What's up you guys, my name is Ian Kenrick. This is Ion Motive number 10. Super happy to have you, finally hitting double digits, so that's pretty awesome. It's gonna be a good one. This is actually the fifth time I've tried to record this episode, I did not like the first three at all. I just recorded it again, it turned out pretty good, and I realized my microphone wasn't on, so there's no sound. So here we go. Fifth try. I think this is the one, it's going to be the best one yet. Let's do it. Today, I'm going to be talking about which is better: waking up early, or going to bed late, being an early bird or a night owl? Straight up, here's my answer, and probably an obvious one, but I'm going to explain why. I think waking up early is more beneficial for a person who wants to establish a proper mindset, a resilient, strong, positive mindset, and a person who wants to work on their goals, who wants to accomplish their dreams and aspirations. I'll give specific reasons why. But if you want to do one of those two things, or both of those things, I think, or I've learned for me personally, it's better to wake up early, that might not be the case for you, you might be better, you might get more work done late at night. And if that's the case, you're. you're wrong. I'm completely kidding, completely kidding. It really comes down to what works for you. If you get more work done late at night, that's awesome. I'd actually love to hear your schedule, because I'm always looking to improve my own schedule. I think it's still important to both have both in early morning routine and a late night routine. But overall, I think it's better to wake up early than to stay up late. 

Before I get into the specific reasons why I think that, I'm going to discuss a little bit about my morning routine. So I try to do four things every morning. The first thing I try to do is give thanks. It's a great way to start the day. I'm just thankful for everything I have, I'm thankful for this life. I mean, really, is there a better way than starting my day off by giving thanks for everything? I don't know, I personally don't think so. But the second thing I try to do every morning is do some visual meditation, which I talked about much more in depth in my last episode, Ion Motive number nine. So if you haven't checked that out, I talked about how you can use meditation to overcome or deal with self doubt. So I'm not going to go into too much detail here. But overall, I do this to set the tone for the day. I prepare myself for challenges that might come, I see how I want the day to go. This meditation gives me a sense of direction. And it just again, one of those things that sets the mood for the day, sets the, sets the road, it gives me the the map as to how I want my day to go. The third thing I try to do is learn. I specifically do this through podcasts in the morning, because just a simple, simple way to do things, kind of get the blood flowing, just listening hearing somebody else's voice kind of wakes me up. And it's easy to do while I'm doing other things. What's amazing is how applicable the things I learned that morning might be later that day, whether it's a financial podcast, whether it's self improvement podcasts, whether it's something about psychology, motivation, you name it. It's amazing how intertwined everything is when it might not seem so. I can't tell you the amount of times I've learned something and then a day or two later, I go Oh, yeah, just like this. And I just learned it a day or two ago. It's mind blowing. The last thing I try to do every single morning is work on this page. Sometimes that's something small, sometimes it's just working on some thumbnails, creating some social posts. And sometimes it's big expansive work like writing a speech because I'm trying to give a speech at some point in the in the near future, hopefully, so I'll work on that, or it's editing a video because sometimes that can be the most difficult or the most unpleasant thing to do. So it's good to just get it out of the way early in the mornings. So those are the four things I try to do every single day: give thanks, meditate, learn, and work on my page. And if I skip out on one of those things, that day doesn't go as well as when I do every single one of those things. No matter which one I miss, I can tell I'm not as effective, I'm not as efficient. And let's say I miss my meditation. I usually try to take a minute or two later in the day and say okay, here we go. I'm gonna do this process. Because when I do all those things, the day simply goes better than when I don't. Additionally, I'll try to work out in the morning three days a week. The morning is a great time to work out, it's a powerful way to start the day, gets the oftentimes most difficult thing out of the way. I love it. Simply put, I think, working out in the morning is great for a couple of reasons, which again, I'll talk about later in the podcast when I get into more of the specifics. But for now, I'll just leave you with that.

Now that I've provided some context with my morning routines, let's get down into the specifics why I think early mornings are better than late nights. First of all, the morning is a great time to set the tone for the day. I obviously just talked about this a little bit with giving thanks, meditation, learning, things like that. Those are really important, those, those start your day off on a positive note. So no matter what happens, if you started the day off positive, you're more prepared than if you just kind of wake up and go. So for example, let's say I, so I personally, I try to go to bed at 10, wake up at six, I have pretty much two to three hours before I have, before I have school before I have something to go to, I can spend that time to prepare my mind, to prepare for how I want the day to go. But let's say I go to bed at 12, I wake up at eight and I have to be somewhere at 9, I'm more in a rush, I don't really start the day with intention, with a purpose with positivity. Because then I'm in way more of a rush, I kind of just got to get out of the bed and go, I got to just kind of stumble along. And I'm not prepared for what could potentially happen, whereas if I wake up in the morning, give my time, give myself time to, to think about some things I can do that. I can be more positive, I can be ready for challenges. It's awesome, and it's helped me so much with my anxiety, my OCD. It's, it's, honestly for me, it's become an essential. it's hard to do something like that late at night, because let's say you do those things, you can obviously give thanks and meditate at night. But a lot of the things, like the meditation, visually preparing for the day, If you just do that, and then go to bed, you don't get as much use out of it. If you work out and then go to bed, you're going have a harder time falling asleep. If you work out in the morning, you, it's actually super helpful. If you work out in the morning, you actually have more energy, and you tend to learn better. So that's another great tool. That's another great way to set the tone for the day. 

Reason number two: the mornings are a great time to to reflect and self assess. It's important to ask some of these questions. Why am I doing what I'm doing? In what ways could I be more effective? In what ways could I be more efficient? The morning is a great time to ask those questions. We need to be asking those questions. Sometimes it's really hard to, to disengage and take a step back and figure out ways to do things better, how to do things faster, or just remember your purpose, why you're doing the thing you're doing. It's easy to get caught up on, caught up in the playing field. But sometimes we need to disengage and watch from the stands, and think about some things, to self assess. Because if we're just engaged in the process all the time, it's this snowball effect where it just keeps building, building, building, and we're going and we can't really stop and we don't know where we're going, how we can be better, how we can be more efficient, things like that. I think those questions are harder to ask late at night because there's more going on. The world's busy, it's bustling. There's, simply put, there's not as much time for you to self isolate, to self assess, as there might be in the morning. It's peaceful, it's quiet. It's really just you and your thoughts. And you have to self, you have to self assess, no matter what you do. It's important to to think about how you can be better because that's going to push you to the next level. It's important to figure out ways to get things done faster, because that's going to push you to the next level more quickly. Those questions are necessary and the morning is just a great time to ask them and figure out the answers to them. 

That pretty much leads me to my third point: there are less distractions. It's great to get alone time. But it's hard to do that in this this crazy world, with social media, where we're constantly running around, but it's necessary. It's good to just be at peace, be alone. It's, quiet is nice. But that's hard to find later in the day later at night, just during the day. There's way more distractions. There's social media, there's sports games going on, there are so many things that would prevent you from establishing and working on your mindset, or working on your goals. If you wake up in the morning, you don't have those distractions, really. There's nothing going on the world is slow, the world is quiet. And you have a limited time to find that kind of peace. I think, I think you've got to find it in the morning. I have a hard time finding it at any other time during the day. So Reason number three, there are less distractions. 

And that kind of leads me to my next point. Reason number four: by waking up early, you can guarantee things get done. You have no excuse, because really, your only possible excuse is, "oh, I'm tired. I don't want to get out of bed," and that's not really a valid excuse. So for, for example, working out, a lot of people have a hard time convincing themselves to go to the gym, right? If I plan to workout at three o'clock, there are legit reasons that might come up that would prevent me from going to the gym. I might have a surprise pop test or a pop quiz, I might have, whatever it is, somebody might need my help on something, there are so many things that could potentially happen that really are less likely to happen in the morning. Nobody's going to call you. School hasn't started. There's no surprise test. There's nothing like that. It's a great time to get the hard work, the hard things out of the way. One of my biggest pet peeves is when people say they don't have time, and I'm kind of being hypocritical, because I say that when in reality I try to admit, okay, I just didn't prioritize my time. It's about priorities. If you actually want to get something done, and you are having a hard time doing so, do it in the morning, because you have no excuse. There is nothing else you really need to be doing at six in the morning, seven in the morning. Get it done, then. If I workout in the morning, as much as I might hate it, as much as I might hate getting out of bed sometimes. Especially now, I don't really hate the working out, I just hate getting out of the bed, getting in my car. Because you know, it's getting, It's getting cold. The days are okay, but it's getting to 30 degrees at night, it's just it's cold, right? It's sucks. But when I actually come back, when I when I walk out of the doors of the gym, the sun's shining and the birds are chirping. It's, It's awesome. I got, I, no matter what I accomplished something, I accomplished something difficult. In the morning, that sets the tone for the day, and it makes sure I get something done. 

The fifth and final reason I prefer to wake up in the morning is because I'm more likely to actually make use of the couple extra hours I have in the morning, then the couple extra hours I might have at night. For me personally, the time from 10 to 12 o'clock at night. nothing's really going on. And I think that's how it is for most people. I'll sit on my phone, I'll get up I'll go to the fridge, I'll grab a yogurt, I'll go back on my phone. I get up 10 minutes later, I go to the cupboard, I grab a granola bar, I go back qnd sit on my phone. It's just this constant cycle where really a lot of times, I'm wasting my time. On the flip side, if I go to bed at 10 and wake up at six instead of eight, I will get things done. I mean, there's literally nothing better for me to do, besides crawl back in bed, but if I actually get out of bed, there, like what, what is there to do besides working on your goals or establishing your mindset? Nothing. It is much, it's much easier to make use of that time for me personally, than, in the morning than it is late at night. 

So those are the five reasons and again, whatever works for you works for you. I think for the vast majority of people who are really striving to create a powerful mindset, a resilient mindset, or for the person who's trying to work on some huge goals, some huge dream, It's easier to to find time to work on those things in the morning than at late at night. It's worked for me I love waking up early now. It's kind of scary because I'm starting to enjoy Mondays, which is a good thing but also kind of kind of concerning at the same time. But overall, it's been a very enjoyable process. And I would highly encourage anybody who's considering waking up early, actually anybody, you might not be considering it, I highly encourage anybody who's trying to work on their mindset or their goals to wake up early. I would love to hear your thoughts on today's episode you can message me on Facebook or Instagram, and I would also love to hear your morning routine or your late night routine. How you You get things done. I would love to hear it, I'm always looking to learn, looking to try new things. But that's all I got for you. Other than that, hope you enjoyed this episode. Make sure to subscribe, wherever you're watching or listening to this so you can get notified when these episodes first come out. I'm trying to get him out every Tuesday morning. That doesn't always happen. So make sure you subscribe. But until next time, remember the Ion Motive: live a charged life!