Beep, beep, beep…Talk about a rude awakening!
How important can an alarm clock be? This is something we truly underestimate. Does the sound of your alarm clock trigger a feeling of anxiety or even doom? Why would anyone ever want to start their day off like this? The mind is distressed before you have even opened your eyes, your body starts the day by releasing cortisol (stress hormone) and everything goes down from there. This sets the tone for the rest of your day. It may be hard to believe but your alarm clock plays a major role in sleeping habits. Research has shown that waking up to a jolting sound can be bad for the heart, especially over time, it causes higher blood pressure and heart rate.
Then there’s alarm anxiety which is the fear of missing your alarm or the stress of not getting in enough Zzz before the alarm goes off, since our brain associates the sound of our alarm clock with waking up, and because this is in somewhat of a startling way, it puts a lot of stress on our body. This can cause people to react negatively to it, in fact, previous studies have linked sleep deprivation with excessive weight.
It is not surprising that researchers have found that happier upbeat music benefits the brain in moving forward in the morning and contributes to overall better quality of life. According to a new study, waking up to bands such as U2 “Beautiful Day” and The Beach Boys, for example, might start your day off with “Good vibrations”.
Neuroscience has never been so advanced and today we know that the brain is not hard-wired as was once believed, the brain changes and neurons that fire together wire together, thanks to neuroplasticity, we can rewire our brains positively, or negatively, in fact, it’s in our control.
In the one life we have been given we have 3 C’s, Choices, Chances, Changes. You must choose to take a chance or your life will never change. Choose to take control where you can and wake up the right way! Through years of experience and much research, trying and studying the most motivational songs and messages to wake up to, combined with research from international bestselling books such as “The 5 Second Rule”, I have finally created what I believe to be the simplest yet perfect alarm clock to wake up to. My custom alarm clock involves music to remind me how beautiful life can be, the 5-second rule, and words of motivation to break my state of doom and gloom I use to experience every morning. For me, this has been life-changing.
What is the 5-second rule? Melanie Robbins an American television host, author, and motivational speaker wrote the 5-second rule and has helped countless people conquer life’s struggles by teaching a very simple technique that takes just five seconds. The way I have applied it to my motivational alarm clock is; no matter how you feeling when you hear the countdown of 5,4,3,2,1 … you jump out of bed take your phone with you (assuming that’s what you use as your alarm) find somewhere to sit and listen to the motivational message that follows, then, you GO; get your day started! Continue this behaviour and it WILL become a new habit. The brain will naturally start to rewire in this direction and the neurons associated with lack of motivation will begin to weaken.
This simple action can take you from a place of zero desire for life to a life you didn’t even know was possible. You and only you can take this action. The key in the beginning to bring about positive change in behaviour is to trick your mind into believing your actions, so jump out of bed regardless of how unnatural it feels and as the old famous saying goes “Fake it, till you make it”. Here is just one tool to get you started; you can download my personal motivational alarm clock for free as an MP3 below and save it on your phone as your alarm clock, remember the 3 C’s!
Change your habits and you will change your life!
Song Credit: U2 – Beautiful Day
Sara Bareilles – Brave