What the Most Successful People Do Before Breakfast
And Two Other Short Guides to Achieving More at Work and Home
Book Edition Details
Summary
"What the Most Successful People Do Before Breakfast (2013) is a guide to the early hours. Packed with useful tips drawn from the lives of today’s highfliers, it lays out an actionable plan that’ll help you design and implement your perfect morning routine. Do that, and you’ll find time for the things that matter most to you. Even better – once you’ve mastered a few time-management skills and revolutionized your mornings, you’ll be set to boost your work performance and get the most out of your w"
Introduction
Picture this familiar scene: your alarm jolts you awake, you hit snooze multiple times, then rush through a chaotic morning routine that leaves you frazzled before the day even begins. By the time you reach your workplace, you're already exhausted from battling traffic, wrangling children, or simply feeling behind schedule. This morning madness isn't just inconvenient—it's robbing you of your most powerful hours. What if those early morning moments could become your secret weapon for transformation? The research is clear: successful people don't just wake up early by accident. They've discovered that mornings offer a unique window of opportunity when willpower is strongest, distractions are minimal, and the potential for meaningful progress is at its peak. Your mornings hold untapped power to reshape your career, deepen your relationships, and nurture your personal growth in ways that seem impossible later in the day.
Why Mornings Matter: The Science of Willpower and Success
The secret to morning success lies in understanding how willpower actually works in your brain and body. Just like a muscle that grows tired with use, your self-discipline becomes depleted throughout the day as you face countless decisions, resist temptations, and navigate challenges. Consider the groundbreaking research by psychologist Roy Baumeister, who discovered this principle through a fascinating experiment. Students were asked to fast, then placed alone in a room with freshly baked chocolate chip cookies and radishes. Some lucky participants could eat the cookies, while others were forced to resist temptation and eat only radishes. Afterward, both groups worked on challenging puzzles. The results were striking: those who had resisted the cookies gave up on the puzzles in just eight minutes, while the cookie-eaters persevered for twenty minutes. The act of resisting temptation had drained their mental energy for the next task. This revelation transforms how we should view our daily schedules. Every decision you make, every temptation you resist, every frustrating interaction you navigate chips away at your reservoir of willpower. By evening, after battling traffic, managing difficult colleagues, and making countless choices, your capacity for self-discipline is nearly exhausted. This explains why diets are broken at night, why most impulsive crimes occur after 11 PM, and why your best intentions for evening exercise often crumble. But here's the powerful opportunity: mornings offer you a fresh supply of willpower. After a good night's sleep, your mental energy is restored and your optimism is naturally higher. Research analyzing millions of Twitter posts worldwide confirms this, showing people use more positive words like "awesome" and "super" between 6 and 9 AM than any other time. Start your day by tackling activities that require internal motivation—those important but not urgent tasks that external forces don't demand—and you'll accomplish things that seem impossible later when your willpower is depleted.
Three Pillars: Career, Relationships, and Personal Growth
The most successful people channel their morning energy into three transformative areas that create lasting impact on their lives. These aren't random activities but strategic choices that compound over time. Take Debbie Moysychyn, who discovered the power of morning focus when building a new division at Brandman University. Her days were constantly interrupted by drop-in visits and urgent requests, making it impossible to tackle important strategic projects. Everything changed when she realized her daughter's early water polo practices gave her access to empty office hours before 7 AM. Instead of mindlessly clearing her email inbox during this quiet time, she began dedicating these precious hours to her most important work. The transformation was immediate and dramatic. "I can accomplish more before breakfast than I used to do in a day," she reported. "I am checking long-standing things off my to-do list." This same principle applies to relationships. Kathryn Beaumont Murphy, a corporate tax attorney struggling to spend quality time with her daughter due to long work hours, revolutionized their connection by shifting her focus to mornings. Instead of rushing through getting-ready routines with eyes constantly on the clock, she began treating breakfast as sacred mother-daughter time. They cooked together, read stories, and simply connected before the day's demands took over. The ritual became so meaningful that her husband eventually took over morning duties, turning breakfast into "a huge production" that the whole family cherished. For personal growth, consider the routine of Steve Reinemund, former chairman and CEO of PepsiCo. Every morning at 5 AM, he would run four miles, spend quiet time in prayer and reflection, then share breakfast with his family before heading off to run a Fortune 500 company. This wasn't just exercise—it was a carefully crafted ritual that centered his mind, strengthened his body, and connected him with his values before facing the day's challenges. The key insight is that these three areas—career advancement, relationship nurturing, and personal development—require internal motivation and sustained focus. They're important but rarely urgent, which means they get pushed aside when your day fills with external demands. Morning hours protect these priorities from the chaos that inevitably follows.
Building Your Perfect Morning: From Vision to Habit
Creating a transformative morning routine isn't about copying someone else's schedule—it's about designing a ritual that aligns with your values and fits your life. This process requires honest assessment, clear vision, and patient habit-building. Start by tracking exactly how you currently spend your time, particularly your morning hours. Write down everything you do for a full week, noting not just activities but how much energy and attention each requires. You might discover you're spending precious morning minutes on mindless tasks that could happen anytime, like checking social media or organizing papers that will just get messy again. Next, envision your ideal morning. What would energize and inspire you? Charlotte Walker-Said, a University of Chicago postdoc, uses 6 to 9 AM daily for writing her book on West African religious politics. "Once you start looking at email, the whole day cascades into email responses," she explains. "In the morning, I think I have a career." Wendy Kay, who turned around struggling pharmaceutical facilities, credits her success to morning spiritual practices. She would wake two hours before work to pray, express gratitude, and seek guidance. "When I arrived at work, my vision was always clear," she recalls. The logistics matter enormously. Calculate backward from your desired wake-up time to determine when you need to sleep. If you want to wake at 6 AM, you likely need to be in bed by 10 PM for eight hours of rest. This might require evening adjustments—perhaps recording that late-night show to watch while exercising the next morning, or setting boundaries around nighttime screen time that can interfere with sleep quality. Building the habit requires patience and strategy. Start slowly, shifting your schedule by just fifteen minutes earlier every few days until you reach your target time. Choose only one new morning activity initially—trying to add exercise, meditation, and journaling simultaneously often leads to abandoning everything. Track your progress for at least thirty days, celebrating small victories along the way. External motivation helps initially; promise yourself a reward after two weeks of consistency, or arrange to meet a friend for morning workouts to create accountability. Remember that your morning ritual should bring joy, not feel like punishment. Shawn Achor, author of The Happiness Advantage, transformed from night owl to morning person by creating activities he genuinely anticipated. He begins each day writing gratitude lists and appreciation emails to friends. "If you're thinking about things you're looking forward to, that makes it easy to get out of bed," he explains. "It's usually my favorite part of the whole day."
Summary
Your mornings represent far more than just preparation time—they're your daily opportunity to invest in the person you're becoming. As productivity expert Anthony Trollope wisely observed, a habit "has the force of the water drop that hollows the stone. A small daily task, if it be really daily, will beat the labors of a spasmodic Hercules." The most successful people understand that these hopeful hours before breakfast are too precious to waste on semiconscious activities. Start tomorrow morning by choosing just one meaningful activity—whether it's ten minutes of reflection, a short walk, or focused work on a project you care about. Protect this time as fiercely as you would any important appointment, because in truth, it's an appointment with your future self. When you make over your mornings, you begin to make over your entire life.
By Laura Vanderkam
