How Skipping My Morning Workout Affected My Brain and Performance

Before We Talk About Anchor Habits, Let’s Talk About What They’re Not

Anchor habits are not about becoming a 4:00 a.m. superhero.

They’re not about perfection.

They’re not about stacking twelve optimized behaviors before sunrise.

And they absolutely cannot coexist with rolling over and letting your phone flood your nervous system before you’ve even stood up.

If the first thing you see when you open your eyes is a glowing screen, your brain is already reacting instead of leading.

Anchor habits require sovereignty.

No social media.

No email.

No news.

No reactive input for at least the first hour.

You are in control.

Not a device.

What Anchor Habits Actually Are

Anchor habits are stabilizers.

They regulate your body, your brain, and your emotional state before the world begins making demands.

For me, mornings are intentional. By the time many people are waking up, I’ve lifted, hydrated, spent time in devotion and reading, cared for the dog, made by bed, taken supplements, and gotten ready with intention.

I don’t share that to impress you.

I share it because I’ve learned something about state.

When my physiology is activated early, my cognition is sharper later.

The Day I Underestimated the Science

Last week, I had to get the dog to a very early vet appointment.

So I told myself something reasonable.

“I’ll just lift later.”

And I did.

But later that day, I went to record a video.

The topic? Something I’ve taught so many times I could deliver it in my sleep.

And yet…

It took over eight retakes.

Eight.

At one point I just stood there thinking, “Why am I struggling here?”

My thoughts weren’t landing.

My energy wasn’t grounded.

I kept trying to push clarity instead of accessing it.

Nothing was dramatically wrong.

But everything felt heavier than it should have.

I lifted later, like I said I would.

But it didn’t undo the friction.

The next morning, I was back in the gym with my trainer, Brendan, and I told him what had happened.

He  said, “That makes perfect sense.”

And then we talked about the science.

Why Movement Changes the Brain

When you move your body — especially with intention and intensity — you:

• Increase blood flow and oxygen to the brain

• Elevate dopamine in a regulated way

• Increase norepinephrine (focus and alertness)

• Stimulate BDNF (brain-derived neurotrophic factor), which supports learning and cognition

• Reduce baseline stress reactivity

In simple terms:

You wake up the brain.

Brendan explained something that clicked immediately for me:

Morning movement isn’t just exercise.

It’s neurological priming.

It sets the tone for executive function — clarity, articulation, decision-making — before the day starts pulling on you.

By the time I tried to record that video, my brain hadn’t been primed.

It had been absorbing.

Emails.

Conversations.

Small stressors.

Micro-decisions.

So instead of accessing what I already knew, I was working harder to retrieve it.

That’s the uphill feeling.

That’s eight retakes on mastered material.

When I lifted later, it helped — but the priming window was gone.

There’s a difference between maintenance and activation.

The Downstream Effect Most People Miss

When physiological activation doesn’t happen early, the cost shows up downstream:

In slower verbal fluency.

In lower frustration tolerance.

In subtle self-doubt.

In more force and less flow.

We assume we’re off.

Sometimes we’re simply under-primed.

This Week’s Reflection

• What physical behavior wakes up your brain?

• Have you underestimated what movement does for cognition?

• What shifts in your performance when your body isn’t activated first?

Anchor habits aren’t about productivity.

They’re about protecting the biology that supports performance.

Eight retakes.

One missed prime.

One conversation that validated the science.

Not coincidence.

Downstream effect.

Next week, we’ll go deeper into why we often negotiate with the very behaviors that protect our clarity — and what that reveals about discipline and identity.

For now, notice the connection.

What wakes up your brain?