The Morning Shift: The One Thing You Can Do Each Morning to Change Everything Else

What if one simple shift in your morning routine could change everything else in your day—your focus, your energy, your peace, your purpose?

In this episode of Default to Yes, Nurse Coach and Aromacognition founder Juli Reynolds breaks down the science and soul behind The Morning Shift—a practical, evidence-based framework to train your brain before the day trains you.

You’ll learn:

• Why the first minutes - even the first 10 minutes-  after waking are your brain’s most powerful window for rewiring
• How to use light, breath, hydration, movement, and mindset to regulate your nervous system
• The neurochemistry of calm, focus, and motivation — and how to activate it naturally
• Simple aromatherapy pairings that anchor new neural pathways and create lasting habits

This isn’t another morning checklist. It’s a ritual of regulation—helping you move from reactivity to intentionality, from rush to rhythm.

🎁 Download your free guide: The Morning Shift  — and design a morning that energizes your body, focuses your mind, and aligns your day with who you’re becoming.
 👉 Coachingwithjuli.com/morningshift

or get on the list and I'll send the episodes, bonus materials and any guide that goes with the episode, right to you inbox! 

Because how you start your day determines how you live your life.

Transcript

0:59

I learned a very important lesson this week, and I wish I could say that it's not a mistake that I repeat from time to time, but this week it was very pronounced, very obvious what I had done and what I didn't do, and how that made a difference. in conversation with some of my clients, I'm learning that we're a lot of times making the same mistake over and over again We're gonna talk about how we prevent it, how we see it coming, and how we bounce back when it happens to us. This could make all the difference in our energy and focus and feeling really good about the way we show up in the world, how we are making a contribution, how we are growing and about our overall wellbeing. We're gonna talk about how to start every day defaulting to extraordinary. All right. As we train our brains to cooperate with us in the way we wanna show up in the world, we need to start with what I call the morning shift, before you shift into your day, your brain is already shifting into motion. the question is, who's gonna lead that shift? Is it your notifications, your to-do list, your thoughts about yesterday, or are you. Calling the shots. Are you leading it? Are you tapping into that prefrontal cortex? Are you doing everything that you can to set your day up for success? When you wake up, your brain moves from that theta state, that dreamy subconscious state into beta. That's that alert and active mode. this transition is gold. During those first 30 to 60 minutes after waking, your brain is incredibly, Trainable. This is neuroplasticity at work It's open to influence, suggestion, and patterning, and it's setting that neural tone for the entire day. Dr. Andrew Huberman calls this the neurochemical window, This is a time when your brain's chemistry is aligning. Circadian rhythms cortisol levels and dopamine systems. If you wake up and grab your phone scroll on social media or look at texts you missed, if you rush or react, you wire your brain for stress and reactivity. you're letting someone else set your agenda for the day. But if you pause and breathe and set an intention, you wire it for focus and calm. And this does not happen on automatic it still is a conscious choice, and sometimes that starts the night before. This isn't about perfection, it's about protection, protecting your mind before the world gets to it, so that you can show up in the world the way you want to instead of always bending to everyone else's agenda, Narratives that run in the background that sometimes go unnoticed. So let's talk about why morning routines work and why they fail research from the American Psychological Association shows that consistent morning routines lower stress, increase executive function, and improve emotional regulation. But here's the thing, most people try to copy someone else's perfect morning instead of designing your own. That is where we go wrong. people tend to wake up early, do some kind of physical exercise. A lot of people were for a while doing cold plunges and journal meditation, running or walking, hitting the gym right away, drinking the green juice, and then you crash by Wednesday. It's not sustainable. It's because that routine without rhythm leads to resistance, and your brain craves rhythm. think of your morning as a ritual of regulation, not just another checklist. you're not just trying to do more, you're teaching your nervous system to be more aligned, aligned with who you want to be, how you want to live your day, how you want to show up in the world. every day you wanna get up and default to your extraordinary self, and this is how you do it. I call mine the morning shift, so I'm gonna share with you that framework, and I'm also gonna give you an opportunity to get my guide. my guide is not a Here's how you do it exactly. 1, 2, 3. It's a lot of different ingredients that you can pick from and customize your own routine. maybe you have 30 minutes, maybe you have five minutes, maybe you have an hour. It doesn't really matter. What matters is that you do something. let me walk you through what I call the morning shift. For me, it's five simple science backed steps that prime the brain and body and spirit for the day, and each one builds on the previous following how your nervous system and circadian rhythm naturally function. Now, there isn't a specific order in which you have to do these things You do something that you will actually do. That's how you make it sustainable. first of all, stepping into natural light within 30 minutes of waking is a good idea. sometimes that's just walking out on the porch. a lot of times I go to work and it's still dark, so that's not possible. You could rely on artificial light. sunlight hits the retina signaling your body's internal clock, and it's to start the day. Cortisol rises naturally and energy stabilizes, and melatonin resets for Better sleep tonight. I like to use aromatherapy, so my aroma cognition tip would be to inhale wild orange and peppermint that sensory cue anchors alertness and optimism. I'm also gonna teach you a breath technique that may have the same impact if you don't have access to light in the morning. breathe before you scroll, and never pick up your phone until you've done a couple of these things and set your morning routine in motion. It's a trap and I fell into it this week. even if your app guides you in your morning shift, choose one activity that does not require you to touch your phone. breathe first, your first breath pattern. Set your vagal tone for the day. try a two minute box, breath. Inhale for four, hold for four. Exhale for four and hold for four. This activates the parasympathetic nervous system and it calms your heart rate and focuses you or prefrontal cortex. This is your decision making center. You could pair that with frankincense or bergamo. Both of those are shown in research to lower cortisol and support cognitive clarity. another thing, and this is one of the first things I do because I don't need my phone to do it, and that's hydrate. Your brain is about 75% water and overnight it loses hydration through respiration. mild dehydration, even 2%. can impair memory and attention and mood. So before caffeine, before coffee hydrates. So a glass of water before you grab your coffee Again. These thing, that one thing, having a glass of water, I like to keep my water bottle by my bed so I can just, throw my feet over the side of the bed. I can do some stretches and reach for my water all before reaching for my phone. So before caffeine hydrate, add some trace minerals or squeeze of lemon to help your cells reenergize. That would introduce some novelty to your water. I like to put some essential oils, like lemon or grapefruit, tangerine, into my water. Those both enhance dopamine and motivation as well. citrus. Oils are known to be uplifting and cleansing. so you're enhancing your overall wellbeing, doing a lot of good things for your body mind, and spirit as you drink that water. All right. the fourth component that I would com include would be moving movement releases, brain derived neurotrophic factor BDNF. It's, it is kind of a miracle growth for neurons. You don't need an hour long workout either, this isn't just. if you have time to hit the gym or run five miles. Neither one of those or would be things that I routinely would do, and I won't probably do them consistently every single day. But 10 minutes of stretching, even five minutes of stretching, yoga, or brisk walking is enough to signal your brain that you are in motion and ready to lead Now if you need guidance on that, there are so many YouTube videos out there with stretching routines yoga moves, and even brisk walking in place dance routines. You don't actually even need a structured routine. Just move your body intentionally for five to 10 minutes. that is actually something you could do even while you're waiting for your coffee to brew. as far as oils go, this is when I pull out my eucalyptus or peppermint to open the lungs, make breathing easier and clear. Some of the mental fog. I like to put these oils in my shower, so I will drop a couple oil. Drops of oil into the shower, it creates that spa-like experience and gives me the benefits of eucalyptus or peppermint to open my lungs to clear that mental fog and bring that alert into focus. Mindset before mechanics. this is the fifth necessary component of every morning routine. How you choose to do it is completely up to you. I'm gonna give you some tips. if you're really like, I don't know what to do, then schedule a chat with me. I'd love to spend 20 minutes on the phone with you, completely free and no obligation, just ironing out this morning routine. What I get out of it is you get a morning routine and I feel like, we all need a morning routine. I think if everybody had an effective morning routine, the world would be such a better place. before going back to mindset, before mechanics, before you dive into any tasks, set the state. write one intention or affirmation, and you don't have to get complicated about this, just how do you want your day to feel. It could be as simple as just asking that question when I end this day. What would I like to have accomplished? Or what would I like it to feel like when I end this day? So some of the affirmations that are in my journal that I pulled out was today I choose to show up with clarity and calm. One was I trained my brain for possibility, not panic. This was when I was going through some somatic healing and really tapping into some of my nervous system, issues. I had got my nervous system all jacked up on a story. I was responding to something as if it was a threat when it really wasn't. I needed to reset that. So I was training my brain for possibility, not panic. these are very personal. They have to be true, just ask yourself, what do you want this day to feel like? What do you want to accomplish today? And make that your intention. if you have a difficult relationship at work, maybe it's to remain calm and to be a listener, to be curious Have a really busy day. Maybe it is just to be present and focused, whatever that is for you. it's very personal, but you want to make sure that you set that state for how you really wanna show up. even when it does get hijacked by some circumstance, you can easily pull yourself back to that intention and get yourself back on track. If you don't set that intention and you let other people drive your agenda, you get outta bed quickly and scroll on social media, grab your things and head off into the day. You're really subjecting yourself to your mood, other people's moods, the Low energy, the responsive or reactivity to the amygdala and how you start to, how you feel. We never want to be at the mercy of how we feel. That's the lesson I learned this week I had had a busy work stretch and I was tired and really just wanted some relaxation, but I didn't get intentional about that, so I woke up and I felt lazy. I didn't feel like doing anything. And so what happened is that because I didn't do the morning routine. I got up, I got my coffee. I think I read for a while, a book that I'm really enjoying now. Had that been my intention to just get up and read a book for enjoyment. I probably would've felt better about it, but I felt more like it was a default mode and I was avoiding some other things that I needed to do or I wanted to accomplish. That day, I had intentions of working out. I didn't do that. I had intentions of meal prepping for the rest of the week. I didn't do that, so I had a. Yucky day, at the end of the day, I didn't feel good about it and I knew that I needed to reset. in the evening review, I was honest with myself and I said, you cannot let this happen to you again tomorrow. You need to. Be showing up in the world, in the way that you really want to so that you can feel good about it. this doesn't mean you have to have a gazillion things to do. Like I said, if my intention would have been set ahead of time, if I would have chosen to just read for fun and that's what I wanted for the day, that would've been enough. But it wasn't enough because it wasn't what I wanted. It was a default mode, a reaction mode, and I did it out of, survival instead of thriving. it feels like lack of motivation and this is what we don't want. We wanna create that motivation and if we wait for motivation every time, we'll never get anything done and we'll never be really showing up and finding out what we're capable of. And being able to just really live the life that we're called to will end up drifting to somewhere where we. don't mean to be, I know that when I talk about this, sometimes people think that this is a lot of effort, but it's a lot of energy and a lot of effort to have a crappy day too. So you might as well do something nice for yourself. show yourself some love and turn that energy into something you can feel really good about. we're gonna set some intentions and train our reticular activating system that brains filter to notice opportunities aligned with what you value most take a few minutes of gratitude journaling or visualization strengthens that prefrontal cortex and reinforces emotional stability throughout the day. picture what you're grateful for. Picture how you want things to go, and your brain will go to work. Finding evidence for what you know is possible. some of the oils that I like to use for this is cedarwood for grounding lavender or, rose for compassion. So these are all different tools and based on how my intention for the morning goes, I might take one of those oils with me during the day to remind myself to train my brain to go to that intention as a default. Now why this all works? Let's bring it full circle. The morning shift isn't about doing more, it's about activating the systems that already exist within you. So light resets the circadian rhythm. Breath regulates your vagus nerve. Hydration fuels that cellular energy movement increases dopamine and BDNF. Mindset, primes your neural pathways for purpose. You're not just starting your day, you're shaping your neurochemistry. I think that's a beautiful thing. I love that about how we are wired, how we are created, because as we learn more about it, we can really tap into what we are called for, what we are created for. You don't need perfection. You need consistency. You can have a quote unquote bad day. You can have a lazy day. You can have a day where you get up and your only intention is to read a book for fun. That's fantastic. Just show up in the world the way you really want to and do it on purpose. Now let's take a moment and just pause together. Let's take a deep breath in and exhale slowly. Do that one more time. Deep breath in and exhale slowly, and ask yourself, what kind of day am I preparing my brain for? Because every morning is a chance to begin again. It's a rehearsal for the life that you're creating. Now, I mentioned before, I've created a free guide to help you design your own morning shift routine. You can call it what you want, you can order it how you want. it can be five minutes or an hour. either way, just do it. It's rooted in neuroscience, aromatherapy, and lifestyle medicine. It's not a one size fits all plan. It's a framework that helps you build your own rhythm. The guide was intended to offer ingredients. I do share my entire routine with you, and an alternative one for when I have five minutes, one for when I have 30. the important thing is to customize it to make it your own. You'll find a checklist, intention setting prompts, and essential pairings for each ritual. download your free morning shift guide, just go to coaching with julie.com. It's right there on the front page. scroll down to the notes and subscribe so you don't miss any episodes. Share this episode with a friend. Click the link and download your guide if you are already on the email. I'm already going to be sending this guide to you, so just watch your inbox for that, if that's something that you'd like. So you don't have to find the link, or you're driving and worried that you'll forget. Just make sure you get on the list and every time I put a guide with the episodes, I'll send it right to you. the morning shift is important because how you start your day determines how you live your life. Thanks for joining me for this episode of Default to Yes. if you found this helpful, share it with a friend who's ready to take back their mornings and their mindset. Do that together. that could be fun too. Remember, You don't have to chase calm You can train for it. Until next time, here's to your next morning shift may be full of light breath, movement and purpose. I'm Julie, and I'm on the journey with you as you get up every day and default to yes, your extraordinary self.