The Law of The Morning - some unusual science-based reasons why the morning is vital to your productivity
Emerson said that the entire universe is based on a handful of laws. Well, so is productivity – and one of those foundational laws is what I call the Law of the morning.
But what is so special about the morning anyway? Perhaps you have heard the virtues of the morning routine being touted by high achievers (and those who study them) the world over. There are blogs, books and programs dedicated to dissecting and analyzing the morning routines of successful individuals from various fields and industries. Yet what is it about the morning that has us obsessed?
In this article, I will show you things about the morning that make it so special. I have limited this to things that are true only about the morning – in other words, for most people, these conditions will hold true ONLY in the morning. And they impact your productivity directly or indirectly. Let us begin.
But first…
I need to clarify here that, in this article, when I say “morning”, I mean when you wake up. Of course, I advocate waking up earlier than later but at the same time, I advocate you get adequate sleep too. The point is, whether you are a morning person or evening person, your “morning” as far as this article is concerned is when you wake up after your longest sleep of the day. For most of us, that will be in line with the day and night cycles of the earth. And so, that will be the approach of this article. If you are truly a night person (very few truly are) – you can adapt this information for your use. And maybe in the future, I will publish an article specifically for the owls among us.
So what makes the morning so special for productivity?
Mental Prime
Your hormones are optimized for maximum physical and mental productivity in the morning. It may not feel that way as you clamber out of bed to the tune of the alarm clock, but it is. This out-of-it feeling you experience is your body and mind “boot-up”. Technically, this is called sleep inertia and it is a period where you come out fully of a sleepy state.
Sleep studies show that this period of “sleep inertia” displays some very intriguing brain patterns. And some people working in creative fields swear by this period as being almost magical for its ability to furnish inspiration to solve difficult problems.
Whether this is true or not, I am sure you will agree that the morning provides an unequalled sense of calm and poise before we are bombarded by the demands of the day. Therefore, use this time to do your most mentally demanding work. The feeling won't last forever.
Shakespeare is quoted as saying that the minute we are born, we begin to die.
Poetic, sure, but a bit simplistic to my mind. In any case, there is a more accurate metaphor that serves our purposes here – the minute we wake up, we start to fall asleep.
Once awake, we start to fall asleep
The slow buildup of sleep-inducing hormones and depletion of sleep inhibiting hormones means that we gradually slow down over the course of the day reaching slug pace around early to mid-afternoon (between 12 and 2 pm). If we do nap at this time, we experience an energy boost as sleep pressure is relieved. But then the slow march to the duvet begins again once we are awake reaching its nexus late in the evening. And then we sleep, wake up the next morning and do it all over again. This is our Circadian Rhythm at work and this is such a powerful natural phenomenon that we are better off working with it than against it.
You see therefore that even if we did nap sufficiently midday – a strategy that dismally few adults have the intention or luxury of implementing – we still would have only two relatively brief periods of the typical day when our minds would be at their best. In terms of optimizing our productivity, I call this phenomenon the principle of two peaks.
The Principle of 2 peaks
The principle of two peaks describes the two peaks we experience during the course of the typical day.
The first peak, you see is in the morning. This peak is especially powerful because, having not engaged in the hustle and bustle of the day, this peak has the added advantage of being relatively void of distractions and mental drags and drains.
The afternoon peak is useful too but, as stated earlier, most do not experience it at all due to the nature of our work schedules. Most organizations are only now waking up to the importance of sleep and only a pitifully small percentage put processes in place to support afternoon naps. Therefore, sadly, for most, sufficiently restful afternoon naps are relegated to days off.
Others induce this peak with chemicals i.e caffeine. This works. However, because caffeine can produce dependency (dare I say, addiction?), the question of long-term sustainability comes into play.
Whatever camp you fall into regarding high-noon snoozes, the basis remains that even when it occurs, the afternoon peak lacks the feature of clear-headedness that is natural to the morning peak. Therefore, make the most of the morning especially for any activities that require focus. Save the mindless stuff for later – maybe the afternoon.
Speaking of clear-headedness, let us now consider another feature of the morning that makes it so special and powerful for productivity.
Waking up with a clear head in the morning
Research funded by the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) has linked sleep with “brain-cleaning” – the detoxification of the brain - potentially leading to improved flexibility of thought and mental performance. Not to be confused with “brain-washing” – the process of screwing with the mind leading to hampered flexibility and mental performance.
Science is proving more and more that the clear head feeling of you have in the morning after a good night of sleep is beyond metaphor. To quote a report by the National Institute for Health,
A mouse study suggests that sleep helps restore the brain by flushing out toxins that build up during waking hours. The results point to a potential new role for sleep in health and disease. - National Institute for Health
This tells us that sleep clears toxins from our brains. However, similar to sleep-inducing hormones, toxins start to accumulate in our systems as we go through the day. Therefore, it is safe to say that our brains are at their “cleanest and clearest” in the morning. Pipes and tubes are unclogged and screens are squeaky clean. Things flow better and we see, metaphorically speaking, more clearly.
I don’t know about you, but for me, this means many things – better judgement, more focus, quicker recall, more mental agility etc. All of which can do magical things for your productivity – at least from a cognitive standpoint. Yet another reason to love (and make the most of) the morning. Now let’s talk about your big ego – another reason why it is important to make the most of the morning.
Your ego is high – and that’s good
No, this does not mean that you are at your most obnoxious or annoying in the morning. Although, for some of us, it does – especially when we have not had our coffee. For our purposes though, the term ego references ego depletion. Ego depletion is a psychological phenomenon in which our willpower (our self-control if you will – named the ego by psychologists) weakens over the course of the day – reaching its minimum usually around the late evening. Ego depletion is implicated in your tendency to want to just flop onto the couch, eat potato chips and binge watch mindless TV after a particularly hard day at work. You seem less patient and attentive with your partner, children or housemates. And you wonder why. Well, remember, around 1 pm when you forced yourself to finish that report even though you'd rather have taken a nap? Or at 3.30 when you restrained yourself from telling Jim what you really thought about his "strategic plan"? That was your willpower tank leaking away, or your ego being depleted. Having used up a large portion of your willpower reserve to compel or restrain yourself over the course of many different situations during the work day, by evening, you are running on fumes.
How does this relate to the magic of the morning?
Well, in the morning, you are fresh from a good rest and a willpower refill. Therefore, if there is any particularly difficult, mentally demanding or undesirable but essential task you need to do, give yourself the best chance at actually doing it – schedule it as the first thing you do in the morning. You know, while your tank is full, instead of leaving it to later when you might not have enough gas to go through with it and you find yourself procrastinating. And as the day progresses, move more into simpler, easier and more rote activities that you do not have to think too much about to perform well.
Now on to the fourth, and for this article, the final reason the morning is such a powerful time for you and your productivity.
Mornings - time for some quiet time
For most of us, the early mornings are a fairly quiet time of the day. Our children, spouses and even co-workers are in bed. The roads are less busy and there can be a general serenity that doesn’t last very long as the hours go by. Therefore, getting up a bit earlier (even just 15 minutes) means that you can get more out of this quiet time. Why wouldn’t you take advantage of this? You get to do the things that matter to you! You have more control – you can pursue activities in line with your vision and not just what’s in sight. You can reflect, meditate or just do some flippin’ high-value work!
Granted this advantage may not apply to you if you wake up later in the morning. If you roll out of bed at 9:30 am, you may not benefit a lot from the overall calm and quiet as fellow humans are likely already out and about shuffling their feet, revving their car engines and flipping newspaper pages. But if you get into the habit of waking up an hour or two ahead of your fellow Homo sapiens, you could benefit as much from the quiet outside your ears as you do from the one in-between.
Manufactured quiet?
By itself, this point may not be convincing since, technically, you can create quietness deliberately during your day. You can retreat to a quiet room, sit in a chapel near you or don your hi-tech noise cancelling headphones while playing Bach By The Sea.
Aside from the fact that few of us ever really make time to practice these regenerative processes (we sometimes forget our lunch breaks for goodness sake!), there is the question of synergy as well. You see, in sync with the other advantages of the morning already highlighted in this article, I am sure you will agree that you will get a lot more out the morning quiet than any other you may manufacture or orchestrate later in the day. So, if you have a chance to create quiet pockets during your day, by all means, please do so. These can be great boosts (and boons) for you as you go about your day. But the early morning quiet can effortlessly furnish a special blend of internal and external quietness that is difficult to replicate once the business of doing stuff is underway.
Morning matters
You may have been cruising through this part of your day like a landowner sitting unknowingly on a gold mine. But now that you know all the ways in which nature has conspired to make the morning a truly magical time of the day for you to do and be your best, I do hope you will take advantage of it. A few extra minutes can go a long way. Carpe Diem.
Until the next post, be your best and do your best.
