- 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 than by using today's
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class on Skillshare. I have my Fujifilm camera, and I really want to take it out more and work on my composition. And the classes on Skillshare
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just craving the outdoors and wanting to shoot everything
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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)
