I've always found it hard to wake up
early but as students we have no choice
it doesn't matter if you're a morning
person or a night person if class starts
at 7am you gotta be up I just hate how
it's always so hard to wake up early
every single morning
or is it after researching the science
of sleep and circadian clocks I learned
that by sticking to an evidence-based
morning routine consistently waking up
early can actually become bearable so
we're going over a simple yet highly
effective Mooring routine that takes
only five to ten minutes to do it's
effortless so you won't miss any days
it's completely free you don't need to
buy any new equipment and it becomes
easier over time the more consistent you
are so the first few pieces of science
come from Dr Andrew huberman and from
the book why we sleep by Matthew Walker
and it involves a chemical in our body
called cortisol we get a cortisol Spike
once a day when we wake up and as the
day goes by the cortisol comes down
until we sleep and then the whole cycle
starts again the cool thing is that we
can influence when this Spike happens
and we do this with light when light
hits our eyes it sends a signal to our
brain to support that cortisol Spike the
goal is to use light to line up high
cortisol with when we're awake and line
up low cortisol with when we're asleep
basically using light to Anchor our our
circadian rhythm but there are going to
be days when for example I'm feeling
lazy I snooze a lot I'm unable to
convince myself to get out of bed for
the entire morning and sometimes I don't
even see light in my eyes until like 11
A.M or noon time but what happens is my
cortisol Spike will be shifted to later
and I'll still be wide awake at midnight
when I'm trying to sleep so the goal is
to get sunlight soon after waking and
doing this consistently will anchor our
circadian rhythm and make it easier to
wake up around the same time every
morning but how exactly do we get light
into our eyes we're not taking a
flashlight and literally shining it into
our eyeballs we're also not going
outside and staring at the sun either
that would cause permanent damage
getting light into her eyes simply means
seeing light if I go outside in the
morning I'm surrounded by light and all
the photons around me being physically
outside is better than seeing light
through a window which is better than
seeing artificial light from a lamp or
something and even if it's cloudy or
foggy outside is still best because
you're getting it directly but honest
we're going to do whatever we can when I
was working in the hospital or on night
shifts I'm wide awake when the sun isn't
even up yet so I just got to make do
with artificial light so for our morning
routine the goal is to see as much light
as possible within one hour of waking up
at around the same time every day for
five to ten minutes definitely go
outside if you can let the light hit
your skin and get that vitamin D as well
but if you can't then open the curtains
or turn on all the overhead lights
that's the first part of the morning
routine next let's talk about energy you
know that groggy feeling you get in the
morning some of that is your body trying
to get over the chemical adenosine so
adenosine triphosphate also known as ATP
gives our body energy but when we use
ADP throughout the day it's broken down
and we're left with a buildup of
adenosine so the more that builds up the
more tired we get then when we're
sleeping our body gets rid of the
adenosine and the whole cycle starts
over again so that morning grogginess we
can just try to endure it but we can
also help body wake up faster one way is
through exercise it doesn't need to be a
full-on workout either five or ten
minutes is something simple like jogging
or jumping jacks is better than nothing
in a study from the book sleep smarter
found that early morning exercise even
for just five minutes will help you get
a better sleep the following night
another thing that people like to do to
block the effects of adenosine is to
drink caffeine the science here is that
caffeine blocks adenosine but it doesn't
get rid of it so for me a common thing
that happens is that I used to drink
coffee the moment that I wake up to help
me get over that groggy period but since
coffee only blocks adenosine and doesn't
get rid of it when the coffee wears off
all the adenosine comes flooding in and
I get that crash during midday so for
our morning routine Dr huberman
recommends that we delay drinking
caffeine for one and two hours after
waking up to help us prevent that midday
slump it's not easy to do so you can
start with delaying it for 15 minutes
and then going up from there next let's
talk about water we can lose about one
liter of water overnight while we're
sleeping and by the time we wake up
we're pretty dehydrated our brains are
about 80 percent water and even a two
percent deficiency can lower our mental
capacity so when we're sleeping we lose
water from our sweats from the humidity
in our breath plus when we wake up a lot
of us use the toilet and we lose even
more water so what does that mean for
our morning routine you want to drink a
glass of water right when you wake up to
rehydrate your brain and your body next
let's talk about temperature higher
temperature helps us wake up and cooler
temperature helps us go to sleep we've
already mentioned sunlight and exercise
which can both bring up our body
temperature but another thing that some
people do is to take cold showers the
cold water causes our core body
temperature to go up to counter balance
so it helps us wake up even more plus
we're shivering but let's be real I'm
not disciplined enough to be taking a
cold shower every day and I know that
not everyone takes showers in the
mornings either so if you're like me
what you can do is just enjoy your nice
warm morning shower and then for the
last 30 seconds you can turn it to cold
water before you get out so we just went
over three to five simple things that we
can do for our boring routine depending
on whether you drink caffeine or if you
take morning showers you could pretty
much do all of these things at the same
time so for me within an hour of waking
up I try to go outside for sunlight or I
just go next to the window with my glass
of water I do about five to ten minutes
of light exercise and all these things
sunlight water exercise they have the
added bonus of elevating my mood
contrast that with the lazy version of
myself right the person who stays in bed
for like an hour after waking up I'm
still on my phone I'm in the dark
there's no light there's no water no
exercise just kind of lying there that's
what I used to do a lot on weekends and
I realized that I was able to be more
productive and win back my weekends by
sticking to a simple morning routine
every day so make sure you prioritize
light energy water and temperature in
your morning routine for the best best
effect throughout the day it's super
easy to implement right now or tomorrow
morning if you want to and guess what
our simple night routine follows the
same scientific principles as well so
check it out right here if you want to
get that quality sleep to rejuvenate
your mind and your body