How To Stop Self-Sabotage At Night And Wake Up Proud: 2 questions from Future Self research.

Your hardest habits don’t usually fail in the morning, they fail at night. Don't they?

When stress is high and energy is low, it’s easy to reach for quick comfort and then wonder why sleep, nutrition, and workouts never feel consistent.

I’ve found a different lever that works WITHOUT motivation or discipline: your relationship with your future self.

And just like any relationship - it takes upfront work to do it.

What kind of work?

Tune in to find out.

We talk through research that suggests most of us treat our future self like a stranger. When that happens, long-term goals feel far away, and present-day comfort wins by default. But when you practice empathy for the person you’re becoming, healthy choices start to feel like something you do for a friend. That shift will reduce self-sabotage and make behavior change feel natural rather than forced.

We share 3 research-backed practical tools you can try right away - these practices help you build consistency without leaning on willpower.

If this resonates, subscribe, share it with someone who keeps getting in their own way, and leave a review so more people can find the show.

What do you want your morning self to feel like tomorrow?

Transcript

Welcome And Why This Matters

SPEAKER_00 0:09

Hey guys, and welcome back to another episode of Change Wired Podcast. My name is Angela Shorina. I'm your host. I'm your coach, Master, Health Coach 360, sleep stress management, nutrition, fitness, life coaching, executive coaching. That's what I do for a living, what I'm certified to do, and here to share my experience and tools and strategies that I'm learning, applying myself with clients and my personal and professional life to help each other, to help myself, to help my clients, to help you guys, hopefully, to learn more about, unlock more of your potential so you could live the most extraordinary life every day, creating the impact that you want to create and vision of your life that you want to live and just enjoy your life more. Live more, achieve more,

A Friend Asks About Consistency

SPEAKER_00 1:05

give more, and enjoy more. Today, guys, we are talking about. Well, actually, let me start with a question that I got from a friend. You know, a lot of my blogs, a lot of my podcasts are inspired by what's happening in my life, what's happening in my work life with my clients. And I find it very, very good because then it's very relatable and it is guided by real life experience, not something that I read in a book or heard from our artificial intelligence. So the question that I got was about well, I'm gonna read to you. Tell me more about that research on your relationship with your future self, the one that helped you get consistent with your sleep and diet, especially when you don't want to do it. You said it wasn't discipline. So that was a question from a friend. And yes, guys, the reason why I eat healthy almost every single day, uh, I don't even remember the day when I say I didn't eat healthy or I didn't eat what I wanted to do, right? Or I didn't go to bed when I wanted to go to bed. I have almost none of the regrets, at least for the past year, which has been building up to this moment for quite a while with my own practices. And it's the work, it's the practices, it's different ways of thinking about the world that helped me get there. And one of the learnings that I put into practice was around

Why We Ignore Our Future Self

SPEAKER_00 2:45

this concept of future self that completely eliminated the need for any willpower or disciplining myself. Quoting from my blog, um psychological research, most notably from Dr. Hal Harshwell Field at UCLA and New York University, shows that we treat our future self, the person you are becoming every day, guys. We treat our future self like a stranger. Someone we don't really know, someone we don't feel much for. And when we lack empathy for that person, we choose present comfort over long-term goals because long-term goals are experienced by that future self who we treat like a stranger. And present self, we get to enjoy now every time. Herschel wrote a book that I absolutely love, recommend, and I read. It's called Your Future Self, How to Make Tomorrow Better Today. And after reading this book, I became even more conscious about my thinking process about my future self. And whenever I wanted to do something that didn't support that future self, my goals, my future self that I was building in my health, in my work, in my personal development, I'd stop and picture her, future Angela. The one who has to live with today's choices, the consequences of my choices today. The one who inherits, whether she wants it or not, everything that I do and everything that I don't do. Chocolate at night because the day felt too hard, I'd think of her. Staying up late with Netflix to escape a rough morning of work I didn't want to face, I'd think of her. And more and more I'd make the kind choice for her. And my present self would feel instantly proud too, because it's kind of the same feeling you get doing something good and kind for a friend. And you can feel that same feeling for your future self if you start treating your future self as a friend, not a stranger. And just like any relationship, whether that's with your future self or with someone else, it takes work, it takes time, it takes practice to build. The relationship, this compassionate, loving, kind relationship with the person you are becoming every moment of your day. A couple of practices that in research and in my own practice and practice with clients helps helps you to the couple of practices that help you to build that better relationship with the future self that you one day gonna meet,

Write A Letter To Future You

SPEAKER_00 5:40

and you need to build that relationship in advance to do more things for that person that you are becoming. First practice, again, research back to something that I practice and I practice with a lot of my clients. Write a letter. A letter to yourself 5, 10, maybe 20 years out. I imagine Angela at 45, at 50, at 60. What do I want her life to look like, feel like? What pain, what regret do I want her to skip, to avoid? Then I do what supports that vision now. The extra vegetables, the multivitamin, the consistent water, the sleep I'm thinking of skipping. I also recently interviewed 30 entrepreneurs, high achievers, and what I learned from them is every one of them thinks about their future self consistently, sometimes without realizing that to do the hard things, the hard work that needs to be done today. You know, that fitness, that water bottle by your side, that multivitamin, the protein shake, small things done for someone they'll inevitably meet one day. Tomorrow, maybe. Nobody wants to face that, you know, that moment when you look at yourself in your mirroring in your life and you're like, huh, that's not exactly where I thought I'd end up. And you know what? That moment can be avoided only by things that you do today. Alright, so writing letters to your future self. Imagine yourself in like, I don't know, five, ten, twenty years, whatever speaks to you. And think about that person, how their day is gonna go, their life, what they get to enjoy, the pains that they might have because of the things that you choose to do now, right? Every choice, every action has a consequence. That is unavoidable truth of life. So, what consequences are you sort of prepared to tolerate, to enjoy, to experience? Uh so the first is writing letters to your future self to build that relationship so that you treat your future self more like a friend. And every time that you skip the bad behaviors you don't want to do, you do it out of kindness for the future self, not out of discipline, disciplining your present self.

Run A Pre Mortem On Failure

SPEAKER_00 8:10

The second practice is run a pre-mortem. Imagine your future self looking back on any failure of behavior or achievement, and ask yourself, what will sh what will she wish I had done differently starting today? What does she need me to do today in order for her not to experience failure? Right? That question creates urgency today for the thing he should have done tomorrow, to yesterday. Sorry. But the most profound practice that actually helped me to do more of the things that I needed to do and less of the things that I shouldn't be doing, like from the genius place in my heart. Like I know those are things that are good for me, and certain things are not great for me. A simple practice, two simple questions that actually helped me to do a lot better every single day. Again, without the need of discipline and willpower, but with the kindness towards my future self. Every morning, I love waking up fresh, energized, going for my workouts comfortable and confident in my body, starting the day with a clear head, full of ideas, ready to execute on the hardest tasks on my list, focused, driven, happy, with a smile on my face, comfortable, energetic, energized. None of that happens if my evening goes not so good, goes wrong, and I decide to,

Two Night Questions That Stick

SPEAKER_00 9:40

I don't know, overeat or watch Netflix, those were you know my things that didn't make my morning feel good. So none of you know none of the morning things would happen if I allow my evenings to go whatever. If I reach for escape with Netflix instead of the learnings that I planned, if I decide to go for more food for that dopamine hit and relaxation to soften a hard day for the quick pause button instead of hard work of learning to soothe myself with mindfulness, breath, and stillness. Every night I I would ask myself two questions, and that was my saving grace. Letters, yes, from time to time. Pre-mortem, definitely I practice it quite often. But what saved me the most are these two questions that I would ask myself at any hard moment, especially at night when we tend to do a lot of our self-sabotaging behaviors. So, two questions. How do I want my morning self to feel? How do I want to wake up? Like with what kind of energy? What do what thoughts do I want to have? What kind of I don't know, vibe I want to have? Like that morning, what do I want to have in my morning? Because my morning defines the mood, the vibe of my day, right? How do I want to wake up? And what does my evening self need to do to get to get me there? To get my morning right? Like what I want my morning self to feel, what I want my how do I want my morning to go? And then what does my evening self need to do right now? What choices do I need to make in order for that morning to happen? Those two questions on repeat build almost everything I'm proud of today in my life. There are things that I'm still working on and I'm not that proud. But every single thing that I'm proud of comes down to these two questions on repeat every evening in the hardest moments of my day. How do I want it? How do I want my morning self to feel tomorrow? How do I want my morning to go to start? And what does my evening self? What does my today self need to do? What choices do I need to make to get that? To get that morning, to get that tomorrow. Great tomorrow is built with what we do today. That's the whole premise, right? How do I want my tomorrow to go that morning? And what does my evening self need to do to get me there? So those were my questions that are based on this research about future self and building that relationship with the future self and realizing that is the person who is your closest, dearest friend, and you get to meet them, you know, every day, every morning. And hopefully you get to experience a lot less, a lot less of those bitter mirror mornings when you look in yourself in the mirror, you think about your life, you think about yourself, and you're like, oh shoot, I didn't want to end up here. How did I get here? Right? And you got there by allowing your evening self to forget that every choice you make today, every action that you take today or don't take, they're gonna shape your future. And the more you reflect on that fact, the more you think of your future self as of your dearest friend who you care the most about, because everything else depends on them. That's where you get to do all the right choices without needing the discipline and willpower. And that is what I help my clients to do, to build the strong connection between the present self and the future

Share The Episode And Closing

SPEAKER_00 13:35

self. Hope this episode was helpful, guys. Uh, let me know what you like, what you didn't like. Please do share this podcast episode with at least one other person who's been who has a lot of potential, who has a lot of great ideas and great energy about them. Like they want to do good and great in the world, but they keep getting in their own way. So share this podcast episode with them, helping them to see that their future self really needs them and doesn't just need their hustle and action in their work, but also their future self's well-being and health and ability to actually live life to the fullest and contribute to the world to the most, to create more positive impact, all depends on what your evening self-health, well-being work chooses to do today. So share this episode with them. Read review to help these podcasts to reach more eager to learn and improve and create their best self-ears all around the world. We are a global podcast, but we do depend on you sharing, reading, reviewing. So please do so. And think about this, applying these two questions that help me achieve everything that I'm proud of in terms of self-growth and self-development. What do I want my morning to feel like, look like? How do I want my morning to go? And what does my evening self and today self need to do to get me there? Thank you guys for tuning in. Thank you for listening, and till next time, keep well, keep changing and keep growing.