Feb 23, 2023
You've probably heard that exercising in the morning has many benefits, including upping your energy and metabolism all day. Well the mind works in a similar way. All it takes is 5-minutes of mental exercises in the morning to make the other 1,435 minutes of the day more innovative. Imagine if all you had to do is schedule 5-minutes in the morning to stretch and warm up your mind and for the rest of the day you'd be a stronger problem solver, better strategic thinker, and decision maker? That's exactly what we are going to talk about in this episode. I'm going to break down what it takes to be an Everyday Innovator all day. It's much simpler than you think it is.
Tamara’s Everyday Innovator style is Risk Taker Experiential. What’s yours?
Sticky Inspiration: 5-Minute Morning is all it takes to be more Innovative All Day!
Lesson & Action: Schedule 5-minutes every morning to stretch, warm up and strengthen your innovative mind.
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Join our global Everyday Innovators community on Facebook
Raw Podcast Transcript:
Hello, everybody. Hey, Tamara here, your host, creator of the Innovation Quotient Edge Assessment, author of the books. Innovation is Everybody's Business and Think Sideways. I just want to give a moment of gra gratitude. A little bit of a shout out to all you listeners out there. As you all may remember, if you listen to the last two episodes, um, this is our, what we're calling our season two.
We took a little bit of a break to kind of take a breather, figure out what, what we wanted to focus on for the podcast moving forward. There's some other parts of the business that were, have been really taking off that needed our attention. and we're back. And what I'm most excited about is I was looking at the numbers yesterday and Wow, they were better than they were the first season, which was already incredible.
So, Thank you. Thank you. I am, I'm honored that you're still here and that you're sharing it with friends and still getting value out of it. That is amazing. Now, for those of you who are just listening in and going, I don't know the difference between this and last time, Tamara, let me just tell you. The way the podcasts are structured for season two is twofold.
One is a sticky inspiration, and the second one is the lesser action that you can take. Now, the sticky inspiration, the reason it's called that is because I. love my sticky notes and I use them for everything. For my to-do list, my to be list, my goals, my plans, my notes, love 'em. And I also tend to doodle ideas on them.
And these ideas that I've been doodling and giving to people and sharing have become the. inspiration for the podcast. So when we release the podcast, we release the doodle that goes with it on the sticky note. Um, they're often stick figures. I'm not an artist, so, and you know, which to me is proof that you can be an everyday innovator and not be creative in a traditional sense of, you know, being an artist or a dancer or photographer, or anything like that.
I am none of those things, but I love my stick figures and my sticky notes. That's how the podcast is structured. So what do you say? We dig in. Today we're gonna talk about how five minutes, just five minutes in the morning can make all the difference in the rest of your day. Now, this is not a fitness podcast, and if you know me, you know I do love me some exercise, but today I actually wanna connect fitness and the mind for you in a bit of a different way than people normally talk about.
I wanna talk about how five minutes of mental exercise in the mornings ups, your innovation, metabolism all day. Kind of like working out in the morning ups, your physical energy and metabolism all day. So I think to do this, we need to first talk about why morning fitness is so beneficial and then we're gonna apply that to our mental fitness and being an everyday I.
Actually, this is great timing because it's, what time is it? It's about 10:00 AM mountain time when I'm recording, and on this day I went to my 5:00 AM CrossFit class and I'm feeling all the things we're about to talk about. Here's the thing, we've heard it many times that exercising in the morning is super, super beneficial.
So I dug into why that's the. because I found it to be true. I know a lot of people find it to be true, and frankly, the research backs it up. So here's the interesting thing about working out in the morning. So according to Hackney, who's a researcher, says in the early morning hours you have a hormonal profile that would predispose you to better metabolism of fat.
So people naturally have elevated levels of cortisol and growth hormone in the morning, both of which are involved in metabolism. So you'll draw more energy from your fat. So what this tells me is if I exercise in the morning, I get more of the benefits from it, and that energy keeps going and going all day long.
I love that, by the way, about working out in the morning. I know the difference in the days that I don't and the day I do, I can feel it. and when I don't work out in the mornings, I definitely feel more of a mental fog or a lull all day long. And when I do in the mornings, everything just feels like it's humming a little bit better.
And I think that's because of what he is saying about what it taps into. Here's the other interesting thing, by the way, about working out in the morning. A study published in 2019 in the Journal of Physiology found that exercising at 7:00 AM Now I'm a five Amer, but I'll consider 7:00 AM still the morning.
May actually shift your body clock earlier, meaning you'll feel more alert in the morning and get tired earlier in the evening, potentially priming you to get enough rest to wake up and do it the next day. So, , it suggests that it's easier to stick to healthy habits if you do it in the morning. So let's just think about that one for a second because I think this is really important what this, what this study has found.
So if you know me, you know that because I get up at four o'clock in the morning on most days, by about eight o'clock I'm, my head is like ready to hit the pillow. , but, and I used to actually by the way, get really, I dunno if I wanna say embarrassed by this, but you know, I got people texting me at nine o'clock at night.
I got, my kids are up and I'm like, oh my God, I gotta go to bed. But what this is telling me is that, that's good because it means, it is putting me into the right habit. And if I do, if I exercise in the morning, those healthy habits are easier to obtain, easier to sustain. So I thought that was interest.
Here's some other interesting thing. This is where it gets really relevant to what we're talking about here. Actually, it's all really relevant. I'm gonna, I'm gonna connect the two in a minute. The mental and the physical, so a morning sweat may also lead to better mental health and productivity throughout the day.
So because why? Because exercise is actually great for reducing stress. So we go into the day less stressed, more focused, and more productive when we exercise in the morning. And you're gonna find, as I talk about it, this is true for your mental exercise as well. Exercise improves circulation and unleashes endorphins that leave you feeling energized and ready to start your.
So how great is that You exercise in the morning, you get your circulation going, you get your blood flowing, which by the way goes directly to your brain too. So your brain has, is more energized, you're clearer, you're thinking better, and it unleashes us feel good endorphins. So no wonder on the days we exercise in the morning, we feel better all day.
So when, and because you're less stressed, you start your day less stressed, and the entire day you're just able to manage situations better. Research also shows that early morning exercise helps regulate your appetite for the remainder of your day while also improving your concentration. How great is that?
So making good decisions gets easier. I definitely think this is true. By the way, on the days where I exercise in the morning, I make better food decisions and I make better business decisions. How great is that? Okay, now you're going tomorrow. Are you just trying to sell me on getting up early in the morning?
Okay. Maybe a little bit. I love my morning exercise, but I wanna parlay this over into the mental exercises. Here's the thing. When we exercise our brain for just five minutes in the morning, we get all those benefits we are just talking about from fitness, but for our innovative mind, we up our innovation metabolism.
All day long if we just spend five minutes at the gym of innovation in the morning. Research has shown that doing a creative exercise like journaling for just five minutes clears your mind. Builds your confidence and creates a path for greater creativity all day long. So while the brain is not technically a muscle in this way, it actually acts like one.
So if we open it up, give it that circulation, give it that focus and attention in the morning, if we exercise it, that metabolism and all those benefits. Come to us directly in the moment and then all day, there's this great story I heard of this general in the military who kept winning these idea contests.
So the military would have these contests where people could, um, submit ideas on how to solve things or how to do things. He would constantly win and someone on the committee came to him once and said, how are you so innovative? How do you have all these idea? and he said, don't. I'm no different than anyone else, but every morning I take a blank piece of paper and pen and before I get to work, before I answer phone calls, before I look at email, before I have meetings, I spend five minutes and I just get everything I can think about on paper.
Sometimes that's filled with ideas. Sometimes that's just thoughts randomly in my head, but I spend every morning, five minutes. Five minutes. That's what he does at the Gym of Innovation, and he gets the benefit of that all day. So when people are coming to him with problems and challenges, he's trying to figure out his day, his workload, the problems he needs to solve, he's got it because he unlocked that in the morning.
So when I was talking about exercise earlier, I was talking about how it minimizes stress, it increases concentration, you make better decisions. Um, you have feel good endorphins, so you feel better all day long. . All of that is true. All of that, by the way, helps your innovative mind as well. It helps it going for sure.
But also when we mentally exercise, we get those benefits and on top of that, it is easier for us to step into being an everyday innovator. We can be more innovative. We get into that zone more. You know that that the zone that they talk about where you're kind of at peak performance and all engines are fir.
We walk through the world as everyday innovators. All we have to do is go to the Gym of Innovation for five minutes every morning. So, you know, everybody talks about these morning routines and it's usually, you know, don't hit snooze, which I totally agree with by the way. So get up early, drink water, um, walk around the block, like get some movement going.
Uh, right. That's kind of what they talk about, but they're missing this one thing I think, and I think this is. Critical for success during your day to be more productive, to be more innovative. That morning routine should always include five minutes of a mental exercise, something that's gonna spark your innovative mind.
And all it takes, by the way, is one simple exercise, five minutes. And you'll be more productive. More innovative. You'll have more confidence, you'll make better decisions. You will see opportunities and solutions in front of you all day long. because you did this one little thing in the morning that helps you throughout the day.
Now, if you know your everyday innovator style and you've received your custom report, there are actually exercises in the back of that report, four of 'em that speak directly to your power triggers to how your brain works. That is going to naturally unlock your innovative. . So for me, for example, I'm an experiential risk taker.
So the experiential side is all about innovating in motion, innovating in action, seeing things kind of in 3D and innovating that way. And the risk taker side of me is all about innovating in the uncomfortable leaping and figuring it out is actually where I thrive and how I innovate best. So that combination means that my value to the world and the strength that I bring is tangible and bold in.
could be very different for you. It should be. But what that means for me in the morning is my five minute activity usually includes building something, mapping out my day with sticky notes, putting something actually physically together, because I'm all about that physical and the tangible, you know? Now I'm thinking about it.
I think this is why CrossFit, in particular for an exercise for me in the morning really works because if you do CrossFit or if you see it on tv, you know, Every exercise is a, is a little bit uncomfortable and you're pushing yourself, um, and you're kind of pushing limits and try to go to that next place.
So it doesn't just make me feel physically uncomfortable, it makes me feel mentally uncomfortable too. But I think it taps because of that. And because being uncomfortable is where I thrive as a risk taker. It actually taps the risk taker side of me. But all I need to do to really, for my five minutes is give me some sced markers, some sticky notes, maybe even, I don't know, um, some other regular pens and.
I'm on it, right? Just five minutes of building in the morning. For someone who is a collaborative instinctual, spending five minutes playing, kind of what do these things on my desk have in common or what's different about them will unleash incredible innovation all day. For someone who's an inquisitive, imaginative, Something like taking a random photo and creating a story around it will up their innovation metabolism tenfold because it taps their desire to dig, to question things, right?
Figure things out. What's this picture about? And then the imagine imaginative side of creating novel ideas. If you don't know your every unique everyday innovator style, go to our website and take the five minute assessment. It really is five minutes online and the rewards of knowing how to perform at your peak and elevate your value will last a lifetime.
So go take that. That is number one. Let me give you three examples from everyday innovators in our community. So first, let's talk about Max. So here's what Max does. This is what he told me. He takes a blank piece of paper and he fills it with just random thoughts every. For him. This unlocks his innovative mind and gets all that clutter out so that he can start to clear his head, see the connections, and get focused.
So he's a fluid, imaginative to no surprise. So Jesse loves to doodle. She says every time she spends five minutes doodling, the ideas just flow flow for the rest of the day. . Interestingly about doodling by the way, is that, um, what studies have found is that it taps our brain in a different way. So, you know, usually we write or we speak, but doodling is actually a visual medium and physical cause.
We're using our hands, we have to create it, and that taps our brain in a whole different way. Doodling has also been found to up concentration. So if you're in a meeting and you're struggling paying attention, turns out doodling can help you with that. So Jesse loves to doodle. . Bill loves to take sticky notes, Legos and what other funky fun building stuff he has on his desk and build something.
He said that sometimes he has something specific he's trying to create, like a toy car. He said most of the time that's the case, but if he can't think of anything, he just starts building and it comes together. He says the days he does this, he just spends five minutes building. He is more productive and more innovative.
I think that's worth spending 20 bucks at the store to get some materials to be able to build every day. He's an experiential futuristic. It makes sense. So here's the thing I really want you to consider now that we're talking about all this, all those benefits of upping your physical metabolism apply to your mental metabolism as well.
But it can't be left a chance if it's left a chance it doesn't. So build these five minutes into your calendar. You schedule your workouts, your meetings, your evening out with friends. Why not schedule this? What I found is that when things get on my calendar, they get done. They don't get on my calendar, and I'm like, oh, it's just five minutes.
I won't, I won't worry about it. I'll remember, I don't remember. This is five minutes. Just it. That's it. Five minutes. that makes the other 1,435 minutes in the day more productive and more innovative. You'll work smart. And oh, by the way, we're not even getting into the compounding benefits of doing it daily.
We're gonna leave that to another podcast for now. I want you to go to your calendar, put in five minutes in the morning. If you can make it consistent across every morning, great. If not, go look at your calendar and see where you can fit it in and get the benefits of going to the gym of innovation up your innovation metabolism.
See solutions, solve problems, make better decisions every single day.
Tamara out.