Creating New Habits and Neural Pathways
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In this episode I explore the various ways to create the habit of waking up at 4:30 AM. I have always been a night owl. In high school, my mom would have to pour water on me to wake me up. As a seasoned night owl I always envied people that got up super early. I’ve tried over the years to commit to getting up 2 or 3 hours before I have to be anywhere, but it never lasted more than a few weeks at a time. Then I can across Mel Robbins. She’s a motivational speaker and life coach that Kim turned me on to. She has a method that works well for getting up early. It’s ridiculously simple but it works for me. Mel uses this technique for not only waking up but anything that she wants to begin or end. She calls it the 5 second rule. It goes something like this. When my alarm goes off I count back from 5 and when I’m done I get up out of bed. Like I said, very simple, but not exactly easy. The logic behind this is to take action before my brain has time to come up with excuses for not getting up early. My brain is amazing at rationalizing and coming up with perfectly logical reasons for not getting up. The snooze button seemed to be designed just for meUnfortunately, this is a slippery slope. I typically hit that button anywhere between 5-10 timesThe bad part is this is a horrible way to start the day. The first thing I’m doing in my day is procrastinating and it sets the tone. A friend of mine recently released his fifth album. The Infinite Calling is the name of his project and the album is called Beyond the Illusion. It's an ambient guitar project and although it’s instrumental the songs tell a story. Dan really pushes the limits on what a guitar can sound like on Beyond the Illusion. You can find it at https://theinfinitecalling.bandcamp.com/ as well as Spotify and Amazon. Mel Robbins: https://melrobbins.com/