Kwik Brain Episode 16: My Morning Routine - How to Jumpstart Your Brain & Day

Welcome to Kwik Brain, bite-sized brain hacks for busy people who want to learn faster and achieve more. I'm your coach, Jim Kwik. Free your mind. Let's imagine if we could access 100% of our brain's capacity. I wasn't high, wasn't wired, just clear. I knew what I needed to do and how to do it. I know kung fu. Show me. How do you jumpstart your brain and your day? How do you do it? How do you do it for greater productivity and peace of mind? I do daily live streams on Instagram @JimKwik, and I regularly receive this question all the time. It's the most consistent popular questions that you ask. It's, what's my morning routine? How do I start my day? And for me, I'm gonna give you a few ideas of what works for me. I don't always do all of this, nor do I have time sometimes to do all this, especially when I'm traveling. But for me, this is really about the science of momentum, right? We've all heard that if you could win the morning, you could win the day. And one of the reasons why I wanted to do this episode is because we got such great feedback from our episode on how to create new habits with Dr. BJ Fogg. And really my goal is creating routines in the morning and in the evening. So I don't have to suffer from what a lot of people do called decision fatigue, saying that you could only make a certain amount of good decisions in a day. And after that, You can't, right? And so how do you insulate yourself is one of the ways to doing that is to create regular rituals and routines so you don't have to think about what you need to do. And if you could set up routines and habits, especially early in the day, you could benefit from this science of momentum and create positive momentum as opposed to being reactive, like how a lot of people do. They pick up their phone the first thing and they start reacting and driving distraction and reaction as opposed to proactively spending time with self-care and self-love and having a vision and a direction for your day. So let's get into it. Now, as I jump into this, again, this is my ideal day. So sometimes I can't do all of this, but I could do as many as I can. So when I wake up, and we're gonna do a whole episode on quick sleep, on how to get fast, deep sleep, restful sleep, I'm waking up in an environment that has the blackout curtains, so it's pitch black. I have grounding sheets and all that. And I'll go through my sleep routine in another episode if you want. So let me know, @JimKwik. But when I— the first thing I do is I— and some of this is not in order, but I'll give you the, the basic building blocks. The first thing I do when I wake up is I recall my dreams. If you've listened to episode 14, it's all about the power of your dreams to be able to transform your life and how some of the most amazing inventions, scientific breakthroughs, literature, music came from your dreams. Because it's when you're dreaming is that you're actually processing and integrating and and working on solutions, your subconscious mind, to the things that you're focusing on during the daytime. But most people forget their dreams. So the first thing I do is I go through a process which we went through in episode 14 on how to recall my dreams. After that, I get out of bed and I make the bed. Okay? And now this is something that is obvious that most of you do, but if you don't do it, take 2 minutes and make your bed because that's a success habit, right? If we're talking about positive momentum, the science momentum, getting things done, checking things off, doing it with excellence, then make your bed. It's worth the 1 or 2 minutes because again, how you do anything is how you do everything. And to have a good check mark on something like making your bed is very powerful because it teaches you to be able to do something really well and excellence like they do in the military. And the other benefit is when you come back at the end of the day and you're doing your nighttime routines, which we'll talk about in another episode, you come back to success. You come back to your bed already made. And who doesn't like a great, you know, your bed to be messy anyway? Who doesn't want that? A clean bed. After that, what I'll do What I'll do is I'll go into the kitchen and I'll have a tall glass of water because, you know, we use a lot of water and most of us are very dehydrated at night. I'll take my supplements there. I'll do a whole different episode and we've also already covered some of the supplements in previous episodes with Dave Asprey and other episodes. But I take my probiotics, which is the big one, because your gut is your second brain. We talk about Kwik Brain, you know, being your brain in your head, but you also have— Your gut. incredible amount of nerve cells in your gut. And so I wanna make sure that's being fed and healthy, so I take my probiotics. Then what I do is I do my breathing, right? I'm thinking about the things I'm focusing on here. I'm thinking about excellence, I'm thinking about hydration, I'm thinking about oxygen. And so years ago, about 5 years ago, I got to share the stage and then also interview Wim Hof, and some of you know him as the Iceman. Whatever your breathing technique is, I focus on breathing. So whether it's box breathing or alpha breathing, Whether it's Wim Hof's method, I do a breathing technique because I wanna fully oxygenate my body and my brain, which is obviously part of my body also as well. And maybe we could do another episode dedicated towards that. I do my meditation in the morning and also later in the afternoon or evening, sometimes before I go to bed, but I always do an early morning meditation. I do it for about 20 minutes. And again, this is an episode for another time, but mindfulness is so important. So I wanna have a clear mind as I enter the day. And so meditation puts me in that space. 15, 20 minutes. Some of you use Headspace app. Some of you use the Muse device, use some kind of technology. I meditate then. And again, we could go deeper in future episodes on that mindfulness training. From there, I do 1 or 2 minutes of just movement. And this could be different. It could be calisthenics, it could be burpees, but I just wanna get into my body after I meditate. And so I move it, my body, pretty intensely for a couple minutes. And if I'm in a hotel room, maybe I'm just doing jumping jacks, but I'm basically, or I'm doing crunches, For 2 minutes straight, I'm just waking up my body. That is not my exercise for the day. It's just for me to get my heart rate beating and getting some movement in my body. My exercise for me personally, I do it later in the afternoon. From there, I take a shower and it's a cold shower. And I do believe in cold therapy. It works for me. It helps me to reset my nervous system. You know that if somebody, and I do this a lot when I'm doing Instagram Live, I often do it on my way to cryotherapy. which is a chamber you walk into at -240 degrees and so on. Ice baths are very powerful because it helps— like if you hit your knee, you put ice on it to reduce swelling and inflammation. Cold therapy is a very powerful way of resetting your nervous system and reducing inflammation. So I take a cold shower. When I get out, I go through my normal routine, right, of shaving and brushing my teeth, all that good stuff. Then I make a tea. And my favorite tea is like a brain tea. You know, it's a combination of gotu kola, ginkgo, lion's mane, some MCT oil, and some other gems. As I go through it, I sip my tea, and that's where I write my journal. And I'm a big believer in journaling. I've been doing it since I've been in college, and I feel like some of the most amazing thinkers of our time and in history, they, they journal and they keep diaries. I mean, you think about Edison, Einstein, da Vinci. I mean, their journals are Are priceless, right? They do these studies with geniuses in different fields, and they find a high commonality that they journal. And they're trying to figure out, is it because they're geniuses that they journal, or is it because they're journaling and creating and making notes— refer back to our note-taking episode that we did— that's making them geniuses? That the act of reflection and note-making actually is help stimulating them to succeed. So that's something to think about, but I journal. From there, right from journaling, since I'm writing, and I like writing, there's a lot of studies saying that handwriting is better than actually typing, and we could go through it if you listened again to the note-taking episode. Then since I'm writing already, I'm going to my to-do list. And we all have an ongoing, most of us have an ongoing to-do list of things that we need to get done. For me, the big thing is I just wanna be able to accomplish as a total win, 3 things for work and 3 things personally. And they don't have to be all epic big things, but I just feel like that if I could get 3 of my work goals done on my to-do list and 3 of my personal things to do, then it's been a great day. And, you know, it's kind of like my friend Clay Hebert talks about a champagne moment. It's like your champagne moment when you're looking back at the end of the day saying, yes, today was a great day. Today I crushed it. Today I won. And in addition to my to-do list, I also have a list, a to-feel list, because I feel like we are— a lot of who we are is our states and emotions. And I think I don't want it to be just where I happen to feel a certain way by accident. It's by its design. It's the metaphor I always talk about, the difference between a thermometer and a thermostat. A thermometer reacts to the environment. And I feel like sometimes if I act like a thermometer, I'm just gonna react to everything that's going on in my world, and I just might have some good positive states, as opposed to being a thermostat where I set in advance a standard, a goal, you know, my— for my to-feel list, certain feelings I wanna feel throughout the day so I could design it that way. To feel love, to feel curious, to feel bewilderment, right? Connection, gratitude. I also have besides a to-do list and a to-feel list, I also look at my to-be list. Like who do I want to be today? And you know, do I want to be a good partner? Do I want to be a good friend and a good leader, a good teacher, a good coach? I feel into what I want to be that day because it's not just about, you know, we're not— it's kind of cliché, but there's a truth to it. We're not human doings, right? We're human beings. So who do I want to be today? From there, if I have time, I will, and I'll make time for the things that are most important, is I read. I read for about 20 30 minutes. And this is so important because if you do this already, if you are a reader, because leaders are readers, you could refer to the episode we did on how to read one book a week. And for most of you, you could actually finish one book a week just by reading 30 minutes a day, but you have to schedule it to be able to do it. So after my— I do my reading, then I go and I, um, I make my brain smoothie. And my brain smoothie is really— is a mixture of a lot of— probably half the ingredients, if you listen to episode 5, which is my top 10 favorite brain foods, right? We talk about the brain berries, which are your blueberries and avocado and your leafy vegetables and water and everything. I actually make— most of the ingredients actually come from my— from that list. So I make a brain smoothie. And when I'm done with that smoothie, I go through my brain training in one of our Kwik Learning online programs at kwiklearning.com. We have an online speed reading course, online memory course, thinking course, academic success course. That's where I do my brain training. And I like to do it in the morning because I wanna jumpstart my brain, my mind, if you will, and also my body. And that's the goal for me, that focusing in the morning. So after I do certain brain trainings, which are all in our programs, then I really start my day. I'm gonna be doing an episode on time management, but it's not really time management because you really can't manage your time as much as you could manage your priorities, the things that are most important that you're prioritizing, if you will. And so it's funny because priority, it used to be a singular word up to a few decades ago. Then it's everyone has priorities, right? It used to be one thing, but now it's many things. But I really focus on my most difficult, important tasks. And the reason why is because in the morning is when you have the most nervous energy, nervous system energy. And so I like to take on the biggest thing on my list. And usually the thing that I don't wanna do is the thing that I should do that makes everything else easier for me. Mm-hmm. And so that's my goal. And if you have trouble getting yourself to do that big thing, I would refer back to the episode on how to stop procrastinating. We did an episode that was extremely powerful and shared a lot all about stop procrastinating. So if you want extra tips on how to be able to start your day with work— and the reason again why I do this, you know, really managing the first hour of my day, is the first hour of my day and the last hour of my day, which will be a future episode, is usually a time that you can control and influence the most. Usually when we get to work, then we're fighting fires and we have things with our team and we have clients and customers and things can get a little bit out of hand. But I try to at least do as much as I can the first hour of the day. And if that requires me to get up a little bit earlier than I need to, then I'll do that. So the first hour a day and the last hour a day. And again, I don't always have time to do everything. This is more of my ideal day. If anything on this list appeals to you and resonates with you, I would see if you could incorporate that. If you need help in adding any of these things in, like a cold shower or the meditation or your breathing or the water or making your bed or journaling, I would refer back to the episode on how to create new habits. I mean, that's an owner's manual. That's a clear map on how to add new habits. And then in the future, maybe we'll do an episode on how to break old habits. But really what this conversation is all about is about self-love, because self-love and self-care is not selfish. And you can't be really good for somebody unless you're being good to yourself, because you don't have any tea in your cup to be able to share with others. So fill up your cup. And that's really what the morning really is set up to do, is to be able to set yourself up to win and have so much momentum. And then you could check your phone and your email and everything, but you're in a strong resilience state, and you have positive momentum, and you have a few things that are very important that you've already checked off your list. And then you could come back and celebrate at the end of the day. And people will ask, how was your day? And you're like, wow, I won today. I really crushed it today. And it's all because, you know, you managed the first hour of your day, because that's what you do when you have a Kwik Brain. Want to double your brain speed and memory power? If you'd like to learn rapidly and get ahead faster, I'd like to give you my brand new Kwik Brain Accelerator program. You will discover exactly what I teach my clients to learn, read, and remember anything in half the time. There is no charge. It's my gift to you for being one of our subscribers. That's kwikbrain.com, or simply text the word podcast to 916-822-7246, and we'll send you a direct link. That's 916-82-BRAIN. Growing up struggling with learning challenges from a childhood brain injury, it's been my life's mission to help you have your very best brain so you can win more every single day. Now, want more quick brain? Here are 4 ways to fast-track your results and lock in what you just learned into your long-term memory. Remember FAST. F-A-S-T. The F stands for Facebook. You're not alone on this journey. I invite you to join our free private online group. There you can connect with me, your fellow brain lovers, links to resources, And even submit your questions for me to answer in future episodes. Go to quickbrain.com. That's K-W-I-K brain.com. The A stands for apply. Act on what you learned today. Remember, knowledge is not power; it's potential power. It only becomes power when you use it. So use what you just learned. The S stands for subscribe. Don't miss the next episode and other free brain training. And finally, the T. T stands for teach. You want to learn faster now? The key is to lock it in right away by teaching it to someone else. When you teach something, you get to learn it twice. Here's a simple way to do that. Leave a review on iTunes. Leave a review with your biggest takeaway from this episode. You could also post and share this podcast on your social media. It helps us spread our mission of building better, brighter brains. And of course, tag us. So our team can properly thank you. #KwikBrain, K-W-I-K Brain. Mine is @JimKwik, K-W-I-K, on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. So what does FAST stand for? Facebook, Apply, Subscribe, Teach. I'll see you in our next episode of Kwik Brain. Until then, remember, you are faster and smarter than you think.