Transcription
Every successful person, from Elon Musk to Cristiano Ronaldo, swears by their morning routine. It's their secret weapon. So, I broke down the habits of the world's top achievers to create the ultimate morning routine that guarantees productivity, and I'm going to be putting it to the test.
You know what they say: every successful morning starts with an early night. So, it's 8:00 p.m., and we're getting ready for bed. As you can see, the blinds are open, and that's because Richard Branson leaves his blinds open for the sun to naturally wake him at around 5:00 a.m.
Now, I'm from Canada, and it's winter here. We don't get sunlight, period. Since I'm not living in the Virgin Islands in June, I have a backup plan. Retired Navy SEAL Jocko Willink sets his alarm for 4:30 a.m. to the song "Iron Swan." It's something that he calls an escalating alarm. It starts off nice and mellow, and if you don't get up in time, it's coming. I'm scared for that.
I feel so exposed right now; I might as well just drop the sex tape. I really hope my neighbors don't have binoculars, or else they're going to see something else.
The vibe of the song is making me just want to hit a hookah and then pass out, not leap out of bed and seize the day.
Good morning, everybody! As you can see, it's as dark as my diary the year I had puberty, and my usual little morning greeter hasn't even risen. Out of sheer curiosity, I'm going to let the song play out because I'm just so curious about what's going to happen. While I do that, we're going to drop down and do some push-ups.
Simon Cowell does 150 push-ups every morning. It's one of the things that helped him lose 50 lbs. Also, it didn't take long for me to figure out exactly what Jocko meant by an escalating alarm.
Yeah, that's a trauma alarm. That's some hell week type. You knew it was coming, didn't you?
Cristiano Ronaldo takes a cold shower every single morning. Who else hates themselves? I want to wake up feeling like a champion, not inferior to a baby carrot. But everyone says it's good for you. I heard a guest on Joe Rogan say that, which is everyone, I guess.
I never really know: am I supposed to bring shampoo and body wash in, or is this just supposed to be sheer torture? This is easily the worst one minute of my life that I can recall. I think ever since my dad gave me the birds and the bees talk.
But the amount of benefits of a cold shower is really hard to pass up on. It really can only get better from there.
I made my bed; here's some proof. Apparently, this simple chore can make you more productive the rest of your day. Then, I went downstairs to make a coffee.
Ed Catmull makes a drink consisting of three espressos, three tablespoons of cocoa powder, and some sweetener. He says this helps him think better. So, Ed, you're telling me this helps you think better? What's in your cocoa, Ed?
I think another name for this thing is a crackhead's Redeye mocha. If you need this first thing in the morning, you probably should have stayed in bed just a little bit longer.
Oh my gosh, that's a heart attack hot chocolate! Whoa! It's definitely not the consistency that I would describe coffee to be. It's pretty thick; I could almost maybe seal a wound with it. I think that this might just help him think better because anything less than this might just be instant withdrawal.
It is so strong! If you have a child you're looking to wean onto caffeine, this could be a good start.
Now, if you think that this drink is different, Warren Buffett, first thing in the morning, has some Coke. And not even the good kind—Coca-Cola in the can. Dude is in his '90s!
It's crazy how I already feel like today is going to be a banger because I made my bed. I wore this so that people would see me, but now I just have a feeling that everyone's just going to want to hit me.
Kevin Hart will run two to three miles every single morning after The Rock kisses him goodbye before heading to his Iron Paradise. Two to three miles? I like that distance. I'm not running 15 miles like David Goggins because somehow I don't think frostbite is going to make me more of a man.
Now, I have three concerns on this run:
1. Wildlife.
2. The fact I just had three shots of espresso before cardio—that's a big concern.
3. This is a reasonable hour for crime in my city, and I just don't want to be caught in the middle of it.
We're just going to try to get this done as quick as we can. Let's go!
So here I go, just absolutely crushing the pavement, looking like a mobster doing community service. My goal with this run is just to finish it as fast as humanly possible. The world's asleep, and I'm just out here grinding.
I'm not crying; it's the wind. Mile number one is the mental breakdown phase, where it feels like the worst thing in the world. But then, once you get past that, you find that runner's high, and you just can't be stopped. So I'm just hoping to achieve that fairly soon.
Yeah, I don't need to stop. Yeah, it still sucks. We're over a mile in; I haven't got that high yet. I'm running through an alley right now. I'm freezing, can't feel my hands, got an icicle between my legs. I really just want to go home.
I love Christmas time. I feel like if I go this way, I'm just asking for it. Even though the run is only two miles, for some reason, I'm somehow both exhausted and weirdly proud. The feeling I have finishing this run is the same feeling I had leaving my last exam of the year.
Today is going to be a good day! A touch of hypothermia in the morning, I think it's really going to make me feel appreciative for the rest of the day.
Another really big bonus of the early morning run is I'm already just about 4,000 steps in of my 10,000 a day total, and it's 6 a.m.
Tim Ferriss makes something called the titanium tea, and given the name, I was expecting Viagra in the recipe. But nope, it's just a mixture of black tea, green tea, ginger, and turmeric.
I do find tea to be a lot like candles and gasoline—it smells a lot better than it tastes. Yeah, I mean, it just tastes like hot water. But apparently, this tea is going to be great for cognition and fat loss.
While we sip on this, we're going to be doing something called the Pomodoro Technique that Elon Musk and Bill Gates use. Basically, what it is is you're going to break your stuff up into time slots. They do five-minute slots where you focus on one thing at a time. A lot can get done in five minutes—a lot of disappointment.
But now I have an excuse. I'm sorry, Katie, I'm just trying to live my most productive life.
So I checked my emails for five minutes, did a little mindfulness practice, and then I created my to-do list for the day:
1. Finish all my work while working on camera—how meta.
2. Clean my room. I mean, just look at it; it's bad, and I'm getting kind of embarrassed.
3. I need to give Boba a Christmas gift, and every day with him is a gift already, so there's no cap on how much to spend on him.
4. Romantic dinner for Katie because I'm a good husband, and I'm on dinner duty, and she can't really cook all that much.
Got to hate morning traffic. Pretty much every celebrity that I looked at, they all went to the gym in the morning.
Now we have to give a special shout-out to my boy Jeff Bezos. He went from looking like a librarian to just an overly involved football dad. He looked like he went from getting stuffed in lockers to calling dibs on top bunk. He literally looks more like Vin Diesel than Vin Diesel.
There's a lot of speculation regarding his natty status. I mean, look at this paparazzi shot; he has a lethal arm pump just casually on his yacht. Jeff, I hate you.
Regardless, he attacks the weights for 45 minutes every single day, so we're going to do a 45-minute upper body workout. Let's get it!
Barely alive and running solely on vibes from my run. Honestly, the only thing keeping me going was the sweet relief that it wasn't leg day. If it had been, I'd probably still be in the parking lot for real.
But instead, a glorious collection of manageable weights and machines where I can sit down. I mean, if you don't like people and you're antisocial, just wake up early, man. There's like nobody here.
I have definitely had better workouts in my lifetime, that's for sure. I'm also terrified to say I am starving right now. It's only 7 a.m. I'm not usually hungry at this time; I'm not usually awake at this time, and it's kind of scary.
The thing that sucks about eating is that eventually, you have to stop eating. So then you're no longer eating, and then you're basically just thinking about the next meal. So I just have a prolonged amount of time of that headspace, which is extremely difficult.
I think I might go over my calories today, which is not conducive to my goals. I can't say I feel the call of iron in the morning, but one thing's for sure: I'm going to try my best, and that's all that really matters.
We don't know much about Jeff's routine other than he does a push-pull-legs type of split. I rotate; I do a pulling day, a pushing day, and a leg day.
Quick little fun fact: I actually DMed Jeff Bezos's trainer on Instagram, being like, "Yo bro, give me this golden routine, what the heck?" And then he responds, "Yo dude, I have an NDA; I can't."
That's making me wonder how personal does this trainer get? What muscles are we not supposed to know he's working? But then again, being one of the richest people in the world, he probably has an NDA for the pizza boy delivering something to his house.
Between the cold shower and the morning run, it had me feeling like I was aging in reverse, if you know what I mean. But the sauna has me feeling a little more like a man. Now I'm just going to chill in here for a little bit, sweat away my sins one drop at a time, and just get ready to attack the day.
Why are these rocks here? I'm just kidding. If you have access to a sauna, my one piece of advice for you is to go in it. On this website, it says it can increase muscle regrowth by 30% and even increase your HGH by 200 to 500%. That's a no-brainer!
Workout already done; I feel like a champion! Seriously though, I've been trying to convince myself to start going to the gym early for the longest time, and I just can't do it. I'm a sloth in the morning, but this has just sealed the deal.
The gym and getting my steps in take up so much of my headspace during the day, and it's super annoying when I'm doing desk work that I'm like, "Damn, I got to get up and pace and get my steps in, or else I'm not going to get the minimum out the pace tonight."
All that stuff, so it's just nice; it's out of the way. I don't have to worry about it. I'm already at a little over 6,000 steps. That can't be stopped!
Just had a wonderful shower; here's some proof. Now it's time to make some breakfast.
So, Taylor Swift is one of, if not the most influential person in the entire world. Now, I'm going to reserve my judgment on that because Swifties are terrifying. They are like vegans with social media clout.
Just like a lot of situations I got myself into, I'm just going to swallow and smile. Her favorite breakfast of all time is buckwheat crepes with ham, egg, and cheese, which, to be honest, sounds great and sounds pretty well balanced.
So I'm going to try to make that and see how close we can get to Taylor. Well, I mean, she probably doesn't cook it—guaranteed doesn't cook it—so let's see how close I get to Taylor Chef.
I just feel so productive right now that I feel like I need to let myself down, you know what I mean? I feel like I got to lower the bar for tomorrow, or else I feel like I'm just going to feel terrible.
I also just don't want Katie to see how much more I can do. I don't even know if I can keep this up for the entire day; I'm already starting to fade a bit, but we'll see.
Well, Taylor's crepes look and probably taste like they came straight from Paris. Mine, on the other hand, could have been cooked by a prison chef named Paris.
Ham, egg, and cheese—a day's work for a cow and a chicken and a lifetime commitment for the pig. Eggs and ham—you can't mess those up. It's something Dr. Seuss taught me a long time ago.
Now, apparently, sometimes Taylor puts some imported truffles on her crepes. I have some truffle sauce imported from Walmart.
Crepes: thin and mysterious. Given my track record with French guys, I should probably get it tested first. But I definitely overcooked that egg. Holy smokes! I'm way more hungry than I should be for breakfast. I've just been up for a freaking long time.
It is flat, but mine doesn't have a lot of personality. Taylor fans, do not look too much into that.
Oh my God, that is good! I think it's actually impossible to mess up these things, you know? And if you do, you should be shot.
If Warren Buffett's eating McDonald's, Taylor Swift's having cold cuts. Billionaires are relatable! Yo, that means there's no reason why you can't eat leftovers.
Oh my God, I have a head rush!
Oh, before I start taking on my to-do list, we have one more thing. Apparently, Rihanna dances in her kitchen before heading off to work because it keeps her happy.
I don't know really why she does it, but I think I'm going to try it. Maybe I'll figure out why she does it. Now, I'm not going to have a name like Bad Girl Riri—maybe something like Slightly Silly Wily.
I'm not that much of a dancer; I didn't even have a date to prom, so this is going to be kind of awkward.
Okay, I'm definitely solidifying any possible stereotype. Okay, that's upsetting me.
It was time to tackle work. My 11:00 a.m. meeting destroyed; my 12:00 p.m. meeting obliterated. They didn't even see it coming! I was like a productivity ninja, throwing out ideas and solutions like they were nothing.
Then I locked in for the rest of the afternoon, crushing work before heading off to shoot part of a video where I'm transforming someone. Any guesses?
All my work is done for the day. I'm considering taking a nap to give my to-do list some time to breathe.
Time to address this fabric jungle. I swear it's been here for so long it could probably qualify for historical preservation. Let's get rid of it!
For me, coming out of the closet was easy; it's just going back in to put clothes away that I find challenging for some reason. My thought process was to take the pile of clothes on top of the dresser and then put them on the bed and not into the dresser.
Oh my gosh, I have been looking everywhere for you! Oh my God, I've also been looking everywhere for you! Who would have thought there was a method to the madness?
During the time, I was just determined to clean things up, and I was just super excited to actually see bare surface with all that dust there. It's so gross!
This took so long; it took 15 minutes. I have no idea why I waited this long to do it, but I wrote it down, I made a list, and I'm just like, "I have to execute it."
And they do say if you write it down, you are more likely to get it done. So maybe I should write down Will Schwarzenegger and see where that gets me.
Next up on the list: get Boba a Christmas gift. So, he went to his favorite store, Pet Value. Now, he really wanted to come with me because, for some reason, he just doesn't trust me selecting the proper toys for him.
I'm not sure why, so we talked about it; we shook hands. As you can see, we made a deal. I made a promise that I'm not going to let him down.
Every time I'm at the pet store, I have to remind myself I'm not shopping for me; I'm shopping for my dog. Bro is going to look so cute!
After tons of distractions at the store, it was time to actually shop for Boba again. This one looks perfect; it has the sound that we're after. It even looks a bit like Mommy. I think this is it!
Dinner is served, and I'm actually shocked I've made it to this point of the day. I'm extremely overtired, running on adrenaline, and this time no drugs were involved, like at homecoming.
One thing I do know for sure is I'm going to be crashing harder than a toddler after a sugar high tonight because I am just so sleepy, but I'm so hungry.
So we made some penne with some turkey meat sauce. Going to put some Parmesan cheese on it—just going to manifest what I wish my coffee table looks like right now. It's one of those days.
Well, a good meal and a happy wife. I think the right thing to say is, "What more could I ask for?"
And now, I don't know many things, but what I do know is this routine is just not for me. I think I'm going to be off to hibernate for at least the next three days.
But hey, they say if you win the morning, you win the day. So everyone should have a morning routine. It doesn't have to be over the top like this one—just something simple that gives you purpose and sets you up to tackle the day your way.