what you look at first thing in the morning. I cannot wait to tell you what it is, but first, I want to give our advertisers some love because they support this show. And I'll be waiting for you after a short break. So stay with me. Welcome back. It's your friend, Mel. I'm so glad you are still with me. We have covered decision number one of the three simple decisions that you need to make to feel incredible and that decision, get up when the alarm rings. Do not rot in bed. Do not hit the snooze. Grab those four extra weeks of time. Feel good, feel in control. I know you're like,
(31:16):
I'm on it. I'm trying it. Let's go to number two. Alright, let's talk about the second decision that you need to make in order to feel incredible, natural light before artificial light. I'm, say it again, natural light before. Artificial light. What does that mean? I'm glad you asked. That means as soon as you get out of bed, when the alarm rings, do not stare at your phone. Instead, get outside as soon as possible and get exposure to natural light before you saturate yourself with the artificial light and the crap on social media that's on your phone. Let's start with the common sense reason why this matters, and then we're going to jump into the deeper science. Let's go back to person A and person B. Remember person A, that's our snoozer, that's our bed rotter, that's our person that is wasting four hours a week just hitting the snooze button. That's the person that's making this major mistake. And person B, the person who doesn't feel like it, but 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 gets out of bed when the alarm rings.
Mel Robbins (32:25):
In this scenario, I want you to get natural light before artificial light. Okay, let's talk about person A and person B. Person A based on the research is 89% of the human beings on this planet. Within 10 minutes of waking up, you are staring at your phone. And so I want you to just visualize this, okay? I want you to imagine somebody who's finally gotten out of bed. This is person A. And as you watch them, what do they have in their hand? They have their phone. And what are they doing with their phone? Oh, they are just staring at their phone. Their neck is cranked down. They might even been laying in bed looking at their phone, they're drinking their coffee, looking at their phone.
(33:07):
They're walking around and brushing their teeth, looking at their phone. They're staring at their phone. They're watching the lives of influencers and celebrities. They're replying to emails to their boss while they're in their underwear. They're brushing their teeth as they're checking on the headlines in the news. That's person A. Now, person B, notice what they're doing. They've gotten up when the alarm rings, they've turned off the alarm on their phone and they've either set their phone down and walked out of the room or they've put it in their pocket and they've done something interesting. They walked outside and you see person B sitting on the porch, they're listening to the birds. Or maybe you see them taking a short walk around the block. They're getting natural light exposure, not saturation from their phone. They're just present in the moment. And let's go back to logic and common sense.
(34:05):
Who's making the better decision? Person A, who's mainlining artificial light and social media or person B, who's taking a moment to get natural light exposure? And to be outside for a minute, which person would you hire? Which person would you want to date? Which person do you wish you were? If you had to place a thousand dollars bet on who is going to have a better day, who's going to feel better? Where would you put your money? Obviously it's person B, you're a smart cookie. Common sense tells both of us that the person who gets exposure to natural light is way better off than the person who just saturated their brain with artificial light and all of the garbage that is on their phone. See, person B is making a decision that is empowering. Person B is making a decision that puts them in control.
(35:14):
And person B is also making a decision that has extraordinary benefits for your mental health, for your physical health, for brain functioning. It helps you sleep better at night. And look, I know I'm being harsh around person A, you want to know why? Because I have been person A for most of my life. I've been person A. And the thing about that's crazy about this habit and this decision that you make in the morning to look at your phone first thing, it is literally the first thing that you're looking at is that you know it's not good for you. And if you are one of the many small business owners or entrepreneurs who listen to this podcast, I know your person A, because your business is your phone or if you're a high schooler or a college student or a graduate student, I also know that you're person A because you have grown up literally in a world where the phone has been in your hand and it is your relationships, and I get it.
(36:05):
It used to be me too, but I want to come back to the power of your decisions. This is a moment that has a huge impact on how you feel and on your life and on your brain every single morning, and you're in control of this decision. And so I'm not just going to appeal to logic and common sense here with you because this decision to not look at my phone and instead to make it a priority every single morning to get outside and get exposure to natural light for just a minute or two, that's all that it takes. Instead of saturating myself with artificial light and artificial information and artificial emergencies and priorities, this has been a game changer. It has made me more successful, more productive, happier. It makes me feel like I am in control, which is why it makes me feel incredible and it's going to make you feel incredible too.
(37:05):
And there are two reasons why. The first one is your attention. When you make the decision every morning to get natural light exposure, instead of saturating your brain with all of this artificial information that is on your phone, you maintain control of your attention. Just stop and think about this. If you look at your phone, what's on your phone? It's things that influencers want you to buy. It's the lifestyles of celebrity. It's headlines that news organizations want you to pay attention to and to get upset about. It is emails and emergencies from work that are not important at this very moment. The second that you look at your phone, all of that artificial information goes to the front of the line in your brain you just gave away without even thinking about it. The most important commodity that you have, which is your attention. I want you to make a decision to own your attention.
(38:06):
And the way that you do that is you prioritize natural light and you do not have your phone on you because when you step outside and you awaken your five senses, even if you're just standing on the porch, even if you just walk around the block, even if you just stick your head out a window for crying out loud, your senses come alive, you have a chance to take a breath, you warm into the day, it boosts your mood, it allows you to think for a second and get present about what matters to you. You're putting yourself first by making the decision to not saturate yourself with artificial light and artificial information. That doesn't matter if you are so tired of never having time for yourself or always coming last or feeling like you wake up into an emergency or that you're always putting out fires.
(39:03):
This one decision will change your life because it is a major mistake to begin your day by saturating yourself with artificial life and artificial information because you have just lost the battle for attention with that singular mistake. That's reason number one, that this changed my life and it makes me feel incredible. Reason number two has to do with the science around circadian rhythms. We've had multiple experts on the Mel Robbins podcast talk about how getting natural light exposure first thing in the morning signals to your internal clock, your circadian rhythm, that it is time to wake up, which also signals when you go to sleep. No kidding, getting natural light exposure first thing in the morning helps you sleep better at night because it is part of you stimulating the circadian rhythm in your brain. That is why this is such an powerful, powerful decision that will make you feel incredible.
(40:04):
And sure enough, I told you that our daughter was out taking a walk with Chris this morning. My husband, my husband Chris, and I take a walk almost every single morning. I was not with them this morning because I was planning a little surprise. But when I saw them, I said, so how do you feel after taking the walk? And sure enough, she reported exactly what the research says. When you get outside and you expose yourself to natural light and you start your day without the artificial light and the artificial information, you allow yourself to get present, what do you feel? You're going to be in a better mood. You're going to be more present. You're going to feel more in control. You're going to be more energized. You're going to be calm. You're going to be clearer about your priorities. You're going to feel like you've put yourself first.
(40:44):
And that's exactly what the research says you will feel. Which is why when you make the decision each and every morning, you step into the natural light, you will feel incredible. And that brings me to the third decision. I want you to pour yourself a glass of water before you pour yourself a cup of coffee or tea. Let me explain this. What's the very first thing you drink in the morning? It's most likely a big cup of coffee or some tea. And the first thing that you drink in the morning, this is a very important decision. Just consider the word we use for the first meal of the day. It's breakfast. You're breaking the fast break fast. In other word, the food that you're eating breaks the fast from overnight when you were sleeping. I want you to extend that same thinking to the first thing that you drink every morning because you're probably making the same mistake that I did instead of drinking something that helps you, that makes you feel incredible, that helps you focus.
(41:55):
You're probably making the mistake that I used to make. And that is the very first thing that I used to drink every single morning was a giant cup of coffee, usually with artificial sweeteners and a creamer. I mean, the more it tasted like candy, woohoo, the faster I drank that puppy. And then I had the audacity to stand there. After I would have a big cup of coffee on an empty stomach and break out into a sweat, my anxiety would spike and then I'd start to get the shakes. And if I were going to an exercise class and I'd feel like throwing up, and then I'd always be running to the bathroom, and I had the audacity of being like, oh, I wonder what's wrong with me? Oh, do you think it could have been that gigantic cup of Java lava that you just shoved into your stomach and spiked your anxiety?
(42:41):
Mel? I mean, give me a break. And this is where false confidence comes in. That army crawling your way to the coffee maker and slamming down a big cup of coffee because you're tired, it's not good for you, but somehow you convince yourself that you need it, that you're tired, that you can't wake up without your coffee. How many times have you said, oh, I'm really sorry. I haven't had my coffee yet. That's why I am not thinking straight. I used to say that for years. In fact, I wore it like a badge of honor. I lived for my first cup of coffee and then my second, and then around two or three I needed my third. And this is where...
Mel Robbins (43:20):
The decision comes in and the research that supports it that will change your life. I want you to pour a glass of water and drink it before you pour a cup of coffee or tea. And there's a bazillion reasons why. Number one, caffeine on an empty stomach spikes your cortisol levels and that will make your anxiety and your stress worse. I am sure that it is not helping your gut health. But the second reason, and this is really the game changer, the second reason is you think that caffeine helps you wake up. Believe it or not, caffeine first thing in the morning makes you feel more tired, not awake. And I want to share some groundbreaking research that has changed my decision. I pour water and I drink water before I pour coffee. It makes me feel incredible. I cannot believe the impact of this. Dr. Amy Shaw first explained this on the Mel Robbins. Yes, I still drink coffee, but I have made the decision to pour water and drink it first. And I make the decision to not have coffee until about 90 minutes after I wake up.
(44:44):
And here's the crazy thing. Not only am I more awake and alert and my mood is better, and I don't have anxiety now that I do this. I never experienced the afternoon slump and I used to be so predictable. 2:00 PM need some coffee. I don't feel that anymore. This is research that you need to understand that will change your decision and will have you pour water and drink water before you have a cup of coffee. And it is research around something called adenosine. Adenosine is basically a chemical in your body that signals to your brain that you're really sleepy. So when you have a lot of adenosine, you feel sleepy. And during the day, adenosine starts to build up in your body and it reaches the highest levels right before you go to bed. Okay? And there's a reason why adenosine is building up all day. And the reason why is because the adenosine kind of signals that it's time to go to bed and you're feeling really Sleepy.
(45:48):
And as you're sleeping that adenosine level, it starts to reduce in your body. Why? Because you're sleeping. You don't need the adenosine anymore because you're actually falling asleep. But here's the thing, when you wake up in the morning, you still have a little bit of adenosine in your system according to the research. That's why when you wake up, it's one of the reasons why you still feel kind of groggy. It's like the adenosine. And based on the research it takes about an hour or two after you wake up for the adenosine to truly leave your brain and to drop down to like zero. Okay? Here's where the caffeine comes in. And this is really important because it's based on research. Again, Dr. Amy Shaw, who appeared on the podcast, shared this with you and me. The moment you have caffeine, caffeine binds to the ends of the neuroreceptors in your brain, and it prevents the adenosine from truly flushing out of your system.
(46:46):
Basically caffeine first thing in the morning, traps adenosine in your brain. And so when you have caffeine and you trap this sleepy chemical in your brain, and so you're okay for about an hour or two, and then what happens? The caffeine wears off. What happens to the adenosine that's in your brain? It now is in your system, which is why you feel a little bit of a slump and you need another cup of coffee. So the caffeine isn't making you feel awake. The caffeine is blocking the adenosine from leaving your brain, and now the adenosine is back in your system, which is why you're constantly chasing more caffeine. It's freaking unbelievable. And so here is the advice based on neuroscience and medical research. It's so incredible. Delay caffeine for an hour or two every morning when you delay caffeine for an hour or two after you wake up, you give your body a chance to flush the adenosine from your system so that when you have the caffeine an hour or two after waking up, it's gone.
(47:52):
It can bind to the neuroreceptors in your brain. No problem. And here's what happened for me. This is so cool. When I started pouring a cup of water and drinking it, number one, I was worried about doing this because when I tell you I was addicted to coffee, it was part of my identity. It was part of my morning routine. I was like, I'm not giving up caffeine. I don't know what the health experts say, but I'm not doing that. I didn't think I could do this. I had a cup of water, and the glass of water fills you up a little bit. It's way better for your gut. It kind of helps you wake up a little bit. It's way better for when you're exercising. If you exercise first thing in the morning like I do, and then I started to notice literally within three days, I went from a person who drank three or four lattes a day or cups of coffee and always battled an afternoon slump every single day to being a person who has a cup of coffee around 10 o'clock in the morning.
(48:53):
Half the time I don't even finish it, and I never crave another one, and I never have an afternoon slump. It's like magic only. It's not because it's science. And here's the problem. As you're nodding along, guess who is going to be there tomorrow morning when you wake up and you go outside and you get your natural light exposure, and then you go straight to the coffee maker, your false confidence is going to be going, oh, come on. Now. You did the other two things. You do not need to do this one. You are not a morning person, woman. You have got to have your cup of coffee. You cannot jump on that zoom meeting at work or drive those kids to school or say hello to your partner. You cannot do this without the caffeine, that adenosine, sleepy stuff that does not apply to you.
(49:42):
Your brain is not like anybody else's brain. Your brain does not work like that. Your brain needs caffeine. I don't know about that adenosine thing, that sleepy stuff thing that Mel Robbins is talking about, but that does not apply to you. You are going to tank if you just, I'm not kidding. Tell that false confidence to take their caffeine addiction somewhere else. You, my friend, are going to use the science. You are going to make a different decision. You're going to try this for three mornings. Pour a cup of water before you pour a cup of coffee or tea, drink your water and delay the caffeine intake for at least an hour and see what happens. Because if you make the easy decision and you do what you always do and you let your false confidence convince you that you're the only human being on the planet that this doesn't apply to, you're actually creating that afternoon slump.
(50:34):
Do not do that to yourself. Make the harder decision. Pour the water before the coffee and you make your life easier because you're using science to make your brain work better, to boost your focus, to take care of your gut, to lower your anxiety, and to take control, and that will make you feel incredible. That's the three simple decisions. Get up when the alarm rings. Get natural light exposure before you saturate yourself with artificial light and artificial information and drink water first thing in the morning before you pour your coffee. These three decisions will make you feel incredible. And you know what else will make you feel incredible? Sharing this with everyone, empowering other people. I wish I had known this in my twenties. Heck, I wish I knew this in my thirties and my early forties. Sharing this research with our kids, it's made a huge difference in their lives.
(51:37):
Sharing this research with my team has made a huge difference in their lives. And one more thing, in case no one else tells you today, I wanted to be sure to tell you that I love you and I believe in you, and I believe in your ability to create a better life and to make better decisions. In fact, these three decisions will make you feel incredible and you deserve that. Alright, I'll talk to you in a few days and thank you so much for being here on YouTube and making the decision to watch this video. Will you please also decide to subscribe? Seriously, the majority of people who watch this channel are not subscribers. It's free. It really supports me in bringing you brand new free content every single day. I really, really, really appreciate your decision to take a second and do that. Thank you also for sharing this video with absolutely anybody that you know will feel empowered by this, particularly people you love. And after you subscribe and you're like, all right, what's next, mal? What's the next mal? You're going to love this. These are eight small habits that will change your life. It's the best expert advice that I'm using this year. Check it out.
Key takeaways
False confidence is that sneaky voice telling you, “You’ll be fine,” right before you make a self-sabotaging choice you regret every single time.
If you’re laying in bed after the alarm, you’re not resting. Science proves that you’re reinforcing a cycle of anxiety, fatigue, and procrastination that hijacks your entire day.
The blue light from your phone creates artificial chaos that hijacks your attention before you even begin. Soak in some natural light before you look at your phone.
When you check your phone first thing, you’re handing your morning and your mood over to algorithms, headlines, and other people’s priorities.
Caffeine before water tricks your brain, traps grogginess, and guarantees an afternoon crash. Drink water first, then caffeine and you won’t crash.
Resources
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- Behavioral Economics: What is the overconfidence effect?
- U of Notre Dame: Snoozing: an examination of a common method of waking.
- Behavioral Science: Start new habits during the time of day you have control.
- Academy of Management: How you start your day impacts your work.
- PloS One: Longitudinal connection between depression and inflammation.
- Neuroscience News: How to become a morning person.
- Sleep Medicine: Resetting the timing of ‘night owls’ has positive impact.
- Journal of Sleep Research: Snoozers 3x more likely to feel drowsy upon waking.
- Oxford Academic: Snoozers averaged nearly 27 extra minutes in bed.
- The New York Times: Stop hitting snooze! 8 expert tips for waking on time.
- Journal of Sleep Medicine Disorders: Negative effects of time in bed extension.
- National Public Radio: These habits cut the risk of depression in half.
- Psychology Today: “Bed rotting” may be bad for your mental health.
- Environmental Research and Public Health: Lighting in the home and health.
- National Library of Medicine: Shedding light on light
- Mol. Bio. and Transl. Science: Consequences of circadian rhythm disruption.
- Sleep Foundation: Adenosine and sleep: understanding your sleep drive.
- Journal of Sleep Research: Adenosine, caffeine, and sleep-wake regulation
- Sleep Foundation: Caffeine and sleep.
- Pharmacopsychoecologia: The role of adenosine receptors in the central action of caffeine.
- The Washington Post: Is it bad to drink coffee on an empty stomach?
- Nature: Daily morning light improves eye health in healthy young adults.
- Journal of Exercise, Nutrition, Biochemistry: Effects of exercise on sleep, with light and without.
- The Washington Post: Getting out in the sunlight helps you sleep better.
- Stanford: More sunlight exposure may improve sleep.
- Somnologie: Effects of light on human circadian rhythms, sleep, and mood.
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