The Mel Robbins Podcast6 Simple Science-Backed Hacks That Will Make Your Life Better
EVERY SPOKEN WORD
120 min read · 23,877 words- 0:00 – 12:13
intro
- NANarrator
(instrumental music plays)
- MRMel Robbins
20 years of your life is spent just scrolling on your phone?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Looking at your phone. It'll be about, for most of us, 20 years on average.
- MRMel Robbins
W- wait, what?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. It's something that you want to do over and over again. You wanna return to your screen, you wanna keep using it, despite recognizing that you're not enjoying it and that it's not very good for you. That's the only thing to ask yourself. "Do I feel better, happier, like my life is more meaningful after this? Or do I feel worse off, like I'm empty?"
- MRMel Robbins
It's true, I do feel empty.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. That's what people say when they spend huge amounts of time scrolling. They feel kinda empty.
- MRMel Robbins
I hate that you put it like that.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. I, I don't love that it's true, but I think that's what's going on.
- MRMel Robbins
How do you stop?
- AADr. Adam Alter
It's very difficult. I mean, I think... (swoosh sound)
- NANarrator
(instrumental music plays)
- MRMel Robbins
Hey, it's your friend Mel, and today, you and I are talking with one of the top psychology experts and professors in the world, and he's gonna reveal six specific things that play a huge role in your success, happiness, and health. Now, these are things that you interact with in your day-to-day life that you probably don't think about at all. But after our conversation today, you're gonna know what they are, and more importantly, how to use 'em to your advantage. Dr. Adam Alter is here in our Boston studios today. He is a renowned researcher and professor at NYU's Stern School of Business, and the Robert Stansky Teaching Excellence Faculty Fellow. He received his PhD in Psychology from Princeton University, where he also completed two fellowships, which means he's really (laughs) smart. And he's the author of three New York Times bestsellers: Irresistible, Drunk Tank Pink, and the brand new best-selling book, Anatomy of a Breakthrough. Now, Dr. Alter is here today to break it all down, share his research with you about the unexpected forces that shape how you think, feel, and behave, including one change today that, based on the research, will give you 20 years of your life back. So please help me welcome Dr. Adam Alter to the Mel Robbins Podcast. Thank you so much for making the trip to Boston.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Thank you for having me. It's good to be here.
- MRMel Robbins
It's terrific to be with you. I'm so excited to learn from you today. And I wanted to start off by asking you if you could just speak directly to the person who's listening and tell them what they're about to learn, and how their life could change if they really apply what you're gonna teach 'em today.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Sure. So I think there are two things. The first thing is I think we sail through life generally not really understanding what's shaping how we feel and behave, and what's guiding us in the, the directions that we happen to be moving. So the first thing is I think you're gonna understand a number of the things that are guiding you that you don't recognize are there. But the second thing is because you understand what those things are, you're able to act on them. You're able to use them to your benefit. Maybe the ones that are pushing you in the wrong direction, you can kind of stave them off. So I think it's, it's a combination of both of those things.
- MRMel Robbins
What made you wanna research things like colors and these environmental, I don't know, like things outside of us and within us that shape our experience of life?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. So, uh, you know, I think like a lot of people, I'm sort of fascinated by this idea that so much of what goes on is hidden from us, that-
- MRMel Robbins
Hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... um, essentially life is kind of like the iceberg where there's a little bit above the surface of the water, but a lot of really interesting stuff is unconscious, it's hidden from us. And so I wanted to try to understand as much of what's going on under the surface of the water. And a lot of it is these things that are shaping us in ways we don't recognize. So a lot of my research has been about trying to uncover those and then figure out what we can do about them.
- MRMel Robbins
I love this. All right, so let's dive in.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Sure.
- MRMel Robbins
There is (laughs) so much to learn. So much of your research also focuses on the environment around us-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... and how that can influence all different outcomes. Can you share some of that with us?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. So it's huge numbers of different factors, but around us all the time, there are colors.
- MRMel Robbins
Hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Um, sometimes we're in a built environment, like a room, and sometimes we're in a natural environment. And so a lot of my work focuses on, on how these different cues shape how we think, feel, and behave, and our welfare, our well-being. Um, a lot of the focus for me recently, because I've been very interested in, in the effect of spending huge amounts of time in front of screens, is what happens when you go as far from screens as possible to natural environments? Which we all sort of have the, I think, general sense that that's good for us, it's good to be in a natural environment, but the, the effects there are among the most profound I've ever seen in any research, that just spending a bit of time near a, a, a body of running water, or hearing wind rustle through trees, or spending 12 hours driving to the eclipse, which is what I did, that... It, it's a huge amount of energy that you put in, perhaps, to get to those kind of environments-
- MRMel Robbins
Mm-hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... but they have a huge effect on your welfare, and it's worth doing.
- 12:13 – 14:45
If you want to be a better athlete, this is the color you should wear.
- AADr. Adam Alter
in sports affect how they play. Um, so there's some work looking at Olympic athletes in combat sports like judo and wrestling-
- MRMel Robbins
Mm-hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... and taekwondo. And in- in the Olympics, what they did a while ago was they decided that they were gonna randomly assign each competitor to either wear blue or red before each bout-
- MRMel Robbins
Yeah.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... as a way to just be fair. Like, "We're gonna randomly pick red and blue and you're gonna get your- your color and then you're gonna-"... go into the bout. But one of the things the researchers discovered was when we wear red, we feel stronger, we feel more dominant. And when you see someone else wearing red, you perceive them as more dominant. And there are very lower order reasons for this. Like, if you look at animals, the animals with more red are more dominant in general. So if you look at 100 birds from the same species, the ones with more red feathers or a redder face will be the alpha birds. And that's gonna be true for apes and other animals as well. So the color red has a really big effect and it's, it's associated with sort of how, how well your blood throws, flows through your body and things like that. And, um, it's, it's a sort of signal that someone is strong and dominant. And what you actually find is in these Olympic bouts, when the competitors are evenly matched, if you are assigned to wear red, you win about two-thirds of the time, despite being evenly matched.
- MRMel Robbins
Really?
- AADr. Adam Alter
So it, yeah, it has a huge effect on, on these outcomes, yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
Wow. So, Dr. Halter, does that mean if I'm going in for a r- like a negotiation for a job, I should be wearing red, or an interview, or a date?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yes, with a caveat.
- MRMel Robbins
Okay.
- AADr. Adam Alter
So the yes is, yes, it will do that. It'll make you seem more dominant. It also turns out to make people more attractive to others-
- MRMel Robbins
Really?
- AADr. Adam Alter
... which is interesting too. Yeah. So, uh, there's research looking at dating profiles where you have the same picture and you just change, every two months, the color of the shirt you're wearing.
- MRMel Robbins
Uh-huh.
- AADr. Adam Alter
People get much more attention online when they're wearing, it's the same picture, but when they're wearing red rather than any other color.
- MRMel Robbins
Wow.
- AADr. Adam Alter
So, um, there's, there are all sorts of good reason to surround yourself with red. It's true, even if you have a border around your picture and it happens to be a red border rather than blue or green or another color. But red also has other meaning too, right? It's not, it's not a color that we don't notice. So you're signaling something beyond just, "I'm dominant," and making yourself look more attractive. It's a, it's a conscious choice. And so if people are seeing that and making other, drawing other inferences from the fact that you've chosen red, then maybe it's a, it's something you don't wanna do, if it's very unusual in that context, for example. But beyond that, as long as that's not an issue, there is very good reason to wear red.
- MRMel Robbins
Wow. And-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... what colors calm us down?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Um, the most calming colors are generally blues and greens, and I think
- 14:45 – 18:11
The color you should paint your bedroom if you want to feel calm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
a lot of that is the association we have with nature, which we, we discussed. So natural environments are very calming. Um, water, the sky, trees, leaves, things like that. Um, and so I think a lot of it comes from, from just the, the sort of calmness you get with the association with those colors.
- MRMel Robbins
So one of your, uh, international bestsellers, Drunk Tank Pink, very interesting name.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
And there's very interesting research about that sort of bubblegum, Pepto-Bismol pink color.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
Can you explain that?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. So the, the name is, it's, Drunk Tank Pink is a name that was given to this very bright, bubble gummy pink color. It was used for a while inside, um, they were called drunk tanks, where you put people who were kind of aggressive, often drunk, you're trying to calm them down. And researchers found that if these drunk tanks were painted pink, in their words, "You could calm these people down much more quickly." That within 15 minutes, they'd be calm.
- MRMel Robbins
And did it work?
- AADr. Adam Alter
There's some evidence that it worked. I think the, the research is a little bit shaky, but there was some evidence that this pink color did calm people down. It was, it got a huge amount of attention in the '80s. There was a 60 Minutes episode about it.
- MRMel Robbins
Wow.
- AADr. Adam Alter
It, it really got a lot of attention. Um, and so I thought it was just a sort of fascinating emblem of the kinds of effects you might see from cues that you might think would have a smaller effect on us. But by being surrounded by those colors, there are huge effects. In fact, the, the visiting locker room at the University of Iowa is painted Drunk Tank Pink in an attempt to calm down the opposition when they spend time in that locker room. So they've, th- it's been used in a lot of different contexts more recently.
- MRMel Robbins
Yeah. Well, and I think, what, where my mind goes is both to the Miami soccer team-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Right. Exactly.
- MRMel Robbins
... but they're a little b- more bright-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... and also to the beautiful trend of athletes wearing pink-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... for breast cancer awareness-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Right.
- MRMel Robbins
... which obviously is signaling something else. But-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yes.
- MRMel Robbins
... I think that's fascinating. If you're put in a bubblegum pink room, that it just sort of dulls your mood a little bit if you're a bit aggressive.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. Regarding Inter Miami, there are people who, when they, they box, they all only wear pink boxing trunks 'cause they think it'll make their opposition a little bit less strong. And so there's, I don't think that's why Inter Miami is pink and they have that pink uniform-
- MRMel Robbins
Right.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... but that's, that's one of the theories.
- MRMel Robbins
Wow. So can you talk about mirrors and how-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Sure.
- MRMel Robbins
... you can use them to change your behavior?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah, there's a lot of research looking at what happens when we see a human face. So, um, one of the things that happens when you see a face, particularly eyes, is you feel that you're being watched. And when you're being watched, it changes your behavior in certain predictable ways.
- MRMel Robbins
Okay.
- 18:11 – 20:53
The surprising impact of mirrors on behavior change.
- AADr. Adam Alter
I've always found quite, quite useful is if you... A, a lot of people might have like a cupboard in their home somewhere-
- MRMel Robbins
Uh-huh.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... maybe in the pantry where they keep their chocolates and things-
- MRMel Robbins
Mm-hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... that they wanna eat only occasionally.
- MRMel Robbins
Mine's in a drawer. (laughs)
- AADr. Adam Alter
Right, or a drawer.
- MRMel Robbins
Yes. (laughs)
- AADr. Adam Alter
And when, when you open that cupboard or when you go into the pantry, one thing a lot of people do now is they'll put up a little mirror.
- MRMel Robbins
What?
- AADr. Adam Alter
So what happens is, you're like, "I'm reaching for the chocolate. I have to look at myself in my eyes. I have to scrutinize this decision."... and sometimes it's fine, but other times maybe I look at myself and I'm like, "Okay, fine. I'll, I'll leave that chocolate sitting there for a little bit longer." So it basically forces you to be a little bit more thoughtful about your decisions.
- MRMel Robbins
Well, I could see how that would happen 'cause, you know, if you think about opening up a fridge-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... if there was a giant mirror in there-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. (laughs)
- MRMel Robbins
... I'd be like, "Oh, you again?"
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
"Uh, okay. Shut the thing." So, I'm, I might actually have to try this putting a mirror in the bottom of the drawer-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah, there you go.
- MRMel Robbins
... where I have all of our snacks. We call it the snack drawer. So, could you use a mirror to kinda cue yourself when it comes to bad habits? Is that like an environmental trigger that-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... can be effective in making you stop and think?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah, I think so. So I think what the mirror does is it makes you think more deeply and it especially makes you think more deeply about doing the wrong thing-
- MRMel Robbins
Mm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... where it's something that's contrary to what you think you should be doing because you have to do it in your own presence. It's like you're watching yourself. And so it's, it's a very powerful cue in all those cases.
- MRMel Robbins
I love that.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
That's a r- I c- I can think of a lot of implications for that, like if you're somebody who's trying to cut down on drinking-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... having a mirror sitting there when you open up the cabinet where the al- "Oh, okay."
- 20:53 – 23:58
Can looking at money really make you less helpful?
- MRMel Robbins
do you have favorite tweaks based on the research that you either recommend or use in your own life that help cue you to be your best or to make behavior change stick?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah, I've talked about the one, the biggest one. It was six years ago, I left New York City with my wife and two kids and we moved to a town where it was natural and beautiful-
- MRMel Robbins
Hm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... and we could go less than a mile in any direction and we would have either a beach or we would have a forest or we, we'd have something. Um-
- MRMel Robbins
Where is this Shangri-La?
- AADr. Adam Alter
The Shan-
- MRMel Robbins
You still work in New York? (laughs)
- AADr. Adam Alter
The Shangri-La's in Connecticut, just outside New York.
- MRMel Robbins
Wow. Okay.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. So, it's, it's beautiful and, and it means that on any day I can drive for 10 minutes or even walk for 10 minutes-
- MRMel Robbins
Mm-hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... and be somewhere that does all of this restoring. So I think being around nature for me is a huge one. Different people have different things that matter to them. That was very important to me. It also, it drew me back to my childhood because being, growing up in, first South Africa and then Australia, natural environments, and especially the beach in Australia, was a big part of what I was used to.
- MRMel Robbins
Hm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
And I miss that.
- MRMel Robbins
Yeah.
- AADr. Adam Alter
And so being near a, near a beach, the sand and the water was really important to me. So I think picking the location that, that does the best for you most of the time is really important that it's worth sometimes sacrificing other things for. And that's something that I've always, I've always followed.
- MRMel Robbins
You know, that makes a lot of sense. I remember this was decades ago, but when I had just graduated from law school and I moved to New York City-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... I basically spent all of my puny income so I could live walking distance to Central Park.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yes.
- MRMel Robbins
And so that I could also get to the West Side Highway because just being able, in the big city, to get to some green space was critical.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
And, you know, you said that thing about it also has a sort of nostalgia thing-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm.
- MRMel Robbins
... of being able to be outside. Anything about your inside environment, like the way that you think about your workspace or you might think about the kitchen or places where people want to be primed or prompted to be their best?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. So, we mentioned earlier, especially if you're in a big city, it's useful to have something natural inside that environment.
- MRMel Robbins
Hm. Mm-hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
It can be hopefully a real plant, but if it's not real, a fake plant. Anything that gives you the sense of that greenery and that nature. Maybe even like a little fountain feature, just a little thing that you plug in that maybe has a light and a little bit of running water. Even the sound of running water reminds you of all these things. And I had the same experience in New York. I was always in Central Park or running on the West Side. Um, and so to the extent that you can bring these features into your home, there's a, there's a huge amount of benefit to that. Um, I think for me personally, and this varies, but I think the lack of clutter that you create in a place is really an important, um, source of wellbeing. Uh, so for me, trying my best, and this doesn't always happen, but trying to remove clutter from an environment, especially where I'm trying to think, is really important. I think that's a really good way to think about doing your best work in general, that having blankness in front of you and just moving forward and pouring out your ideas is the best way to go without being infringed upon
- 23:58 – 26:49
Why do you need to hear running water to feel happier?
- AADr. Adam Alter
by other things that are in the environment around you.
- MRMel Robbins
Why does lots of stuff around the environment where you're trying to work or focus impact your ability to do your best thinking?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Well, every single thing, even if it's in a small way, is distracting. Everything draws you out of the here and now. Some things more than others. A smartphone, massively distracting for all sorts of reasons that are obvious. Even other objects, like if you have a memento that's in view-
- MRMel Robbins
Hm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... that's really nice. A picture of a loved one, that's really nice. But of course if you stare at it, it's gonna take you out of the here and now. That doesn't mean you shouldn't have photos of loved ones on your desk, but you should at least recognize that if there are 1,000 different nice mementos around you, the clutter of that, while it's lovely and it brings back good memories, that's probably not the time and place to do it. So having, having clarity in front of you as you work I think is a really important driver of, of good ideas and creativity in general.
- MRMel Robbins
I, I'm sitting here thinking about my workspace (laughs) at my home, and it is knick-knack attack, like-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... everywhere, like little stuff that I really love and means a lot to me. And I can tell you, this is probably an indication of just how distracted I am.
- AADr. Adam Alter
(laughs)
- MRMel Robbins
Uh, because I could go look at my computer and I've got like four little mason jars with all, like the pens in one and Sharpies in another, and pencils, and then I got a photo of my, uh, mom and my grandmother at the... Like, I, I, and then I've got a little compass my parents sent me, and then I've got a mug that Chris gave me, and then I-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Right.
- MRMel Robbins
... I mean, it just, it's like a little zoo of objects.
- AADr. Adam Alter
If it makes you feel great though. So if you-
- MRMel Robbins
I don't know that it does.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Okay. If, if it-
- MRMel Robbins
I just feel like-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... holy cow, even though I'm not staring at all this stuff, you're saying that subconsciously your mind is still pulling it in to some extent.
- AADr. Adam Alter
To some extent. It's processing things around you constantly.
- MRMel Robbins
Okay.
- AADr. Adam Alter
And so to the extent there are things around you all the time, you might ignore them consciously.
- MRMel Robbins
Right.
- AADr. Adam Alter
But they're always there. They're always, the clutter is always there, and on some level, even if it's on a small level, each little thing is pulling you away in some small sense. And that's the opposite of what you need, especially in the world that we live in now where everything is so distracting, where actually getting 10 minutes of good, hard quality work is vanishingly impossible. So-
- MRMel Robbins
That's it, 10 minutes?
- AADr. Adam Alter
I mean, it's very, very hard for a lot of people to work. If you track them across the day, to get to 10, 15, 20-minute bursts of good, hard work, it's tough for a lot of us, especially if your phone is nearby, if your, if your computer's dinging you with emails and things like that. It's, it's really hard to do the same task for 20 minutes in a row.
- MRMel Robbins
Well, Dr. Altoft, you are one of the most renowned and respected researchers when it comes to the impact of screens on our brains, on our health, and so let's talk about it. You have written a huge book on this. You are somebody that people
- 26:49 – 28:19
On average, we can only focus for 10 minutes at a time, here’s why.
- MRMel Robbins
look to for expert advice on this, and we've talked a lot about nature.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
But nature is combating-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... what has become the reality for all of us, which is, we spend most of our waking hours staring at a screen.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. Yeah, that's right. So, uh, you know, the way I think about it is, when you sit in today's age and you look out at whatever you're looking at-
- MRMel Robbins
Mm-hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... almost all the time you can tell that it's, this year, it's 2024 or roughly 2024. You see screens. You see all sorts of signs that we live in this particular modern age that we live in. I think one really useful thing, and why nature is so great, is 'cause it's timeless. That I think one way to measure how well you're living is, are you spending at least some of your day in an environment that is timeless, that is not attached and tethered to the here and now, that is not about the latest screen, the latest device, the lat- latest tech, the latest gadget. So when you are sitting in a forest, you could have been doing that a thousand years ago-
- MRMel Robbins
Hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... and seeing exactly the same thing. And I think there's some value to living at least part of our lives every day in an environment that is timeless.
- MRMel Robbins
What are some examples of how I can step into a timeless environment if I can't get out into the forest today?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. So closing your eyes is really good for that, right? Because you can then think of anything you like, and people have been able to do that forever. That's what makes us human is our ability to imagine outside of the here and now. The other thing is, I think, just having a conversation with a loved one, which is-
- MRMel Robbins
Hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... again, screens make that more and more difficult. We spend so much time in front of them that we spend less time
- 28:19 – 30:47
Are you spending your days wisely? Ask yourself this question.
- AADr. Adam Alter
with people we, we really connect to. But having a face-to-face conversation with someone, that's also timeless. That was going on thousands of years ago as well. Our species has been doing that forever. We do it less now than we ever have before. So I think timelessness doesn't have to be about nature or even the environment you're in. It can be the activity that you're doing. And so anything where you're connecting with another human being is timeless as well.
- MRMel Robbins
This is so important because so many of us, and I'm gonna include myself, are searching for deeper meaning in life.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
Searching for purpose. Searching for a sense of being connected to self-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... and connected to something beyond just that sort of day-to-day autopilot mode. Onto the next headline, onto the next deadline, onto the next thing on your to-do list.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Right.
- MRMel Robbins
And I love how you phrase this as, how do you take a break from modern life-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... that is always going to pull you to the next thing-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... and step back into these things that you have described that escape a sense of what decade you're in-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... and what age you are, and that have always been around?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Right.
- MRMel Robbins
And so nature-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... conversations with somebody else, closing your eyes, and escaping into your thoughts to remind you that there is something so much more important-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... than the here and now. And is there anything else that you would recommend?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah, I think physical activity is a big one, right? Because a lot of the time we spend in front of screens is sedentary. We're not moving. We're sitting.
- MRMel Robbins
Hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Maybe we're standing if you're at a standing desk. But it's very tethered to a particular place. It doesn't involve a lot of activity.
- MRMel Robbins
Hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
So, um, I think there's a timelessness to physical activity. Our ancestors had to do much more of it just to stay alive. And so they had to find food and they had to, you know, negotiate different landscapes. We don't have to do that anymore. It's easy for us to get by and not move. So I think exercise, picking up heavy things, uh, moving our bodies for certain periods of time every day, all of that is also consistent with this timelessness that I think is important. And I just think it's a good rule of thumb. I've, I've realized this over time, that when you're trying to figure out, am I, am I living the way I'd like to live? A lot of it is, is those timeless activities that go back to things that we were doing a long time ago that were very good for us as a species that brought us to where we are today. It's a lot of
- 30:47 – 34:11
The shocking impact that screens have on our lives.
- AADr. Adam Alter
the things that are kind of incredibly new and different, as, uh, um, I love technology, I think it's wonderful in many ways, but a lot of the aspects of it that we've kind of put as a gloss over our lives today, I think-... leave us impoverished in some sense.
- MRMel Robbins
Very much so.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
And disconnected.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
And distracted and not feeling like you're doing something that's actually meaningful to you.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Right. (whoosh)
- MRMel Robbins
So, you've done extensive research on screens, on digital distraction, and also just kind of this constant need to be occupied.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
It's almost like this state of distraction that we've gotten used to. What's some of the most shocking things that you have come across in your research?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. So I've spoken to, I don't know how many dozens, hundreds of audiences of the kids themselves who use screens, the parents of those kids, teachers in schools, school district heads, um, people in policy, in government, uh, people in all sorts of different areas about the effects of screens. And the most striking thing to me is that, when you speak to kids in particular ...
- MRMel Robbins
Mm-hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
So, especially teenagers, you get this incredible difference between how much they feel they have to use these devices and how much they enjoy it, how much it- is good for them. Um, so when you eat candy, you might say to yourself, "That's delicious. I kinda know it's not great for me, but I'm gonna do it anyway."
- MRMel Robbins
Right.
- AADr. Adam Alter
With screens, it's like a different tone. It's this tone of, "I wish I and all my friends stopped doing this thing. I wish we didn't keep returning to the same social media platforms because I know it's not good for any of us. But if we don't, if I'm the only one who says I'm gonna draw back, then I'm isolated." And so, it's- it's this very collective problem where, unless you can get lots of people to do the same thing at the same time, it's not gonna be easy to solve. And you hear this from a lot of kids. They say, "If only I could get everyone else in my class, or at least a certain number of people not to do this, I'd feel better." And the parents say the same thing. They say, "I wish I could be the parent who says we're- we're gonna be much more careful about exposing our kids to these-"
- MRMel Robbins
Right.
- AADr. Adam Alter
"... devices and social media and so on. But we can't be the only ones 'cause then our kids are just ... that's a different problem, they're the only ones."
- MRMel Robbins
Right.
- AADr. Adam Alter
So a lot of the work that I'm doing now is on- o- on trying to push not just individuals to change how they behave, but to work with, say, entire classrooms or entire schools or entire school districts, so that the entire district pushes parents and the kids of those parents to- to delay how long it takes them to use these devices.
- MRMel Robbins
Well, you know, it's interesting. I remember reading a big write-up of Deerfield Academy-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... in Massachusetts, who you probably know have this new policy heads up, which is no phones on campus, period. Like, they can be in your locker, they can be in your backpack, but they are not on your person.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. So th- there's a movement called OK to Delay, um, for example. And there are some others as well that are trying to deal with this at that collective level-
- MRMel Robbins
Mm-hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... for exactly the reason you mentioned. There are very few benefits to having phones at school. Maybe a flip phone so you can get in touch with someone in an emergency.
- MRMel Robbins
They can call the front office.
- AADr. Adam Alter
They can c- yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
Like, I'm personally one of these people that's like, get the fricking phones out of the schools.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
Parents can call the front office if there is an emergency.
- 34:11 – 36:29
How to change your relationship with your cell phone.
- AADr. Adam Alter
- MRMel Robbins
They take their phones away.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
And they love giving their kids that break and the kids love it, but, you know, I do think it's interesting that the shocking piece of (laughs) research that's come out of it is, we all know we need to do something-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... we all know it's bad for us, and we all wish there was an alternative, and yet my entire social life is on this thing.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. I mean, the way I opened this book was talking about how years before the rest of us were aware of this, Steve Jobs, with his own kids, he wouldn't bring the iPad into his house.
- MRMel Robbins
Mm-hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
And then you look at other tech titans. There's a school in the Bay Area that doesn't let kids near phones or use phones or use screens until about ninth grade, until they learn to code.
- MRMel Robbins
Yup.
- AADr. Adam Alter
That school, 75% of the kids there are the kids of Silicon Valley tech execs. So they are sending their kids ... The people who know the most about what this tech is doing are keeping their kids as far away from these products as possible, especially in the school environment.
- MRMel Robbins
I mean, it makes perfect sense.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
So do you think we're all addicted to the screen?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. So this term addiction is, um ... I- I use it in the book as a sort of shorthand to describe a lot of what I think is going on in this case, because the- the- the definition that I use is, it's something that you want to do over and over again, you wanna return to your screen, you wanna keep using it, despite recognizing that you're not enjoying it and that it's not very good for you-
- MRMel Robbins
Hm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... on balance, and that it has negative effects in the long run for your social well-being, you know, your relationships are degraded for it. Um, it means you're more sedentary, so it's not good for you physically. It exposes a lot of us to bullying, anxiety, aggression, loneliness, other negative psychological consequences. It's also a way to overspend. A lot of people spend too much money-
- MRMel Robbins
(laughs)
- AADr. Adam Alter
... using these devices.
- MRMel Robbins
I feel like Instagram has turned into the Home Shopping Network.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Exactly. Yeah. It's a very powerful way to sell products. Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
Wow. Y- y- you said earlier this interesting metaphor that, for example, we all know candy's delicious.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
But if you just pound a gigantic, like, five-pound chocolate bar ... I love Tony's Chocolate, I d- oh-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. (laughs)
- MRMel Robbins
And I also love MrBeast's new line, like, oh, I just love chocolate. And Halloween, go out trick-or-treating-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yep.
- MRMel Robbins
... I'd fill that pillowcase up, man. I would come home, sort all the candy, and I would just start munching-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... but then I would have a huge stomachache and I wouldn't wanna look at candy again for another month.
- 36:29 – 40:18
Are we all addicted to our screens?
- MRMel Robbins
And it's almost as if that Halloween candy hangover is what's happening every single day, where we wake up, we know we don't wanna spend nine hours ... What- what is the average amount of time that people are spending on their phones?
- AADr. Adam Alter
It's hard to get really good definitive data, but it's many hours a day. Um, I had a high school class that I was teaching at NYU for a while over summers. I'm not doing it at the moment, but I did it for several years, and at the beginning of that six-week class, I would ask the students to download an app that would track their usage, which now most phones do anyway. And the numbers I was getting were-... absolutely staggering. Some of the students were on their phones, like, 10, 12 hours a day. Um, the average was something like six or seven or eight hours a day, and this was a number of years ago. I think it's only gone up since then. Um, I've heard three, four, five hours described as the average for adults as well, so it's a huge amount of time. Um, one of the things it's doing is it's changing your tolerance for spending a long time doing something that involves hard, deep work and thinking. You know, so-
- MRMel Robbins
What does that mean i- with a simple brain like mine? What do you mean it reduces tolerance?
- AADr. Adam Alter
So- so what it- what it means is, if you're getting 2,000 messages a day, each one lasting maybe a second or two seconds, that's how your brain starts to process information, in these bite-sized chunks. And they're all also chosen to be maximally enjoyable, interesting. They bombard you with interesting content. And so what happens is you assume the rest of the world is gonna be like that. You know, we get into an elevator for five seconds and that's too much, that's hard, so we pull out our phones to be entertained in that moment. And that's how the rest of the world becomes. So if I say to a- a seven-year-old kid who's on a screen all day, "It's time to learn to read," the amount of energy and- and intense concentration you're asking for there is so different from what that kid is used to, if- if it's been about sort of scrolling through videos, that that's deeply problematic. You can't expect people to just suddenly turn on this muscle that they haven't been using. So it makes us less used to having to try really hard. And so that's, I think, one big problem. The other thing is, if- if you look at how many hours a day we're doing this for, there's a huge amount of other stuff, the opportunity cost there is so great, that we're leaving this other stuff behind. So I could be spending that time having a conversation with a loved one or a friend. I could be spending that time in a natural environment, or I could be exercising. I could be doing lots of different things, but I don't do any of that stuff because I'm spending time mindlessly scrolling. So the- there's a- a huge amount there.
- MRMel Robbins
Can you explain the mindlessly part? Like-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... why do we doom scroll? I- I- there's so many of us, um, Adam, that come home from work, you cook dinner, you- you've got kids, you're married, you know, you're doing all the stuff. You're packing up the backpacks, you're cleaning up the dishes-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... you're letting the dog out. You're hopefully, like, having a moment of quiet to yourself, and you say to yourself, "I'm gonna go to bed early tonight," or, "I'm gonna work on that project." And next thing you know, two hours have gone by-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... and you've just wasted your evening doom-scrolling.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
Why do we do that?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. There- there's this interesting theory about gambling, that I think a lot of people have this naive idea that when people are gambling, they're just like, "This is amazing, and this is so much fun, and I'm getting all this feedback, and I-"
- MRMel Robbins
Yes.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... and I- then I hit a jackpot. People don't gamble because that's true. They gamble because they get into this kind of trance. Like, there's something about sitting in front of a slot machine that is deeply soothing and numbing, and that's what the screen does. At the end of a hard day, what you don't want is to be massively excited most of the time. You're exhausted.
- MRMel Robbins
Hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
You just wanna have this kind of comfort, this lull. It's like a- taking a bath in the screen, and it- it brings this sense of comfort and reliability, and I'm- I'm- nothing is being asked of me. I don't have to do anything. I just move my phone, move my finger, and that's all I have to do.
- MRMel Robbins
It sounds so lovely.
- AADr. Adam Alter
It sounds lovely, right?
- MRMel Robbins
Yes.
- AADr. Adam Alter
And what- what else gives us that sort of really uncomplicated dose of
- 40:18 – 44:14
So, why do we doom scroll on social media for hours?
- AADr. Adam Alter
calm at the end of a long day?
- MRMel Robbins
Alcohol.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Very little. Alcohol, that's the other option. And so there aren't that many options. It's substances or it's screens, and many of us just turn to screens. So that's, I think, what's happening for most of us.
- MRMel Robbins
I hate that you put it like that.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. I- I don't love that it's true, but I think that's what's going on.
- MRMel Robbins
How do you stop?
- AADr. Adam Alter
It's very difficult. I mean, I think the biggest thing when we try to stop doing something is we- we don't replace it with something else. So the first thing to think about is, if I wanna stop doing this thing, whatever this thing is, whether it's drinking, using a substance, scrolling through TikTok, whatever it is, when you would have done that thing, there needs to be something else there, and preferably something else that you enjoy that's not bad for you.
- MRMel Robbins
Hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Something that you feel better about doing. And that's gonna be different for everyone. You've gotta cultivate that habit, that change. And so just saying, "I'm gonna not do this thing, and I'm gonna use my willpower," no one has that much willpower.
- MRMel Robbins
Right.
- AADr. Adam Alter
That's exhausting. You can't expect yourself to be superhuman. But figure out what else you could be doing that's more enriching but that also makes you feel good and do that other thing.
- MRMel Robbins
Th-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Pla- plaster over that gap.
- MRMel Robbins
This is a pathetic question (laughs) -
- AADr. Adam Alter
(laughs)
- MRMel Robbins
... but given that you are-
- AADr. Adam Alter
My favorite kind.
- MRMel Robbins
... the renowned guy that is doing the research on this, do you have some suggestions? Because even my first thought was, "Well, you know, I've been addicted to the-" Well, I shouldn't say addicted. I've been loving this fantasy audiobook, Court of Thorn and Roses. I am living in a different land, and it's on my phone. Um, I think about, "Oh, okay, well, I could just slump on the couch and watch something on TV." There's another screen.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
So in the research or in just kind of really digging into this topic, are there things that have come up that could offer just a spark of a suggestion for those of us that would really like to not have this be a habit and not be lulled every night-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... into giving our evenings away to our phone?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. So I'll say one thing. I think this is a good moment to say that screens are not one thing, right? It's not like looking at a screen is automatically a bad thing.
- MRMel Robbins
Right.
- AADr. Adam Alter
You could be reading a really r- enriching book on the screen, and that's great, it makes you feel good. Or you could be watching a show or a documentary or whatever. It doesn't matter. There's nothing wrong with spending hours in front of the TV at the end of the night, if that's mindfully what you wanna be doing with your time. There's also nothing wrong with briefly scrolling through a social media platform. The problem is none of us have the willpower to just do it for two minutes.
- MRMel Robbins
Right.
- AADr. Adam Alter
So I don't think it- you have to find something that's not screen based. You just have to find something that's not making you feel hollow and unhappy, that doesn't make you feel like you've kinda been robbed of your self-control and your agency. So if that means you're gonna watch an episode of your favorite show on Netflix, and then you're gonna go and read five chapters of your favorite book, and then you're gonna have a conversation, and then you would- you're gonna try a new recipe that you wanted to cook, whatever it is, it doesn't really matter what it is-... it just should be something that doesn't leave you feeling hollow. That's the only thing to ask yourself, "Do I feel better, happier, like my life is more meaningful after this? Or do I feel worse off, like I'm empty?" And that's what people say when they spend huge amounts of time scrolling, they feel kinda empty. So, just find something else, even if it's on a screen, that doesn't leave you feeling that way.
- MRMel Robbins
It's true, I do feel empty.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
And it then makes you feel stupid for wasting that much time. And if you add it up cumulatively over the years, it's a large part of your life.
- 44:14 – 45:41
3 ways to replace screen time with something more meaningful.
- AADr. Adam Alter
one thing to think is imagine it's the end of your life, you- you've hopefully lived a very fulfilling long life, you get to that point and then someone says, "Would you like 20 extra years?" And the answer is, "No, I'd rather have spent 20 years scrolling mindlessly." No one's gonna say that. So, I think when, when you, if the first step to fi- fixing this problem is having people say, "I really wanna change this," that to me-
- MRMel Robbins
Hm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... is a good place to begin, that idea that you are shortening your life, effectively, by 20 years, or 15 years, or ho- however long it ends up being, because you spend all this time consuming sort of eye candy, mental candy by, by scrolling. I, I think almost everyone would say when you zoom back, assuming you have the self-control, "I think there are better things I could be doing with that time. Maybe I'll save a year or two for the scrolling, but then that leaves me still 15, 18 years to do other things."
- MRMel Robbins
You just basically dropped a grenade on any excuse that somebody would have that they don't have time, or it's too late, or, "I, I couldn't possibly fit this thing in," because you have all this found time.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
Is there a difference between the screen on your phone and the screen on the television in terms of the impact to your brain?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. So, well, the way you interact with those screens is very different, right?
- MRMel Robbins
How so?
- AADr. Adam Alter
So, so when, when you watch TV content, it's just something that's kind of being visited upon you, you're not interacting with it.
- MRMel Robbins
Yep.
- AADr. Adam Alter
So, there are good and bad parts to interacting with a screen. If you're learning a language, you're gonna learn it less well on a TV than on a phone 'cause you can interact with the phone.
- MRMel Robbins
Okay.
- 45:41 – 49:02
This is the most profound question you can ask yourself.
- MRMel Robbins
- AADr. Adam Alter
If you are using a social media platform, no one uses that social media on a screen like a TV, 'cause you can't have that bi-directional relationship where you act on the thing and then it acts back on you.
- MRMel Robbins
Right.
- AADr. Adam Alter
That's critical, that's what goes on on phones that makes, make it so immersive. Um, so a TV screen is, is less kind of weaponized to, to draw our time and attention away from us.
- MRMel Robbins
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
It gives us a little bit more agency. That doesn't mean it's perfect. You know, if you're watching a show, there's a cliffhanger and someone says to you, "Just sit here for 10 seconds, the next episode will begin," that's where binge viewing comes from, and we almost all do that.
- MRMel Robbins
Right.
- AADr. Adam Alter
But what we do with our screens when we're on phones is, I think, much more difficult for us to resist.
- MRMel Robbins
You know, I think I just got something that I'd never thought about before, uh, Dr. Alter, which is that your brain is getting so many fast signals and messages, from the ads, to the pop-ups, to the notifications, to you yourself switching between the texting and the email and search, and what is getting fused together is a brain that now is constantly expecting this go, go, go.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
And I had not thought about the fact that because if you're using your phone and you can interact with it, so now you've also got your hands involved, and there's that whole body of research around neurobics and marrying the, the, the physical movement and particularly movements of your hands with new thought patterns-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... and how that fires and wires your brain quicker. Like, that to me makes so much sense, that because you're actually typing and you're interacting with it, you're programming your brain faster almost to expect short form. I hear people also talking anecdotally, like, "There's a rise in ADHD," but it's actually a rise in your brain getting trained to be distracted.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. So, I think what's happened is, uh, we live in an age of time contraction. Everything happens in really brief chunks.
- MRMel Robbins
Hm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Everything's five seconds long, 10 seconds long. It's, it's, time is contracted. If you go on a vacation to a beach and you spend a week doing nothing, you get time dilation, time suddenly works on a different scale. You think of five minutes as no time at all. Whereas, in the way we live our lives, many of us most of the time, five minutes, you could do 100 things. You could look at 100 videos. There are a million things you could do in five minutes, and that creates a sense of massive urgency. For what purpose? I don't know. Probably not a good one for most of us most of the time. So, I think there's some value in, in changing the scale of things, in, in going for a four-hour drive. I drove 12 hours there and back to see the eclipse.
- MRMel Robbins
Where'd you go?
- AADr. Adam Alter
I went to Northern Vermont. And it was incredible. I drove six hours with a friend.
- MRMel Robbins
Yeah.
- AADr. Adam Alter
We got out of the car for five minutes, watched the eclipse, got back in, and drove home. So, it was 12 hours of driving for three minutes of magic. But the one really interesting thing that did, that was several days ago now, was it changed how I feel about time. There's a hangover period where I'm like, "A few hours? No problem, not a problem at all. I can focus on things for a few hours." I did it for 12 hours the other day. When do we ever do one thing for 12 hours? It's just very rare. So, I think doing things that are extended and protracted is really valuable, because it resets what you think of as a k- a kind of meaningful chunk of time.
- MRMel Robbins
Well, and this goes back
- 49:02 – 51:21
If you feel constantly distracted, it’s because you are.
- MRMel Robbins
to something that you also talked about, which is, I guarantee that those five minutes that you probably spent at Burke Mountain, right? You know, up in that area. (laughs)
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah, yeah, exactly. (laughs)
- MRMel Robbins
Um, that-There was something about those five minutes that felt like five hours.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
And you used the word time dilation-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... which means that you're stretching your own perception-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... of being in the moment. And you gave us a list of things like being in nature, having plants or some sort of water element in your house, meditation, a conversation with somebody-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... where you're really in the moment is a way for you to actually slow down time-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yes.
- MRMel Robbins
... and get important time back.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Right.
- MRMel Robbins
So you also have this research, it's very interesting, it's this concept called stopping cues?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
What does that mean?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah, so stopping cues, if you think about how we consumed information in the 20th century and- and the early 21st, everything had a natural end point to it, th- these are known as stopping cues. So you'd read a book and you'd get to the end of a chapter or the whole book. You'd watch a TV show, the credits would roll.
- MRMel Robbins
Yes.
- AADr. Adam Alter
These were all gentle signals that you probably wanted to do something different.
- MRMel Robbins
Mm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Move on to the next thing. And they were built into everything we did. So those are called stopping cues. Now the thing about a lot of the tech we use is that tech companies have systematically eradicated those stopping cues, they've removed them, they've weeded them out. So the bottomless feed that you get on social media platforms, that is a good example of a- the absence of stopping cues. So because we are humans who are creatures of inertia, we just keep doing the same thing over and over until something pushes us to the next thing. In the absence of a cue that says, "Hey, maybe you want to move on to the next thing," we just keep going, and that's a lot of why once we start using a social media platform, there's no cue to move on. The same way when you're on a slot machine, there's no cue to move on, so we just keep going.
- MRMel Robbins
So some of my favorite cookies-
- AADr. Adam Alter
(laughs)
- MRMel Robbins
... are Pepperidge Farm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
And they come in these stacks and these trays.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
And when I clean out a whole tray, the empty tray is a stopping cue- (laughs)
- AADr. Adam Alter
That is a stopping cue.
- 51:21 – 54:27
The danger of having no stopping cues with technology.
- MRMel Robbins
so much about how distracted we've become by our phones?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah, so I- I think the biggest one is that the- the simplest solution to this problem is actually an analog one, which is to- to cultivate habits where there are certain parts of the day that are sacred and free of screens. I think that's very important. And it's different for different people. So it could be, you know, every day, dinnertime, no screens, we all put our phones in a cookie jar, we put a timer on, we are not allowed to go into that jar for 30- 30 minutes maybe. That's one example.
- MRMel Robbins
It seems kinda psycho that we have to do this, honestly.
- AADr. Adam Alter
It's- it's totally ridiculous that we are in this position as consumers of this tech to have to do it, but we do. So-
- MRMel Robbins
But- and it's because though, and I think this is a really important piece of the research that you're explaining to us, this isn't because you're weak, it's because this technology is designed to keep you going.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
That sort of emptiness that you described when somebody's sitting in front of the slot machine-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... where you're just sort of lulled into this state, that that's why you have to have these stopping cues and you have to have these boundaries. You know, one of the things I'm curious about, because you've researched this and you're also a father of two-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... and you're married, and you're teaching, and so you're seeing students of different ages, and you've seen these platforms change since you, you know, have been writing all of these books and doing this research-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... uh, Dr. Alter, what does your morning routine look like?
- AADr. Adam Alter
So one thing I try very hard to do, and I'm better at this some mornings than others, is to spend as much time after I wake up not looking at a screen as possible. It's really useful to kind of ease your way into the day by not immediately picking up the phone and looking at whatever's on the screen.
- MRMel Robbins
Mm-hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
So that's one important thing. Um, I have, there are different days where I'm doing different things, but usually the very beginning part of the day is with my kids, and often my wife, um, and so that's- that's obviously a deeply connected time where you're discussing what we're gonna have for breakfast, and, you know, there are little conversations that happen. They themselves are not necessarily full of meaning and philosophy and richness, but there's a richness just to the kind of routine of- of connecting over that period of the day. And I think that's really useful. If you live with someone else, that is a time when some of us need a little bit of time to wake up and a coffee, but once you get past that, to connect, I think, is really important, and I try to do that as much as possible in the morning.
- MRMel Robbins
Got it. So if you could speak directly to the person who's been listening to this who's now panic-stricken-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yes. (laughs)
- MRMel Robbins
... that they're going to lose 20 years of their life looking at their phone, and they're thinking about stopping cues, and they're thinking about all of the amazing things that you've made us think about-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... and wanna try, what do you think the one action, if you had to say there's one thing I- I really want you to do-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... what would it be?
- AADr. Adam Alter
So I think the easiest thing you can do that will give you back years of your life is to take your device for an hour a day, you pick the hour, it could be in the morning, could be in the afternoon, could be in the evening, put it in a drawer or a cookie jar, put it somewhere, make sure it's roughly the same time every day so it's
- 54:27 – 55:45
A morning routine that will optimize success and happiness.
- AADr. Adam Alter
a habit, and if you do that for enough days, you will literally give yourself back years of your life, where you would have spent that time mindlessly scrolling, you're gonna be doing something more enriching. Just do that one small thing to start, so it- it'll have a massive effect on your well-being.
- MRMel Robbins
Wow. Dr. Adam Alter, thank you-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Thank you.
- MRMel Robbins
... thank you, thank you for being here with us.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Thank you for having me. (whooshing sound)
- MRMel Robbins
You heard him. I want you to get 20 years of your life back, and I want you to use that time to create a more meaningful life for yourself, because you deserve that. And in case no one else tells you today, let me be the one to say, I love you, and I believe in you, and I believe in your ability to change your life and to use all of these amazing things that you learned today to help you do that. All righty, I'll see you in a few days. And I know that you want more videos to watch, more inspiration. I'm gonna recommend a video in just a second, but first I wanna say thank you, thank you, thank you for subscribing to the channel. It takes a second. It's one way you can support me and give back to our team. It really helps us bring you world-class experts at zero cost, so thanks for doing that. And thanks also for sharing this with people in your life that you love. It's one way that you can make a difference with them. All righty, I know you're looking for more inspiration, so check out this video next.
Episode duration: 55:45
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