- So I've really avoided making a morning routine video,
specifically because I feel like there's just
so many of them on YouTube,
and I feel like morning routines are generally overrated.
Everyone's seen thumbnails on YouTube of like,
"The One Morning Routine That Will Change Your Life."
Actually, that sounds like something that I would make.
Elon Musk, morning routine revealed.
The secret morning routine of every billionaire
who ever lived, apparently.
They all did this one morning routine
and it's the reason they're successful.
But at the same time though,
there's a reason I'm making this video.
And it's because if there's one thing that my life
has been lacking in the past year or so,
it's been structure.
I feel like a lot of people have felt the same way.
It's kind of a meme that people don't really know
what day it is, half the time,
and I think people are starting to realize
that it feels good to have to be somewhere,
to have responsibilities, to have appointments and meetings.
It makes you feel more human.
So if our life circumstances has presented a situation
where there's way less structure,
I think it's important that we invite more structure
and more responsibility into our life voluntarily.
One of the main ways that I started to do that
in my life was by actually adding a morning routine,
having a game plan every time I wake up,
and having a sequence of events that I partake in
that both make me feel like I'm starting the day
on the right foot, and that I'm contributing to society
and moving my life forward.
So this video is going over what I do,
and hopefully it'll give you some ideas
as to what you can start doing
to add more structure into your life and gain momentum,
get the ball moving again.
So every morning I wake up at 9:00 a.m.,
and right off the bat, that's not that early,
but I'm a huge night owl.
If left to my own devices,
I'll fall asleep around 3:00 a.m. every single night.
So after I wake up, the most important thing I do,
or not do is I don't look at my phone.
I don't go on social media.
I won't go on Reddit, I won't go on Facebook.
I won't go on Instagram.
I grab my gray hoodie off the little closet door in my room
and I march downstairs.
And after I walked downstairs, I'll walk into the kitchen
where I'll start boiling the water for coffee.
And while that's heating up,
I'll lay down a large glass of cold water.
Allegedly, this gets your metabolism going or something,
which doesn't really make sense to me,
because there's no calories in water.
But at the very least, it kind of wakes you up.
Cold glass of water in the morning will wake you up,
maybe because it makes your brain cold or something.
Anyways, I'll also down a athletic greens shake.
They're not sponsoring this video or anything,
that's just the brand I'm using right now.
I might switch to another one. You never know.
And I also have two drops of this vitamin D complex.
And I use the green shake to wash down
my medicinal mushroom blend of lions mane,
reishi and cordyceps.
I think that's how you pronounce it.
I don't really know if any of this shit does anything,
but I'm a lifelong sucker for pretending that it does.
So after the water's done boiling,
I'll use an AeroPress to squeeze
out a nice juicy cup of coffee.
I think AeroPress makes really great coffee,
even better than pour over.
And I know I'm triggering everybody from Portland.
Sometimes if I'm feeling really fancy,
I'll add a tablespoon of MCT oil and I will blend it,
so I got this nice blended MCT, oily coffee.
Allegedly this kind of Bulletproof coffee
increases gray matter in the brain or something.
I don't even know if that's true,
but I find that the most useful part
of making coffee like this,
is that it helps stave off hunger,
and hunger is extremely distracting when I'm writing.
So when all that's done, I walk into my office,
I sit down on my chair, I light a candle.
I put my hood up.
I set a timer for one hour, and I write.
And like a monk praying at the chapel at Dawn,
writing for one hour every single morning
is something that I'm starting to take
almost religiously seriously.
So the whole idea around this odd sequence of events
is that it's all surrounding a central activity,
it's an almost sacred ritualistic act
that prepares the way for the main event, which is writing.
And there's a reason why I've chosen writing
as the central activity instead of editing,
or shooting B-roll or responding to emails.
It's because I've identified writing
as the backbone of my entire career.
Without me putting pen to paper or finger to keyboard,
I will have nothing to talk about in front of the camera,
which means I'll have nothing to edit and nothing to upload.
And when I have a script or a set of ideas
that I think is really tight and that I'm really proud of,
I'm infinitely more excited to talk about it
and share my thoughts in front of the camera.
And if I think what I'm sharing
in front of the camera is super tight and well thought out,
then I'm infinitely more likely
to not procrastinate the living out of editing it.
Even shooting the B-roll is way more fun
when I know the overall product is something
that I'm really proud of.
So the overall fulfillment of my life
and what I do on a day-to-day basis
rides pretty heavily on me doing a good job of the writing.
Unfortunately though,
writing is also something I hate doing.
Ever since I started this channel,
writing has been the thorn in my side.
It's the thing that I procrastinate the most by far,
mostly because compared to being all cinematic and artsy
with my B-roll and editing funny memes into my editing.
Editing funny memes into my editing,
writing is super, like excruciatingly mundane in comparison.
You're just sitting there,
hitting your fingers against plastic,
trying to siphon out some kind of gold,
but it's usually coal.
That's the narrative I have in my head anyways,
and it's this narrative of writing being dreadful
that adds a lot of fuel to this feeling of resistance.
The resistance that stops me
from just sitting down and working.
And the longer I put it off,
the more the resistance grows in power.
And before I made writing the first thing
that I do every single morning,
I'd postpone writing for as long as possible.
For hours and hours, days, and days,
I would do every single other thing
other than just sitting down and writing.
But the hilarious thing is,
it's actually not that hilarious, it's just sad.
The resistance I feel towards writing
is a lot more unpleasant than the writing itself.
Once I start writing, it's actually quite pleasant,
and peaceful, and dare I say, I actually really enjoy it.
You know, it's kind of sucky at first,
maybe for the first five or 10 minutes.
but very soon after I've settled down,
my brain has slowed down and I get into the flow
every single time.
It's like clockwork.
Which has really made me realize that a lot of the time,
the resistance that we feel towards doing
the most important thing that we have to do in a day
is more unpleasant than just doing the thing itself.
And if we eventually have to do the thing itself,
after a long enough timeline,
then why add all of this suffering in between
before we just engage with the suffering of action?
It's like suffering twice.
Why suffer twice when you can just suffer once?
And when you structure your day like this,
you wake up, you do these fancy things to set the stage
for this important thing that you have to do,
and you get in the habit
of actually doing this thing every single morning,
there's a certain level of existential security
that you'll start to feel.
You don't have this dark cloud
looming over your head all the time.
You will live most of the day
as somebody who has done that thing already,
rather than someone who has to do that thing.
Maybe you're working a job that you don't really like,
and you have this side hustle
that you keep on fantasizing about as you're way out,
schedule one hour to work on it
every single morning non-negotiable
or maybe you're enjoying your career,
and you have to show up to work
in a brick and mortar building.
But usually you have tasks to do,
and you should do the most important task first
doing the most important thing
that you have to do every single morning,
getting that fat monkey off your back
and throwing it to the side or killing it,
but it's kind of an immortal monkey,
'cause you kill it one day and it'll show up the next day.
But if you get in the habit of doing that,
you'll start to walk around life
with the exaggerated swagger of a monkey-killing psychopath.
You'll just feel so good.
And you'll free up so much time later
in the day to learn new things.
And there's no better way to learn new things
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I have my Fujifilm camera,
and I really want to take it out more
and work on my composition.
And the classes on Skillshare are often really inspiring.
There are so many talented instructors on there,
and they really get me just craving the outdoors
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learn something new, explore your creativity.
And as usual, have a great time.
If you liked this video, make sure you hit like,
because when you hit like, the algorithm blesses me
and it shoves my bald head
into other people's homepages, helping them out,
and it also helps me out.
And if they're gonna get a notification on their phone,
it might as well be about content
telling them to not spend so much time on their phone.
And if you watch Better Ideas regularly
and you say to yourself,
"This is kind of a cool channel.
"Joey seems like a cool guy."
Why don't you subscribe to my second channel?
Check that out.
I've been posting there every single week,
I have a show called, "Joey Answers Your Questions."
The show, it's extremely meme-y,
It's a lot more laid back,
but I'm personally having a great time with the videos,
and you guys seem to be having a great time too.
We also have a Better Ideas subreddit.
You guys are posting tons of memes there,
and I will react to them on the second channel,
and I have been reacting to them on the second channel.
The links for those are in the description
or probably on this video somewhere.
Other than that, thanks so much for watching
and we'll catch you in the next video.
(gentle music)