Pod Insights Change Wired How To Stop Self-Sabotage At Night And Wake Up Proud: 2 questions from Future Self research. About this episode Your hardest habits don’t usually fail in the morning, they fail at night. Don't they? When stress is high and energy is low, it’s easy to reach for quick comfort and then wonder why sleep, nutrition, and workouts never feel consistent. I’ve found a different lever that works WITHOUT motivation or discipline: your relationship with your future self. And just like any relationship - it takes upfront work to do it. What kind of work? Tune in to find out. We talk through research that suggests ...
Transcript 0:09 Speaker 00 Hey guys and welcome back to another episode of Change Wired Podcast. My name is Angela Sharina, I'm your host, I'm your coach, master, health coach, 360, sleep, stress management, nutrition, fitness, life coaching, executive coaching. That's what I do for a living, what I'm certified to do and here to share my experience and tools and strategies that I'm learning, complying myself with clients and my personal and professional life to help each other, to help myself, to help my clients, to help you guys hopefully, to learn more about, unlock more of your potential, so you could live the most extraordinary
0:52 Speaker 00 life every day, creating the impact that you want to create and vision of your life that you want to live and just enjoy your life more, live more, achieve more, give more and enjoy more. Today, guys, we are talking about, well, actually, let me start with a question that I got from a friend. You know, a lot of my blogs, a lot of my podcasts are inspired by what's happening in my life, what's happening in my work life with my clients.
1:26 Speaker 00 And I find it very, very good, because then it's very relatable and it is guided by real life experience, not something that I read in a book or heard from artificial intelligence. So, the question that I got was about, well, I'm gonna read to you. Tell me more about that research on your relationship with your future self, the one that helped you get consistent with your sleep and diet, especially when you don't want to do it. You said it wasn't discipline. So that was a question from a friend. And yes, guys, the reason why I eat healthy almost every single day.
2:08 Speaker 00 I don't even remember the day when I say I didn't eat healthy or I didn't eat what I wanted to do, right? Or I didn't go to bed when I wanted to go to bed. I have almost none of the regrets, at least for the past year, which has been building up to this moment for quite a while with my own practices. And it's the work, it's the practices, it's different ways of thinking about the world that helped me get there. And one of the learnings that I put into practice was around this concept of future self that completely eliminated the need for any willpower or disciplining myself.
2:53 Speaker 00 Quoting from my blog, psychological research, most notably from Dr. Harshill, Harshill Field at UCLA and New York University, shows that we treat our future self, the person you are becoming every day, guys. We treat our future self like a stranger, someone we don't really know, someone we don't feel much for. And when we lack empathy for that person, we choose present comfort over long-term goals. Because long-term goals are experienced by that future self, who we treat like a stranger. And present self get to enjoy now every time.
3:36 Speaker 00 Harshill wrote a book that I absolutely love, recommend. And I read, it's called Your Future Self: How to Make Tomorrow Better Today. And after reading this book, I became even more conscious about my thinking process about my future self. And whenever I wanted to do something that didn't support that future self, my goals, my future self that I was building, in my health, in my work, in my personal development, I'd stop and picture her, future Angela. The one who has to live with today's choices, the consequences of my choices today.
4:19 Speaker 00 The one who inherits, whether she wants it or not, everything that I do and everything that I don't do.
4:27 Speaker 00 Chocolate at night because the day felt too hard, I'd think of her. Staying up late with Netflix to escape a rough morning of work I didn't want to face, I'd think of her. And more and more, I'd make the kind choice for her.
4:45 Speaker 00 And my present self would feel instantly proud too. Because it's kind of the same feeling you get doing something good and kind for a friend. And you can feel that same feeling for your future self. If you start treating your future self as a friend, not a stranger. And just like any relationship, whether that's with your future self or with someone else. It takes work, it takes time, it takes practice to build. The relationship. This compassionate, loving, kind relationship with the person you are becoming every moment of your day.
5:22 Speaker 00 A couple of practices that in research and in my own practice and practice with clients. Helped helps you to, a couple of practices that help you to build that better relationship with the future self. That you one day gonna meet. And you need to build that relationship in advance. To do more things for that person that you are becoming. First practice, again, research back to something that I practice and I practice with a lot of my clients. Write a letter, a letter to yourself five, 10, maybe 20 years out. I imagine Angela at 45, at 50, at 60.
6:06 Speaker 00 What do I want her life to look like, feel like? What pain, what regret do I want her to skip, to avoid? Then I do what supports that vision now. The extra vegetables, the multivitamin, the consistent water, the sleep I'm thinking of skipping.
6:26 Speaker 00 I also recently interviewed 30 entrepreneurs, high achievers. And what I learned from them is every one of them thinks about their future self. Consistently, sometimes without realizing that, to do the hard things, the hard work that needs to be done today. You know, that fitness, that water bottle by your side, that multivitamin, the protein shake, small things done for someone they'll inevitably meet one day, tomorrow maybe. Nobody wants to face that, you know, that moment when you look at yourself in your mirror and in your life and you're like, huh, that's not exactly where I thought I'd end up. And you know what?
7:11 Speaker 00 That moment can be avoided only by things that you do today.
7:19 Speaker 00 Alright, so writing letters to your future self. Imagine yourself in, I don't know, five, 10, 20 years, whatever speaks to you. And think about that person, how their days gonna go, their life, what they get to enjoy, the pains that they might have because of the things that you choose to do now, right? Every choice, every action has a consequence. That is unavoidable truth of life. So what consequences are you sort of prepared to tolerate, to enjoy, to experience? So the first is writing letters to your future self to build that relationship so that you treat your future self more like a friend. And every time that you skip the bad behaviors you don't wanna do,
8:04 Speaker 00 you do it out of kindness for the future self, not out of discipline, disciplining your present self. The second practice is running pre-mortem. Imagine your future self looking back on any failure of behavior or achievement. And ask yourself, what will she, what will she wish I had done differently starting today? What does she need me to do today in order for her not to experience failure? Right? That question create urgency today for the thing you should have done tomorrow, yesterday, sorry. But the most profound practice that actually helped me to do more of the things
8:45 Speaker 00 that I needed to do and less of the things that I shouldn't be doing, like from the genuine place in my heart, like I know those are things that are good for me and certain things are not great for me. A simple practice, two simple questions that actually helped me to do a lot better every single day, again, without the need of discipline and willpower, but with a kindness towards my future self. Every morning, I love waking up fresh, energized, going for my workouts, comfortable and confident in my body, starting the day with a clear head full of ideas ready to execute on the
9:26 Speaker 00 hardest tasks on my list, focused, driven, happy, with a smile on my face, comfortable, energetic, energized. None of that happens if my evening goes not so good, goes wrong, and I decide to, I don't know, overeat or watch Netflix. Those were, you know, my things that didn't make my morning feel good. So none of, you know, none of the morning things would happen if I allow my evenings to go whatever. If I reach for escape with Netflix instead of the learnings that I planned, if I decide
10:04 Speaker 00 to go for more food, for that dopamine hit and relaxation to soften hard day, for the quick pause button instead of hard work of learning to soothe myself with mindfulness, breath and stillness. Every night, I, I would ask myself two questions, and that was my saving grace. Letters, yes, from time to time, pre-mortem, definitely, I practice it quite often. But what saved me the most are these two questions that I would ask myself at any hard moment, especially at night when we tend to do a lot of our self-sabotaging behaviors. So two questions. How do I want my morning self to feel?
10:48 Speaker 00 How do I want to wake up? Like, with what kind of energy? What, what thoughts do I want to have? What kind of, I don't know, vibe I want to have? Like, that morning, what I want to have in my morning? Because my morning defines the mood, the vibe of my day, right? How do I want to wake up? And what does my evening self needs to do to get to get me there? To get my morning right? Like, what I want my morning self to feel? What I want my, how do I want my morning to go? And then what does my evening self needs to do right now? What choices do I need to make in order for that morning to happen?
11:29 Speaker 00 Those two questions on repeat build almost everything I'm proud of today in my life. There are things that I'm still working on and I'm not that proud. But every single thing that I'm proud of comes down to these two questions on repeat every evening in the hardest moments of my day. How do I want, how do I want my morning self to feel tomorrow? How do I want my morning to go to start? And what is my evening self? What does my today self needs to do? What choices do I need to make to get that? To get that morning, to get that tomorrow? Great tomorrow is built with what we do today. That's the whole premise, right? How do I want my tomorrow to go that morning?
12:13 Speaker 00 And what does my evening self needs to do to get me there? So those were my questions that are based on this research about future self and building that relationship with the future self and realizing that is the person who's your closest, dearest friend. And you get to meet them, you know, every day, every morning. And hopefully you get to experience a lot less, a lot less of those bitter mirror morning. When you look at yourself in the mirror, you think about your life, you think about yourself and you're like, oh shoot. I didn't want to end up here. How did I get here? Right?
12:55 Speaker 00 And you got there by allowing your evening self to forget that every choice you make today, every action that you take today or don't take, they're gonna shape your future. And the more you reflect on that fact, the more you think of your future self as of your dearest friend who you care the most about, because everything else depends on them. That's where you get to.
13:24 Speaker 00 Do all the right choices without needing the discipline and willpower. And that is what I help my clients to do, to build the strong connection between the present self and the future self. Hope this episode was helpful, guys. Let me know what you like, what you didn't like. Please do share this podcast episode with at least one other person who's been, who has a lot of potential, who has a lot of great ideas and great energy about them. Like they wanna do good and great in the world, but they keep getting in their own way. So, share this podcast episode with them, helping them to see that their future self really needs them and doesn't just need their hustle and action in their work,
14:07 Speaker 00 but also their future self's wellbeing and health and ability to actually live life to the fullest and contribute to the world to the most, to create more positive impact. All depends on what your evening self, health, wellbeing, work chooses to do today. So, share this episode with them, rate, review to help this podcast to reach more, eager to learn and improve and create their best self. Years all around the world, we are a global podcast, but we do depend on you sharing, rating, reviewing, so please do so. And think about this, applying these two questions that help me achieve everything that I'm proud of in terms of self-growth and self-development.
14:52 Speaker 00 What I want my morning to feel like, look like? How do I want my morning to go? And what does my evening self and today's self needs to do to get me there? Thank you, guys, for tuning in. Thank you for listening and till next time, keep, well, keep changing and keep growing.
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