The CIA Taught Me This Productivity Trick (It's Insane) — Transcript
Full transcript
- 0:00The truth is that most men are wasting
- 0:0280% of their day or more and they don't
- 0:05even realize it. When I was being
- 0:07trained by CIA, we were taught how to
- 0:10literally bend time. How to get more
- 0:12done in one hour than most people get
- 0:15done in one day. The crazy thing is, you
- 0:18can do it, too, if you know one simple
- 0:21secret. My name is Andrew Bustamante and
- 0:23I'm a former CIA intelligence officer,
- 0:26New York Times best-selling author, and
- 0:27viral internet voice. I spent seven
- 0:30years operating around the world with
- 0:31CIA's National Clandestine Service and
- 0:34now I teach spy skills that break
- 0:35barriers to unlock your peak
- 0:37performance. I've had viral interviews
- 0:39with Diary of a CEO, Shawn Ryan,
- 0:41Flagrant, Lex Fridman, and many other
- 0:43top-tier podcasters and mainstream media
- 0:45outlets. If you've seen one of my
- 0:47interviews in the past, go ahead and
- 0:48leave a comment below and tell me what
- 0:50you remember the most. The spy skills I
- 0:52teach have helped tens of thousands of
- 0:54people around the world increase their
- 0:56income, decrease their waistline, and
- 0:58shortcut their way to wealth, happiness,
- 1:00and even love. And today, I want to
- 1:03share a new spy skill with you. CIA
- 1:05taught me that the most important hour
- 1:07in any day is actually the first hour of
- 1:11the day. This is completely contrary to
- 1:14much of what you learn at home, in
- 1:16school, in college, or even at work,
- 1:18where they try to make you think that
- 1:19your most productive hour has to be one
- 1:21of your core work hours. Those eight
- 1:24hours a day between when you get to work
- 1:25and when you leave work. In reality, CIA
- 1:28teaches that the most important hour is
- 1:30the first hour because a productive
- 1:33first hour of the day sets the tone, the
- 1:36foundation, and the pacing for every
- 1:38other hour that follows it. So, the
- 1:41question becomes, how do you make the
- 1:43most out of that first hour of the day?
- 1:46And that's what we're going to cover
- 1:47today. First, let's talk about how that
- 1:49first hour of the day will impact every
- 1:51hour of the day that is yet to come.
- 1:54First, the way that your body physically
- 1:56feels. If you feel bloated in that first
- 1:59hour, there's a good chance you're going
- 2:00to feel bloated for multiple hours that
- 2:02follow. If you feel tired or lethargic
- 2:05or unable to focus, what you feel in
- 2:07your body in that first hour will carry
- 2:10with you for many hours yet to come. The
- 2:12way your brain feels in that first hour,
- 2:14if it's focused, if it's scattered, if
- 2:16it's angry, if it's happy, how your
- 2:18brain feels in the first hour of the day
- 2:20sets the tone for not only how you will
- 2:22cognitively perform during the day, but
- 2:25also how you will emotionally perform
- 2:27throughout the day. So, if you already
- 2:29feel slow and maybe angry, or maybe you
- 2:31feel slow and depressed, you're going to
- 2:33carry those cognitive and emotional
- 2:36feelings with you as you progress
- 2:37through your day. You already know what
- 2:40this feels like. If you've ever felt
- 2:41crappy when you wake up, and then you
- 2:43continue to feel crappy when you get to
- 2:45work. Maybe you even continue feeling
- 2:47crappy until after you've pumped
- 2:49yourself full of caffeine and sugar and
- 2:50had some kind of turnaround around
- 2:52lunchtime. Even more important than your
- 2:54brain or your body during that first
- 2:56hour is actually your behavior. Because
- 2:58the behavior that you set in the first
- 3:00hour of the day becomes the default
- 3:02behavior that you will carry with you
- 3:04throughout the day. So, if you are
- 3:05behaving in a reactive way, an
- 3:07aggressive way, a defensive way in the
- 3:10first hour of your day, you are more
- 3:12likely to carry that behavior with you
- 3:14forward, continuing your aggression,
- 3:16your defensiveness, and your reactivity
- 3:18to all of the new stressors and inputs
- 3:20around you. And most important of all,
- 3:22how you execute the first hour of the
- 3:24day will actually come back tenfold in
- 3:28the last hour of the day when it's time
- 3:30for you to try to go to sleep. So, if
- 3:33you've ever had a bad night's sleep
- 3:35after a bad day that started with a bad
- 3:37morning, you already know what this
- 3:40feels like. It's not you, it's not a
- 3:41problem with your mentality, your
- 3:43attitude, or your motivation. It is
- 3:45literally biological, and the way that
- 3:48you encode your body upon wake up is how
- 3:51your body will process the code before
- 3:53it goes to sleep. Your first hour
- 3:56literally programs your hormones, your
- 3:58attitude, your gut, your cognition, and
- 4:01plays that code throughout the day. So,
- 4:03if we want to unlock your peak
- 4:05performance throughout the day, we need
- 4:07to unlock your peak performance in the
- 4:09first hour of every day. CIA taught me
- 4:12this skill when I was first going
- 4:14through the field tradecraft course, or
- 4:15FTC, something that we commonly call the
- 4:18farm. The farm is a long day every day
- 4:21for many weeks and many months. And
- 4:23because there is so much learning, so
- 4:25much exercise, so much activity, we
- 4:27focus very much on the first hour of the
- 4:30day to set the tone for productivity
- 4:32throughout the entire day. You don't get
- 4:34a chance to go back in time. You don't
- 4:36get a chance to miss a day or skip a
- 4:37day. Nobody lets you have a redo anytime
- 4:40that you're going through CIA training.
- 4:42So, every single day matters. And it's a
- 4:45competition. You might start with 100%
- 4:47of CIA new recruits, but only 80% of
- 4:50those new recruits are actually going to
- 4:52graduate on graduation day. And the
- 4:54reason that last 20% fall out has
- 4:56nothing to do with their intelligence or
- 4:58their capability, it has everything to
- 5:00do with whether or not they were able to
- 5:02adopt a daily routine that allowed them
- 5:05to maintain optimum performance for such
- 5:08a long period of time. So, very early in
- 5:10our training they teach us a simple
- 5:12morning routine, and that morning
- 5:14routine is what I want to give you right
- 5:16now. First, you have to understand that
- 5:18your brain only has two core functions.
- 5:21It can either index information, meaning
- 5:23it can store information for later
- 5:25retrieval, or it can absorb new
- 5:28information, which is another way of
- 5:30saying it can learn. So, your brain
- 5:31cannot both learn and index
- 5:34simultaneously. So, your brain has to
- 5:36constantly switch between learning
- 5:38something new and remembering something
- 5:40old, observing something current and
- 5:43recalling something from the past. Your
- 5:46brain cannot do two things at one time.
- 5:48So, in order to optimize your brain
- 5:50function, you have to dedicate space,
- 5:52particularly in the morning, to letting
- 5:55your brain do one thing or the other.
- 5:58And in the morning, the most important
- 6:00function for your brain is actually
- 6:02indexing. And the reason that indexing
- 6:04is so important is because when you're
- 6:06asleep at night, your subconscious is
- 6:08very active. It's connecting disparate
- 6:11ideas. It's making memories and
- 6:13combining them with creativity. It's
- 6:14creating dreams. It's actually a very
- 6:17active brain state. You are actually
- 6:19learning in your sleep, a process that
- 6:21you've probably heard called osmosis in
- 6:23the past. What that means is that when
- 6:25you wake up, it's really your brain's
- 6:28first opportunity to stop learning
- 6:30something new, stop thinking creatively,
- 6:32stop engaging in its prefrontal cortex,
- 6:35and actually start to save, download,
- 6:38buffer, index the information that it
- 6:40has come into contact with overnight. If
- 6:43you're one of those people that realizes
- 6:44that you have new ideas in the morning,
- 6:46you may already have a little automatic
- 6:48indexing going on. So, we're going to
- 6:50give your brain a boost every morning by
- 6:52creating a window of time between 2 and
- 6:555 minutes where you don't introduce any
- 6:57new sensory information into your body.
- 7:00And the reason I'm focused on sensory
- 7:02information is because your body has
- 7:04five organs that it uses to intake new
- 7:08information. And those five organs are
- 7:09your sensory organs. What you see, what
- 7:12you smell, what you taste, what you
- 7:13hear, what you touch. These are all
- 7:15forms of sensory input. New information
- 7:19must come through a sensory channel. So,
- 7:22if we can avoid engaging any of your
- 7:23sensory organs for the first 5 minutes
- 7:25of the day, it means that your brain has
- 7:28no other option except to index the
- 7:31information that it collected overnight.
- 7:33And your brain can index at a remarkable
- 7:36speed if it's given just a few moments,
- 7:39minutes, or even seconds to do that
- 7:41indexing. So, that's what we're doing in
- 7:43the first 5 minutes of your day. You
- 7:45wake up and you stay exactly where you
- 7:48are. Under your sheets, in your pajamas,
- 7:51you don't drink anything, you don't get
- 7:53up to go pee, you don't talk to anybody
- 7:54new, and you for sure don't look at your
- 7:56phone. We give our brains 5 minutes with
- 8:00no new sensory input so that it can
- 8:02start connecting the dots for what it
- 8:04learned about itself over the preceding
- 8:07night. After that 5 minutes is over, the
- 8:09first thing you're going to do is
- 8:10consume water. Not juice, not coffee,
- 8:13not food, but water. And the reason
- 8:15you're ingesting water is because your
- 8:17body is dried out. It's dehydrated. For
- 8:19the last 8 hours, your body has been in
- 8:22a form of sleeping stasis. And in that
- 8:24sleep stasis, your body has not been
- 8:26hydrating, it has been dehydrating. So,
- 8:29all of your internal organs from your
- 8:31esophagus to your stomach to your upper
- 8:33and lower intestine have all become
- 8:35dehydrated overnight for as long as
- 8:37you've been sleeping, whether that's 4
- 8:39hours or 10 hours. Water, first thing in
- 8:41the morning, jump-starts a rehydration
- 8:44process for your entire body. And that
- 8:47rehydration process will pay dividends
- 8:49throughout the entire day, starting in
- 8:51just the next 10 or 15 minutes after
- 8:54your first sip of water. If you're tired
- 8:56of working harder every year just to
- 8:58earn less money per hour, listen
- 9:00closely. 99% of the people hearing my
- 9:03voice right now will never change.
- 9:05They'll get motivated for the next 10
- 9:06minutes, then get distracted, forget,
- 9:09and go right back to being underpaid.
- 9:11Don't let yourself be one of them.
- 9:13Instead, I want you to be part of the 1%
- 9:15that knows how to negotiate a raise,
- 9:17position yourself for promotion, and
- 9:19play the hiring system against itself.
- 9:22You can get ahead fast. That's why I
- 9:24built the high-income crash course, a
- 9:26step-by-step system to help you increase
- 9:29your income without working more hours.
- 9:31Inside the high-income crash course, I'm
- 9:33going to teach you how to negotiate a
- 9:34raise like a pro so you can start
- 9:36earning a six-figure income. I'm also
- 9:38going to give you the one psychological
- 9:40tactic you need to know so that people
- 9:42immediately understand your value. I
- 9:44want to show you how to stop being
- 9:45ignored and overlooked by your boss and
- 9:47your boss's boss. And most valuable of
- 9:50all, I'm going to give you a powerful
- 9:51and simple three-step method that allows
- 9:53you to get a massive salary jump every
- 9:55year. Thousands of people have bought my
- 9:57high-income crash course for $47 and
- 9:59gone on to have incredible career
- 10:01success afterwards. And I want to change
- 10:04even more lives. So, if you click on the
- 10:06top link in the description below or
- 10:08scan the QR code on your screen right
- 10:09now, you can have instant access to the
- 10:11high-income crash course for just $17. I
- 10:14believe you can have a higher income
- 10:16than you ever imagined, which is why I
- 10:18back my high-income crash course with a
- 10:20bulletproof 100% money-back guarantee.
- 10:22If you don't start earning more money in
- 10:24the first 7 days of my crash course,
- 10:26I'll give you your money back and you
- 10:28can still keep all the course materials.
- 10:30Yes, that means there's literally no
- 10:32risk to you and I'm willing to bet my
- 10:34own money on your success. I told you
- 10:37earlier that most people who hear this
- 10:39invitation will ignore it. And a week
- 10:41from now, they'll still be struggling to
- 10:43make ends meet. In that same 7 days, you
- 10:46could be earning thousands of dollars
- 10:47more than you make right now. Stop
- 10:49feeling trapped. Click on the top link
- 10:51in the description below or scan the QR
- 10:53code on your screen now. Higher income
- 10:55is closer than you think. After your 5
- 10:57minutes of quiet and when you start
- 10:58rehydrating your body, the next thing
- 11:00you want to do is get near a window or
- 11:02even go outside because you're looking
- 11:03for 10 to 15 minutes of daylight
- 11:06exposure. You actually want the outside
- 11:08daylight, the light coming off the sun,
- 11:10the light reflecting from the sun off of
- 11:12the clouds on a gray day. You want that
- 11:15natural sunlight to come into your
- 11:17eyeballs. Because as it comes into your
- 11:19eyeballs, it creates a number of natural
- 11:21hormonal reactions inside your body that
- 11:24wake you up, trigger your cortisol, act
- 11:26as a natural energy source that will
- 11:29boost your morning and carry you through
- 11:31the day. but most importantly, it
- 11:33actually has a relationship with the
- 11:35serotonin levels in your body that will
- 11:37benefit you when you go to sleep at
- 11:39night. So, the next most important thing
- 11:41you do after you start drinking water is
- 11:43somehow get yourself into a position
- 11:45where you can look outside, go outside,
- 11:48walk the dog, go for a jog, and start
- 11:50absorbing some of that outdoor light.
- 11:52Notice that we're about 25 minutes into
- 11:54your new morning routine, and I haven't
- 11:56said anything about food or caffeine.
- 11:59There's a reason for that. At CIA, we're
- 12:02taught that all consumables fall into
- 12:04two categories: water
- 12:07and not water, something that we call
- 12:09food. There is no second fluid that can
- 12:11replace water. It can't be coffee, it
- 12:13can't be juice, it can't be Gatorade, it
- 12:15can't be some kind of energy drink.
- 12:16There is only water and not water. So,
- 12:19now that we're 25 minutes into your day,
- 12:22now that you have rehydrated your
- 12:24internal organs, it's the time to start
- 12:25introducing food. But, it's important
- 12:28that we introduce real food. Even more
- 12:30importantly, we introduce foods that
- 12:33contain natural sugars that also contain
- 12:36high amounts of fiber. reason for that
- 12:38is because we want that natural glucose
- 12:41source and that natural fiber source to
- 12:44complement the other processes already
- 12:46happening inside our gut that came from
- 12:49our hydration in the morning, our
- 12:50morning sunlight, and of course, our
- 12:52time without any new sensory inputs. So,
- 12:55we don't want to put some kind of
- 12:56processed food or processed chemical
- 12:58like caffeine into our gut yet. We want
- 13:01to start with sources of food that are
- 13:03high in fiber, high in antioxidants, and
- 13:05high in natural sugars. So, we turn
- 13:08towards berries and other types of
- 13:10fruit. Strawberries are excellent for
- 13:12this, blueberries are excellent, pears
- 13:14are excellent, apples are excellent.
- 13:15These are all sources of high fiber,
- 13:18natural sugar, and antioxidants. These
- 13:21foods, mixed with the systems that have
- 13:23already been triggered by your morning
- 13:24routine, are going to reduce bloat,
- 13:27increase digestion, increase energy
- 13:29output, and reduce any kind of swelling
- 13:31or bloating. This is what makes you feel
- 13:33good all day. It doesn't matter what you
- 13:36eat at 10:00 a.m., it matters what you
- 13:37eat within the first 60 minutes after
- 13:40waking up. I'm not saying you have to
- 13:43give up coffee or tea or energy drinks.
- 13:45What I am saying is that you want to
- 13:47give your body a chance to work for
- 13:49itself before you start to supplement it
- 13:52with chemical energy sources. And the
- 13:54right time to introduce those external
- 13:56energy supplements is after 90 minutes.
- 14:0090 minutes from the moment that you wake
- 14:02up, whether you wake up to an alarm or
- 14:03whether you wake up naturally. If you
- 14:05let 90 minutes pass, then you are in the
- 14:08ideal window to start introducing
- 14:10something like caffeine through coffee
- 14:12or tea or a pre-workout drink. Those
- 14:15first 90 minutes of your day will be
- 14:17energetic because they will be energized
- 14:19by the natural sources that you are
- 14:21coming in contact with through your new
- 14:23morning routine. You will have a natural
- 14:26spike in sugar from the fruits that
- 14:28you're eating. You will have a natural
- 14:30spike in energy from the cortisol that
- 14:32comes into your body simply by getting
- 14:34up and walking around. The sunlight
- 14:36outside that you take in through your
- 14:37eyeballs will literally energize your
- 14:40body in much the same way that the sun
- 14:42energizes Superman. All you have to do
- 14:44is remember to delay the introduction of
- 14:47caffeine until after the first 90
- 14:49minutes of your day. Give yourself that
- 14:51strong first hour, and then give
- 14:53yourself 30 minutes for that high to
- 14:55slowly start to taper down before you
- 14:58introduce caffeine, which will then pick
- 15:00you back up again and carry you well
- 15:02into and beyond lunch. This is how CIA
- 15:05trained me to take advantage of the
- 15:07first hour of the day to exponentially
- 15:10increase my productivity for the rest of
- 15:12the day because not every hour of the
- 15:15day is created equal. In fact, the first
- 15:18hour is the most important hour because
- 15:20it sets the tone, it sets the
- 15:22trajectory, it sets the pace of
- 15:24productivity for every hour thereafter.
- 15:27This secret has unlocked incredible
- 15:29opportunity for me ever since I learned
- 15:30it with my first day at CIA in 2007. It
- 15:33kept me safe while I was operating
- 15:35around the world with the National
- 15:36Clandestine Service. It helped me build
- 15:38a business when I left CIA. It helped me
- 15:40build a YouTube channel. It helped me
- 15:41build a following and it helped turn me
- 15:43into a multi-million dollar business
- 15:45owner. Not because I'm great at noon,
- 15:48but because I'm so focused on the first
- 15:50hour of my day every day and you can be
- 15:53too. Literally, a new day awaits you if
- 15:57you can just change the first 60
- 15:59minutes. So, here's my challenge to you.
- 16:02Starting tomorrow, give yourself 5
- 16:04minutes after you wake up to do nothing.
- 16:07To just lay in bed. I don't care if you
- 16:09stare at the ceiling or stare at the
- 16:11inside of your eyelids, but don't change
- 16:13anything. Don't introduce any new
- 16:15sensory inputs and just watch what
- 16:18happens to your brain in that first 5
- 16:21minutes of the day. Even if you skip out
- 16:23on everything I said about water and
- 16:25sunlight, caffeine and food, that's
- 16:27fine, but give yourself 5 minutes
- 16:29tomorrow morning just to see that simple
- 16:32difference. And when that difference
- 16:34changes your day, come back, watch this
- 16:37video again, see how much better you
- 16:38feel and how much better you perform
- 16:40when you start to apply every other
- 16:42element of the morning routine that I
- 16:44just taught you. If you learn something
- 16:46new here today, don't keep it to
- 16:48yourself. Go ahead and click on that
- 16:50subscribe button right now. Leave a
- 16:52comment. Share this video with a friend.
- 16:54And if you want to learn more spy skills
- 16:56to unlock your peak performance, go
- 16:57ahead and click on the top link in the
- 16:59description below and take a quiz to
- 17:01learn your secret spy superpower. I'll
- 17:04see you on the other side.
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