Andrew Huberman’s Morning Routine, Backed by Neuroscience

Much of productivity is monkey-see, monkey-do. 

It’s extremely hard to know what’s underneath our own behaviors, and as a result we turn to pet explanations, and lots of trial and error to figure out what kinds of tools and routines work best for us. It’s very rare to find a person who has found a routine that works for them and can tell you exactly why.

Dr. Andrew Huberman is that rare person. He’s a neurobiologist and ophthalmologist at Stanford University, and he also is the creator of the Huberman Lab podcast—a show dedicated to helping us understand how our brain and body control our perceptions, and behaviors.

Needless to say, I am a huge Andrew Huberman fanboy. And while I haven’t convinced him to come on to Superorganizers himself (yet), he’s talked a lot on his podcast and others about the protocols he follows to do his best work. 

That’s what this article is about. We’ve broken down everything we can find about his current morning routine, and we’ve also collected and condensed the science behind it. He says it sets him up for what he calls a “delicious” focused work block in the morning and—having tried most of his suggestions myself—I agree. 

So are you ready to learn how a neuroscientist runs his mornings? Let’s dive in :)

1. He starts his morning at the same time every day.

Dr. Huberman wakes up between 5:30 and 6:30 AM. 

The first thing he does is a personal assessment, where he asks himself if he feels rested. If he does, he gets out of bed. If he doesn’t, he does a 10 to 30 minute Yoga nidra passive listening session. Yoga nidra is a type of non-sleep deep rest (NSDR) protocol that guides the listener toward a state of pseudo-sleep and is restorative especially when you haven’t slept enough.

After doing a yoga nidra session, Dr. Huberman gets out of bed and starts the day.

Why this works

Routines create powerful anchors for the recurring internal mechanisms within our bodies. Waking at approximately the same time is one way to link these mechanisms to particular times of day and has tremendous positive effects on metabolism, hormone regulation, and general feelings of wellbeing. The time itself doesn’t need to be exact or early; it just needs to be more or less the same every day. 

But no one sleeps enough or perfectly every night. That’s where yoga nidra comes in. Yoga nidra sessions activate the parasynthetic nervous system, or the body’s calming system, and allow us to reach the restful netherworld between wakefulness and true sleep. If you try to make up for a bad night’s sleep with a two hour nap, you'll throw your carefully calibrated sleep schedule out of whack. If you instead practice yoga nidra or another type of NSDR and stick with your routine, you'll be better off. 

You can learn more about Dr. Huberman’s tactics to Master Your Sleep and Be More Alert When Awake here.

Takeaways for your routine: