THE ACCRESCENT™ PODCAST EPISODE 126

TA Ep. 207 FINAL

[00:00:00] Hello, welcome back to the Accrescent Podcast. I’m your host, Leigh Ann Lindsey. Before I get to today’s guest, I wanted to give you guys one more quick reminder that if you missed my webinar two weeks ago, the science behind how past trauma and chronic stress contribute to illness, you can still access the replay via the link in the show notes.

Like I’ve mentioned the past couple of times, it was so exciting for me to be able to present the scientific data on how past trauma and chronic stress is actually changing our biology and what we can start to do about it. So check the show notes below for a link to catch that webinar. Onto today’s guest, Emily Byrne.

Emily is the founder of Rise Centered, a wellness brand dedicated to helping people wake up gently live with intention and take meaningful breaks from technology. After years of relying on her phone alarm and struggling to find a screen free alternative that was both [00:01:00] beautiful and functional, she set out to create her own.

Three years later, dozens of prototypes and many, many late nights Rise Centered Sunrise alarm clock was born. This was such a fun conversation for me because if any of you have followed me on social media for any amount of years, you’ll probably know that I have a sunrise simulating alarm clock that I am absolutely obsessed with.

It is one of the most pivotal products in my wellness routine. I feel like I proselytize people on this all the time, and the one I’ve had for the past five years. Is the best I could find five years ago. And it does the job, but it’s not cute. And if you guys know me well, you know, beautiful, well-crafted things are so important to me.

And yet, when it came to a sunrise alarm clock, there just wasn’t anything that was quality and beautiful on the market. So when I came across the Emily’s Rise [00:02:00] centered Sunrise alarm clock, I stopped in my tracks. I was like, this is stunning. It’s made from Himalayan salt and natural wood. It’s so beautiful and classy.

I have since purchased one and replaced my old plastic one, and it is just so, so beautiful. But in this episode, we get into really the physiology of how waking up with a blaring alarm clock actually contributes to waking up groggy. It’s not supportive of our natural wake rhythms, our natural circadian rhythm.

So I think this was a really lovely conversation of understanding why how we wake up is so important. But then also just we had more of a philosophical conversation around setting boundaries with technology. And sometimes the compulsion or even the maybe low grade addiction that can come with that and how we can start to break free.

So with that, please enjoy this conversation with Emily Byrne. [00:03:00] Well, Emily, welcome to the A Crescent Podcast. Thanks so much for having me. I’m so excited because I actually didn’t say this to you before we jumped on. I, I’ve had a sunrise alarm clock for at least five years now. Amazing. It is one of the things that is like absolutely a must.

I do a yearly Christmas gift guide, and it is always one of the things that goes in that gift guide because I’m like, guys, we can’t do this thing of waking up with an immediate shot of cortisol every day. So when I saw your product though, I, I just have like a. A Philips dinky little plastic one that does the bare minimum and is fine.

But I am such an aesthetic person. You can tell by my office here, I love aesthetic. And so I did come across Ri the Rise alarm clock on my feet on Instagram and I was like, oh, oh my God. It does exactly what I want. And it’s stunning. We’ve gotta talk about this. So thank you. Very excited. But I think, [00:04:00] I think before we even get into just talking about morning routines and how we start the day, why that’s so important.

How that affects mental health and productivity and all those things. Give us a little bit of the origin story. Yeah. You know, have you always been an entrepreneur? If not, how did you kind of get the gumption to really launch this thing from nothing? Yeah. Well, funnily enough, um, the origin story of the company actually starts with a Phillips Sunrise alarm clock because, oh my god, my now husband, who I was dating at the time, and this is like nine years ago, has always had a sunrise alarm clock.

’cause he could not get out of bed in the morning and had, you know, a normal nine to five job where you need to be getting up. Before the sun rises most of the time. And so he always had a Phillips Sunrise alarm clock. They work great. They’re wonderful. They’re just not very pretty. Yeah. Um, but, um, I was in the [00:05:00] wine industry for most of my career and wanted to make a pivot during COVID as so many of us I feel like did.

Mm-hmm. And I started just working on my own, um, doing, I was in branding and marketing previously, started working on my own and then really wanted my own sunrise alarm clock. I kind of had this feeling of, I was so dependent on his sunrise alarm clock. I was trying to keep my phone outside of the bedroom at night.

Mm-hmm. I would be dependent on like him setting the time. And I kind of had this like meta moment of like, he’s in control of the time. I need to be in control of my own time. And whether that’s based in reality or not is questionable, but that was the spark. And I was like, okay, I need my own sunrise alarm block.

So I ordered over the course of probably a year, I ordered three different ones. Um, and they were all either like, I tried a cheaper one and it was just like so ugly and you [00:06:00] had to manually, um, choose all the settings. And I was like, I don’t wanna choose all the settings. I just wanted to work. And then I got like the expensive, prettier one, but you needed to have an app and wifi and you had to use your phone to change the time that you woke up in the morning, which was crazy to me because I was like, the whole point of this is for me to leave my phone.

In another room and like not look at it. ’cause every time I look at it, I end up on Instagram. Mm-hmm. Like people do. Yeah. And so after about a year of that, I had always had a thought lamp on my bedside table just for ambiance. And I was like, wouldn’t it be cool if this was my sunrise alarm clock? And so, um, that’s kind of the spark that, that was the winter of 2020, going into 2021.

And then I contacted kind of everyone I knew that maybe sort of knew anything about products. ’cause I didn’t know anything about getting [00:07:00] like an electronic product made. Um, and over the course of, it’s 2025 now, so we launched Direct to consumer in 2024. So it was like three solid years of trying to figure it out.

Um, many, many prototypes. Mm-hmm. Yeah, we launched on Kickstarter in 2023. Um, just to make sure that I wasn’t the only one who wanted this product, um, before I sunk all of my savings into it, Uhhuh. And then, uh, people seemed to be really into it, which was so exciting. And then, yeah, 2023 got funding and was able to start direct to consumer in 2024, which was, yeah, it’s been a really wild ride, but really, really fun.

And we just launched, we started with white, uh, Himalayan salt. So it’s a Himalayan salt globe, uh, wood base and fairly straightforward. You don’t use your phone, you don’t connect it to wifi, [00:08:00] there is no app. Um, it’s pretty simple because that’s kind of what I originally was hoping for, was something that was just gonna work and be beautiful.

Mm-hmm. I didn’t have the kind of like. Crazy bells and whistles. Um, and we launched with a pink Himalayan salt version in July. And so we’re kind of coming out with new colors. We’re gonna have, uh, other versions that do have more bells and whistles down the line, but yeah, that’s kind of how it all got started.

Yeah. And now you’re on that business owner train where as soon as you like refine one product, you’re then in the works for the next product. Oh, yeah. I, I feel like I got the bug. I have like five products in my head and I need to slow my role a little bit. Completely, completely. Oh my gosh. No, it’s so true.

I have to like, pull myself back all the time. And I also have this thing where I wanna launch like the best of the best of the best with everything in it all at once. And I have to remind myself, like even Apple, [00:09:00] like when they’re launching their new whatever iPhone. They already know what the next iPhone is gonna be.

Mm-hmm. And they’re not giving us all those things. And just the pacing of it. Yes. I’m, I’m really learning how to pace myself. Yeah. Because it’s not sustainable if you don’t. No. Yeah. You got it. Men, mental health matters obviously, especially when you’re already in kind of the wellness sphere. Finding that balance is really important.

But yeah, it’s really easy to run and try to get ahead of yourself. For sure. Yeah. Well, and then just when you’re passionate about it and you’re excited and lit up by what you’re doing, that is kind of a natural extension that you’re just like, okay, amazing. How can we make this better? Or how can we bring something in that’s really complimentary to what we’re already doing?

So I think that’s just a natural byproduct of doing something you’re really lit up by too. Yeah, I completely agree. And I also just like. Something that I didn’t fully expect when I started this was to really love the community aspect of it. Like I [00:10:00] just like love chatting with people about how it’s affected their morning or how, you know, what other features they would want or things they would change and stuff like that.

And so I like want like the people pleaser in me is like, oh yeah, we could do that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We could absolutely do that. And it’s like, like, no, you can’t, like not anytime soon. You can’t do that. Like, right, right, right. The manufacturers are like, so that’ll take about a year to figure out everything’s be realistic with timelines.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Exactly. Oh my gosh. Well, let’s get into, I do think let’s maybe like give people a little bit more of what the product actually is. We may maybe like jumped in. Totally, totally. Yeah. I think we’ve like prefaced it, but maybe like, let’s give them the scoop of what the product is, but then I’d just love to talk about mornings and how this can make such a difference in mornings and how this can set you up.

To have the type of morning and the type of start to the day that you want, that is really going to allow you to have, I think, like one of the most optimized days [00:11:00] possible, how you start your morning. But what is the product? Give us that like clear description. Yeah, absolutely. Not everyone knows what a sunrise alarm clock is.

So it’s, it’s an alarm clock. It wakes you up in the morning, um, but it wakes you up using light. So there’s a sunrise simulator that takes 30 minutes. So basically if you wanna wake up at seven, um, at six 30, a very dim light will start and it’ll gradually get brighter over those 30 minutes. Um, and then at your set time for our specific alarm clock, um, there’s these natural birds and a stream that kind of starts very quietly and slowly gets louder.

So it feels like you’re kind of immersed in nature. It’s a very gentle. Wake up. The benefit of waking up with light is that it’s what our bodies have been designed to wake up with. For example, if you’re in like a dark room and a phone alarm just like starts, blaringly go, goes off, it’s like you [00:12:00] suddenly hearing a tiger like, or some sort of like a bear, like that’s what you’re doing to your cortisol.

Mm-hmm. Our bodies, like we didn’t have incandescent lights until, uh, 200 years ago. So for all human history previous to 200 years, everyone for the most part woke up with the sun and went to bed after the sun. ’cause we had candles. But we all know candles are not that bright. Um, and they produce a lot of red light, which helps you to go to sleep.

So. Essentially it starts, it kicks off your hormone, your wakefulness hormones, so that by the time we have these nice little birds chirping at you to get up, um, you feel more well rested and you’re ready to actually get up because hormonally you are ready, more ready than you would’ve been otherwise to wake up.

Right? I think what a lot of us maybe don’t understand is ancestrally, we, [00:13:00] it was not like we’re just asleep and then boom, we’re fully awake. The waking process is just that. It’s a slow, gradual process that, you know, even though you’re unconscious, your skin, your eyes are sensing the sun that’s rising. So it’s starting to send off a cascade of hormone production, even like digestive enzyme productions.

And so waking up actually is a slow, gradual process. And one of the things I love about using a sunrise alarm clock is I don’t, I hardly ever wake up groggy. And if I’m waking up groggy, it’s usually because of, you know, something I did the night before, like, you know, a drink or something like that. Yeah.

But because you’re actually giving yourself that slow, all those slow cues that help you wake up the way you were meant to wake up, you, there’s no like jarring, jolting, immediate kind of awakeness that’s happening. Your body is slowly, slowly waking up over those like 30 minutes. And it [00:14:00] completely changes the way you start your day.

It does, it completely changes the way you start your day. And I think there’s kind of two parts to it. Uh, the one hand it’s, you’re waking up the way your body was intended to. So all of those hormones that you just mentioned, um. Then on the other hand, for most people, they put their, their phone as their alarm.

It’s the first thing that they look at. Even if they don’t try to, if it’s on do not disturb, you’re still turning it off. Um, and all of the kind of connections and, um, things that we’ve kind of built into our. Phone and like what we’ve gotten used to it, meaning to us, which is can be connection and wonderful things.

It can also mean stress. Um, so there’s like many aspects to the benefits of both using a sunrise alarm clock and not having your phone next to your bedroom. Mm-hmm. Right, right. There’s the direct and then there’s the indirect. Having the [00:15:00] sunrise alarm clock then allows you indirectly to keep that phone outside the room.

Mm-hmm. And just help yourself even more, create kind of some like barriers to entry. Yes. To jumping on that phone first thing in the morning. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. I love that analogy though, ’cause I’m in the mental health space. So we talk about, of course, nervous system all the time. And so many of us, our nervous systems are already stuck in a state of danger, whether that’s fight, flight or freeze fa.

And so when we really think about it in those terms. Yes. Like some alarm clocks have changed a little bit now. Like even on the phone where it will like gradual this, the sound will get a little bit louder, but there’s still no light. So you still are kind of like jarring yourself awake in a way that’s not natural to how we were meant to wake up.

But when you just have an alarm that just immediately starts blaring out of nothing, nothing, you are basically like you are waking up and your [00:16:00] unconscious self, your body, mind and spirit, your nervous system is like I’m in danger. Mm-hmm. And that’s how you’re starting every single day. Yeah. With danger signals.

And then we think about how that slowly ripples out into the rest of our day in big and small ways. Right? Big ways of just, I’ve started the day with nervous system dysregulation. Mm-hmm. And maybe a much higher do dose of cortisol than I need. So now I’m trying to like come down from that. I’m starting the day frantic, groggy, urgent.

But then that ripples out in like, now that I’ve got this huge dose of cortisol, my focus isn’t as good. Even like, my digestion isn’t as good. All these other little ways that, that starts to ripple out. Yeah, absolutely. And I think a lot of people forget that your circadian rhythm actually starts in the morning.

I mean, it’s, it’s a, it’s a rhythm. So you never wanna, you wanna try to avoid disrupting it as much as possible. But a big piece of it is starts in the morning. I think we, a lot of us think about [00:17:00] circadian rhythm and we think about falling asleep, but how we wake up affects our circadian rhythm as well.

And cortisol is one of the hormones that we use to wake up. It is a wakefulness hormone. If we had no cortisol, that would be bad. We wouldn’t, we would have no interest in getting outta bed. We’d stay, I would still be in bed, which I would love. I’m a big proponent. Of my bed. Um, but we wanna have the right amount and we wanna have it gradually increasing and as you said mm-hmm.

Not spiking. And so when we spike it first thing, we’re also setting ourselves up for a harder time, falling asleep at night, which I think is something that, um, often gets overlooked. So if you’re struggling to sleep at night, think about your mornings as well. Um, having that much more gradual start to your day, um, can really help your overall circadian rhythm.

As we’re easing outta [00:18:00] summer, whenever we come into a seasonal change, I always like to do a number of different cleanses, and for me, quarterly parasite cleansing is a staple in my wellness habits, my wellness routine. I’ve seen so many different types of parasite cleansing kits and supplements. I’ve tried a good chunk of many of them.

But the one that I think is the easiest to use and the most comprehensive is Rogers Hood Apothecary. I actually had Kim Rogers on the podcast a few weeks ago, if you missed that conversation. It’s episode two oh one, two hundred and one. It was such an amazing conversation. She shared her story of how parasite cleansing was a huge root cause in her chronic illness.

But in that episode, we really talk about how her parasite cleansing kit and products are so different from a lot of what’s out there on the market. And for me, what really stood out is a [00:19:00] lot of parasite cleansing kits are kind of falling into one of two categories, either A, they’re. Going directly after the parasites, but there’s no binding or supportive nutrients, or B, it’s more supportive nutrients and not enough things that actually go after the parasites.

And so what I love about Kim’s products from Rogers Hood Apothecary is there’s products that go after the parasites. There’s products that help bind and flush them out. And then there’s products that help support the organs that are doing all this detoxing work. And all of her supplements, mo, almost all of them, are in liquid form to make them even easier to take, even easier to digest and absorb.

So check the show notes below and use discount code Leann 10 for a discount, a checkout. I usually, when I’m really good with it, I’ve gotten a little bit off track the last few weeks, but when I’m really good I’ll have my sunrise alarm clock, I’ll have my morning coffee, but [00:20:00] I kind of zooop it up. I call it like my morning protein coffee.

’cause I put collagen and raw butter and half and half and honey and it’s like this whole little concoction. And then I’ll usually go on like an hour walk first thing in the morning and that like immediate sun exposure. And for me, for me, like the days are so busy to start my day off with a slow walk.

It’s not about exercise, quote unquote, it’s not about a fast walk and like getting my steps in and getting my heart rate up. It’s literally just about getting up gentle, slow, steady movement and like a huge dose of sun exposure. Mm-hmm. And that completely changes. Like I really do feel like that. Gives my nervous system like a template for the day.

Yeah. Oh, the day started slow and steady. And obviously I know not everyone can start their day that way. Sometimes it might be like a five minute walk outside or just five minutes of sitting in your backyard and drinking your coffee, but, um, I, it, [00:21:00] I have seen what a difference it’s made to really, really optimize my mornings.

I’m, I’m actually far more specific with my morning routine than I am with my evening routine. And I should be with both, but my mornings are like so, so specific. Yeah. Well, it sounds like you have a great routine. Yeah, I think. It’s easy to kind of should ourselves into so many things that we should be doing first thing in the morning.

You know, the, the journal practices, the, the exercise, all the things. And I, I personally like also need my coffee first thing. So I get up and mostly just try not to look at my phone for the first 30 minutes. So it’s usually just like getting up slowly, making myself a cup, a cappuccino, sitting on my couch, petting my dog, and just like looking out the window for 10 minutes.

And the amount of presence that that gives me and groundedness to start my day [00:22:00] of. Like, and it’s so simple because I think what I struggle with most, with kind of like the wellness industry is just this, like layers of everything that we should be doing when really were to simplify. And there’s like a few simple tools that we could use that would.

Make it so that we’re not relying on self-discipline for everything. And I think that is one of the beautiful things of having a tool, like a sunrise alarm clock, is that you are not tempted to look at your phone first thing in the morning and the benefit that it has, like regardless of everything else that you do have that coffee first thing, you know, like, I don’t know, do what you wanna do, but like if you can take just a 30 minute break from your phone first thing in the morning and wake up a little bit more mindfully the rest of your day, it really does set you up for a little bit more presence and you’re also setting up your dopamine for the rest of the day, um, which can really [00:23:00] help with phone addiction, um, and just general happiness in life.

Um, so yeah, I, I love your morning routine and it’s, I I love a good simple morning routine. Yeah. I could go on a little rant about. And I, we talked to off air. Like I, I work with so many cancer and chronic illness patients. I’m, I’m a part of a holistic health center, so there is a time and a place for I think, more intense health routines and protocols and treatment plans.

And I also will talk to my patients a lot about, and we don’t have, we’re not necessarily meant to live there forever. Mm-hmm. And if your self-care list just becomes another should, should do list at some point, it’s not serving us anymore. And. Being able to have that discernment of, am I doing these things because they’re still really serving me?

Or am I just continuing to do these [00:24:00] things because I’m living out of fear? Hmm. And I empathize with that a lot because when you’ve been through a really severe health diagnoses, the hyper vigilance that we experience after that is intense. And there’s, I do think a lot of healing work we can do around that to then shift out of like fear-based living versus discernment.

Mm-hmm. And what’s really good for me, but I, I like to try and live in a little bit more of a fluid state where, you know, in general, the majority of the time I’m living in these rhythms of, you know, waking up with my sunrise alarm, having my coffee, doing my morning walk. And then sometimes, like these last three weeks, I’ve gotten totally out of my morning walk rhythm.

Mm-hmm. But I’m not like berating myself for that and then worried that I’m gonna like get sick. And start regressing health because I’m not doing that. I do know that if I abandon that pattern forever, yeah it could start to impact my health. But I also know that like a few [00:25:00] days or a few weeks of being off is okay.

Yeah. Because our bodies are also really resilient too. Yeah, I love that. I think there’s just like a time and a place and it’s kind of, a lot of it is about sort of like what’s happening internally. Like are you letting yourself release and enjoy and like it really is helping you be more grounded and present in the rest of your day?

Or is it becoming something that is kind of just as harmful ’cause you’re stressing yourself out over like having this perfect morning routine and there is no, there is perfect morning routine. Yeah. And I just, I also think we’re so. We’re so bio individual ourselves and we are so ever changing that I think it, we want to out of like an efficiency means we wanna go like, great, I found my morning routine.

This is what I’m gonna do forever. And the reality is like we are so dynamic. What served me, Leigh Ann, really wonderfully in my mornings. A year ago might not be what’s serving me best right now. And [00:26:00] sometimes less is more. But I do think sometimes there can be limiting beliefs that get created very unconsciously.

’cause I work with the unconscious mm-hmm. That, oh, I can’t be healthy unless, Hmm. I do all these things. Oh, I can’t have a good day. I can’t have my fullest energy if I don’t blank, blank blank. Mm-hmm. And so when those limiting beliefs come in and I, I, I’m like guilty of this too, you know, oh, I didn’t have my morning walk.

Well I guess my digestion’s not gonna be as good today, and my energy and my mood, and then I have to catch myself and be like, hang on. Mm-hmm. There’s still a lot of choice that happens here. And I can still choose to show up in a really intentional, present way and not let that derail my day. Yeah, absolutely.

It’s like being, having that open-mindedness and open-mindedness to change. I think I am currently in my third trimester of pregnancy. And so really having that exciting, thank you. [00:27:00] Having that openness to change as it feels like every day, every week. My energy levels are different. My, like desires are different.

I’m very much so in a nesting mode at the current moment, all I wanna do is throw things out. Um, but being open to like this is, it’s gonna change and it’s gonna change even more in two months when there’s a little one here and then she’s gonna be changing a lot and I need to be open to like how that looks.

And I think having that openness to change, um, can give you a lot more resilience. Yeah. Can we, I don’t know if we can go into it a little bit more, the dopamine piece. ’cause I think that is so important. To your point, the sunrise alarm clock, I think allows you to be able to go, I really don’t wanna get on my phone first thing in the morning.

And I think this is pretty general knowledge, but going into the dopamine piece a little bit more of why, [00:28:00] you know, being able to put that outside the room and have that sunrise alarm clock that’s gonna wake you up in such a natural, ancestral way that keeps us off the phone. But yeah. Can you explain the dopamine piece a little bit more if you’re able Yeah, absolutely.

And to be clear, I’m not a scientist. I created a product and have done a lot of research. Totally. Um, but I just do wanna preface preference that, but essentially when you. Go on your phone first thing in the morning in particular, you are spiking your dopamine. And um, you know, assuming you’re going to the news, you’re going to social media, et cetera, as many of us do first thing.

’cause it’s what is compelling us. We have this, uh, dopaminergic desire to, um, check, get a hit of dopamine to get that hit. And once we get that hit, we’re then researching for that because it’s just this like, [00:29:00] really quick hit we’re intended to have, um, desires that are, that are longer essentially. So, um, be like, oh, I really, you know, wanna look good today.

And that takes 30 minutes to like. Feel that success of like, wow, I like did my hair, I did my makeup, I look good. Um, and you kind of have that dopamine reward, um, when you’re doing that in like five seconds because you’re on TikTok or you know, one minute ’cause you’re reading the news and reading this terrifying headline.

Um, you’re depleting kind of that system and so you’re just re-looking for that dopamine for the rest of the day, which for many of us and me in particular, this is what I, I would say out of all of the benefits, this is what I personally notice the most is that. The [00:30:00] rest of the day, if I start my day with my phone, I am constantly like, oh, let me just check again.

Like, I don’t have any notifications, but I’m just gonna like, pop on. Totally. Like I have almost all my notifications turned off, but I find myself going back to Instagram or back to TikTok, or back to the news or back to my email, um, when I start it, when I’m looking at it first thing in the morning.

Mm-hmm. Because I’ve started that, that dopamine desire. Um, I want that hit. If you start that later, later in the day, um, you’ve already set up your dopa like you’ve already gotten ready, you’ve already made yourself a cup of coffee. Like you’ve done these things that are the desire dopamine hits, but they’re longer, they’re better for that system.

Um, and so you’re just setting yourself up for less of this like, kind of like addictive ness. Um, and so I noticed that. So strongly, um, [00:31:00] when you can just like push that off, even just 30 minutes in the morning, um, you wait to look at your email or read the news. It really does make such a big difference.

And also when you wake up, your brain is much more likely to like kind of take all these things in. So you just wanna be really careful with what you’re exposing yourself to first thing in the morning. Yeah. And I just find this is something I actually really need to prioritize working on because I do, I have my sunrise alarm clock that I don’t need my phone for, but I do like, I have the brain tap headset and so I’ll like set, you know, set that meditation on my phone and run that.

And I do, like, I am in a bit of a, a period right now where I’m like checking my phone first thing, even though I’m waking up really gradually. And so I feel really refreshed when I wake up. I’m still like going to my phone. To check notifications. And I think that’s just ’cause I’m in a period of like kind of acute stress.

Totally. Um, which, you know, really should be a time where I’m like [00:32:00] even more careful about not going to those dopamine hits because I really do feel myself like kind of what you already described. I have all notifications turned off on my phone too. Anyways, for years it’s been like that, but just a free moment, opening my phone, seeing what’s going on.

Mm-hmm. Checking email, checking texts, checking Instagram, checking what, whatever other kind of notifications I can get. And I just feel myself wanting that. Like, what’s the next thing I have to worry about? What’s the next thing I have to worry about? And like, looking for that. Yeah, totally. It tires you out.

Um, and I think, again, I think it’s completely normal to fall into. I fall into those too. Especially when works a lot. Like it’s hard not to, ’cause you’re like, let me catch all the fires. Let me, you know, you’re something. And it also like feels good. You’re like, feel important. You feel like, oh yeah, all of this.

And at least for me, the way my. Life has seemed to work in the last few [00:33:00] years as I have kind of those periods where I get really, and maybe addiction’s not the right word, but I get really attached to my phone and like looking at those notifications and I still will try to do the 30 minutes in the morning.

Um, but even so, I’m like much more on it. Mm-hmm. And then I went through a few month period where I’m like, okay, we need to reset. This has been, yeah. Um, not great because for me at least, it like kind of slowly degrades my energy. There’s some burnout that happens and then I’ll go through a month where I’m like, okay, phone is left at home for like, everything and maybe this will change once I have a child because maybe you can’t leave your phone.

I dunno. We’ll find out. Yeah. Um, but like, I’ll go on a hike and phone is left at home. That’s why I love like, having the aura ring and you know, just really trying to create that. That big, big break. And so I find myself kind of going through these waves of being more attached and less attached, and that [00:34:00] for the last few years has been working for me, but we should check back in and see if it works.

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That is not life. Life is not in this. Mm-hmm. You know, two by six little box in my hand. Life is out here. Life is these trees. Life is this harbor I’m walking past that I really wanna absorb. And so I just, I don’t like that feeling where even when I’m on my morning, morning walk and I’m in a really like stress state, like I have been recently feeling like even when on my morning walk there’s that like urge to go check.

The notifications. And I do think there’s something kind of adaptive about it psychologically, where I notice for me, when I’m in a state of stress, sometimes a big part of that is I feel out of control. Mm-hmm. [00:37:00] And there’s lots of things happening in my life that are out of my control and really sad and scary and, and so I do think like the checking of the emails makes me feel like I have control over something.

Like, oh, I checked this email, I responded to it. Oh good. Okay. I did that. Yeah. Okay. I do have power over something. Yeah. Hundred percent. I’m the same way. And like understanding the mechanism behind it is helpful, but then also like being able to do some of my meditations and do some of that grounding, soothing work so that I’m not really, it’s like the compulsion behind it that bothers me a lot when I feel like I’m acting off of a compulsion.

I really, I don’t like that feeling at all. No, it doesn’t feel good. And yeah, I mean, it, it, I I also notice it when I try to sit down and watch like a television show or a movie with my husband and I like, can’t not look at my phone during it. And I’m like, this is, this is bad. Like this. Like, I like need to be looking at Instagram and be watching this television show at the same time.[00:38:00]

Like, oh gosh, it’s so wild. Totally. Like the amount of stimulation. Mm-hmm. Our brains need to feel stimulated where there’s, there’s, I mean I think addiction’s like a good way to kind of use the analogy though of like, we have to actually resensitize our brain Yeah. To less stimulation that I can just watch this TV show.

And it’s funny, I actually, I don’t know if you’ve read the book, the Anxious Generation by Jonathan, he amazing by the way, if you’re having kids like I, I really do think anyone who’s gonna be a parent in this Yeah. In this age, needs to read this book. Okay. Um, but he, he talks about that like. Just the amount of overstimulation and needing to have so many different things and the split attention.

Mm-hmm. That, yes, technically our brain can do two things at once, right? Like it can pump our heart and I can be talking to you at the same time, but kind of like cognitively, we, it can’t do two things at [00:39:00] once. So when you’re watching the TV and then checking Instagram, really it’s task switching. Your brain is here and then here, and then here, and then here, and back and forth.

And that is super, super exhausting and depleting. But also the difference in like stimulation, which is all of these things, whether it’s an email, a newsfeed, a social media feed, text messages, it’s like. I mean, potentially every like five to 10 seconds, you’re getting a whole new hit of something where even now, like a movie that is like moving at a much slower pace.

Mm-hmm. And it’s one cohesive theme. Mm-hmm. Can actually be really good for you if you let yourself just be there. Yeah. Yeah. I’ve been really enjoying going to the movies, um, recently because of that, because I’m like, okay, it’s so immersive that like, and it, I, and maybe it’s just sad that it, I feel like I’ve [00:40:00] been very successful if I go through an entire movie and don’t look at my phone, I’m like, wow, this movie must have been really good because I didn’t look at my phone once I thought about it.

Twice, but I didn’t actually do it. Uhhuh. Yeah. Sitting in like the theater, I, it’s much easier for me at least to actually like, sit and enjoy and fully immerse myself in mm-hmm. Is happening. I, I’m also in a book club and I noticed, I was just talking about this with my mother-in-law, mother-in-law who’s here this, um, past weekend and she was like, I can’t sit and just like read a book for that long anymore.

Hmm. Um, and I was like, yeah, it takes, I feel like I have to. I love, like, one of my favorite things to do on a weekend if I really need to like chill and reset is to just read for many hours. Like give myself like the whole day to read. And I find that to be really nourishing. Hmm. Um, but it, it’s almost [00:41:00] like I have to drip into it.

Like, I can’t just like sit down and read for three hours anymore the way that I feel like I, I used to when I was maybe like in high school and things like that, um, or Yeah, because phones weren’t a thing then. Yeah. To date or like that last generation before. Yeah. It took over. Like we still, I think, I think, I assume like you and I both still had that like, normal Well, that childhood of like scream free.

Yes, exactly. Um, but now I find I have to kinda like, ease myself into it and I eventually get there where I’m like, okay, now I can like sit for a longer period of time. Mm-hmm. It takes. Um, a few days of like, okay, I read for 20 minutes. Okay. I kind of like, it’s like training for a running race or something like that, but I’m just training myself to be able to sit still and pay attention to a book for a certain amount of time.

Um, which is wild. It is a little bit. And to that end, I think like taking away the judgment around it. If, if [00:42:00] we are, ’cause I do, I, I’ll beat myself up a little bit of like, oh my gosh, I can’t believe you can’t just sit and watch this movie. You have to keep checking your phone. But what we need to, you know, I think where the empathy for ourselves comes in is like, these are highly addictive Oh yeah.

Devices highly addictive. And the brain, like, something I just boggles my mind is the amount of the way that our daily lives have changed even in the last like 50 years. I think in my opinion, is unprecedented. Like mm-hmm. We were meant to change and evolve very, very slowly as whatever our lifestyles changed.

And so the amount of change that has happened within the last 50, maybe a hundred years is unbelievable. And so our brains are not wired to be able to like, have such an addictive device and, and not get addicted to that like insane amount of hits. But that does mean that, you know, we can take away kind of the judgment around it of like, oh yeah, I, [00:43:00] this is still just like a muscle and an organ and understanding how it works and that I’m getting a little bit addicted to these hits.

That makes sense. And I might also have to like ease out of that. It’s not just like a switch. We can flip on and off, but you know what you were making me think of as you were talking about that, like dripping into the patterns again. Mm-hmm. That the good patterns is almost like, I was like, you know what could be really good is like do a meditation, like a grounding, you know, I love, I love tapping, so I’ll do a lot of EFT.

Mm-hmm. Do like a tapping meditation before I start reading to kind of settle the nervous system. Mm-hmm. And maybe like as you’re going through it, pausing, doing a tap, a couple, you know, a minute or two of tapping, ’cause in a weird way an addiction to like even the screen and those hits almost can create kind of an anxiety type thing of like, you start to feel ill at ease.

If you’re not checking it. And so even though it’s not [00:44:00] necessarily, it’s funny ’cause we just talk about nervous system, nervous system regulation in terms of like, I had a hard conversation, it was really triggering. I’m stressed about this project, so I’m gonna do a meditation. But it could be a good tool to bring in when we’re actually trying to do some of these like healthy patterns and, and calm that like frantic compulsive urge to check something.

Yeah, absolutely. I, I love that. I do, I get really frustrated when people kind of try to lean on just self-discipline. Yeah, totally. Because I just, I, I think to your point of like, we need to not be judging ourselves. I like could not agree with you more. I really think like our devices have been created by like the, some of those smartest people in the world to keep us coming back to it.

And like, good on them. They, they’ve done a great job. Um, but like, it is, it’s really not our like faults. It’s not, we should not [00:45:00] be judging ourselves for being fairly addicted to it, but we do need to have the tools so that we know that we can kind of come back and be present. ’cause otherwise we’re kind of missing our lives.

Um, so that’s why I, yeah, I love the idea of meditating. Um. Having any sort of alarm clock. It does not need to to be mine, but like any sort of alarm clock to give you that. Like, you go into your bedroom and you are not looking at your phone. So that means like you’re reading or you’re cuddling your partner or your pet or your dog.

Like, you know, you’re like, you’re just doing something that’s like so much more present. Um, I I, to like the meditation point, I find that I, I’ve been taking a lot more baths because they Oh yeah. Force me. Yeah. You can’t really have your cell, like you could have your cell phone in the bath, you can’t, you like it, you would potentially ruin it.

So like, taking a bath for me is a good way to then like, and then I’ll, like, I’ll read a little bit and then that will like totally calm my nervous system and [00:46:00] then can keep reading. Or that helps me like kind of decompress before I go to sleep. Um, but that really helps me as well. ’cause it’s like so, so such a forced embodiment, which is not a natural strength of mine.

Yeah, that, I think that’s me with my walks and then usually on the weekends, ’cause I’m just such like an outdoor sunshine, uh, I could literally go on like two, three hour walks just down to the beach, do it on the beach, walk through the neighborhoods, come back. But it is like so nourishing and even though like yeah, you, you could be on your phone.

I actually don’t usually listen to anything while I’m walking. Mm-hmm. It really is like my quiet time. I’m not listening to music, I’m not listening to podcasts. I’m just walking and observing. And usually it’s also a really, really good time, especially if I’m like stuck on a kind of a problem or something I’m working through.

I’ll get out and walk until I’ve worked through it and yeah, that’s very steep and I usually can like process through [00:47:00] things so much better when I’m doing it on a walk. I bet. Yeah. It, it’s amazing how, yeah. It’s funny. I feel like as life gets louder. I, I stop listening to podcasts and music on my walks as well, and even sometimes when I’m driving.

But, um, oh yeah, I do. Yeah. I, I, I love my walks. I live in, um, Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and so the seasons are kind of constantly changing. There’s a lot to be paying attention to of the wildfires, the wild flowers coming and going and like seeing the snow and all that kind of stuff. So I, I try to pay attention.

Um. During my walks and I, I’ll say having a dog helps a lot because you get to just look through his goofy eyes of like what he thinks is cool and beautiful and exciting that I normally would not think is cool and beautiful and yeah, [00:48:00] joy just through him. Yeah. Yeah. And I think it’ll be the same with your sweet baby girl that’s coming, like Yeah, I have a, I have a nephew who’s now like one and a half years old, and when he’s around, like I don’t need any other entertainment or distraction.

It is just so fun to watch him see life and get excited about all these things. And his reaction to every single thing is so fascinating to me. So that’ll be a good, totally. Yeah. I get kind of that, those, is it Buddha eyes or like Yeah, the fresh eyes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. To the point. Um, and then we’ll probably like start to land this plane, but to the point of the dopamine though, I was, I also interviewed, um.

I interviewed a guest and we were talking about it was, we were talking about alcohol and how to have a conscious relationship with alcohol and how alcohol also really messes with our dopamine levels. Mm-hmm. Um, but that there’s kind of these two hormones, the dopamine and the serotonin and dopamine kind of comes in, hits and [00:49:00] then like fades faster, which it’s meant to now.

It, we’re not meant to get like so many hits of it that are so fast. We are meant to get kind of hits of it, but not as high of a spike so that there’s not as low as a drop. Mm-hmm. But serotonin is more of like, meant to be this slow, long, kind of prolonged experience that really comes from connection.

Mm-hmm. And so even when you said like, I have my coffee. I look out my window and I pet my dog. That’s connection and you’re actually like creating and building serotonin from those experiences that doesn’t really have a spike. It like builds up in your system and then kind of carries you through the whole day.

And so trying to start the day with things like that, that are slow and intentional and connected, really sets you up to not have like the drops really that come from these dopamine spikes that we’re giving ourselves through things like any of the things on our cell phone. [00:50:00] Yeah. Yeah. I love that.

Absolutely. Yeah. It’s um. It’s, it’s a nice way to start the day. Yeah. It carries through to the rest of the day. It really does shape, like when you wake up and you feel frantic and kind of already out of body and like, oh, I’m, I’m already behind and I haven’t even like, gotten out of bed yet, like, the rest of your day.

I, this, this is when I always say like, oh, I’m not gonna be a very nice person today, Uhhuh. Like, I like, you know? ’cause you’re just like that much quicker to your fuse. You’re that much quicker. And it’s like, if you can kind of like refind your body, fin your yourself and your presence, it’s like you just have that extra pause every time you have an interaction, um, with someone and can show up much better as your.

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One is, what else maybe is a part of your morning routine or maybe you already gave it to us and it right now is just like a really simplified. Lovely, beautiful thing, but are there any other things that you’re kind of intentional about in your morning to start the day? Really consciously, it really is kind of what I said is I, you know, make myself a cup of, uh, a cappuccino and I sit on our couch [00:53:00] and usually my husband is reading his book, but sometimes we’ll kind of just like chat.

It’s our time to kind of like catch up, figure out what we’re both doing for the day. We both pet the dog that we’re very obsessed with times now. Um, but that’s really it. And sometimes I will go on a walk first thing. Um, recently I’ve been not feeling, uh, very. Energetic. Yeah, there’s a lot more sprightly.

That’s, that’s a great word. Um, but historically, before February I was doing morning walks. Um, those kind of have faded out, but hopefully they’ll, they’ll maybe come back in. But yeah, it’s a very, very simple morning routine. Um, just to kind of start the day grounded. If I’m really feeling it, I will, um, meditate first thing, but I generally meditate in the [00:54:00] afternoon, which I know is kind of not what most people do, but for some reason, for me, I, I really find meditating in the afternoon to be really nourishing.

It’s kind of like my, like 4:00 PM I need to like transition Yeah. Phase out of kind of intense work mode. Mm-hmm. The second half of my day. Um, that’s why I like to do that. I love that. I really do think like we need a conscious transition from work. To the rest of the day. Otherwise, like we just stay in that kind of like, go, go, go frantic place.

So do you have, um, a night routine at all? Yeah, I mean, it’s, it’s honestly not that dissimilar from, um, my morning routine where it’s fairly simple, but the phone stays in the kitchen to charge, which is great. Um, I will often take a bath before and it, it’ll be quick. Um, and that is usually like just a candle all lights off.

So that’s kind of [00:55:00] my way to, like, I, I, I hate overhead lights. I hate, I’m very particular about my lighting. Shocking uhhuh. Um, and so like lights are mostly all off. Take a bath with just a candle, which is usually not that long, like five or 10 minutes, just enough to like fully get my nervous system to chill out and then go to bed, read for a little while, or sometimes I just.

Kind of lie there for a little while and kind of think about my day or journal about my day, um, and just kind of let myself process anything that’s like bouncing around my head and Yeah. Um, yeah. Then eventually turn the light out and go to bed. Yeah. It’s just so lovely. You know, it honestly, it’s, it’s actually kind of refreshing ’cause I think over here in the holistic health world, sometimes there’s a, there’s like a, what’s the word I’m looking for?

It, it’s kind of like envied or [00:56:00] idolized the people who have the, and then I do this and this and this and this and this and this, and this, and this, and this and this. And my nightly routine is so perfectly optimized. And by the way, I’m not judging that if that is what nourishes you and what your mind, body, and spirit’s meaning right now, do it.

Mm-hmm. And I also think it’s a really beautiful reminder that for many of us, simplicity. Could be what we need and could be just as nourishing and I could thrive just as much as that other person doing all those things with living in my simplicity. Mm-hmm. Yeah. I’ve always been someone who sim less is more.

I like kind of wear, have my things that I wear, that I love. I wear those and I, when I have more, I feel more stressed out. So it’s what works for me. But I also have the, the more like Virgo friends who are like, and I have my 12 step skincare. I’m like, I would love, I like if I could be that person, [00:57:00] I honestly would love to be that person.

Person. I’m just not that person. Yeah. But yeah, I, I think having it be what works for you is really important. But for me, completely. What is your sign and do you, do you know your human design? Um, yes. I, I am a cancer and I am a manifester. Okay. Okay. Yeah. I’m a manifesting generator and I’m a Gemini, so, oh, I don’t know.

I don’t know a ton about astrology. I know more about human design. Oh, cool. Yeah, my husband’s a manifesting generator. I, I find them both. I find human design and astrology to be really, really interesting. But I found learning my, uh, human design to be like very helpful for me. So I think that’s part of why I like simplicity and I like kind of these ebbs and flows is ’cause I have these bursts of energy and then I have these moments where I really need to kind of like recalibrate, um, and reset.

Yeah. Honestly, I would say, especially as an entrepreneur, I feel like that’s one of the places knowing my human design made such a big difference. Mm-hmm. It’s like [00:58:00] giving myself permission to set my days up differently than maybe like. The traditional entrepreneurial world would say, I should set my days up and not feeling like shame or like I’m lazy or anything because of that.

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. It’s, it gives you a lot of permission and it’s amazing what happens when you have that permission. I, I found that, um, one of the things that was mentioned in I think, manifesto or maybe just generally my chart was like speaking more rather than writing, and I’m also dyslexic.

Oh. So I like now find that like when I’m communicating with customers on Instagram or something like that, I’ll just voice note them because it’s so much easier for me ’cause I get really stressed. I mean, spell check’s amazing, but like even then sometimes I really can’t, I can’t get there, which is sad.

Um, so I’ll voice note and it’s. It’s such a weight lifted, and I think it’s a little bit more personal. Some people find ’em annoying, but I love it. [00:59:00] Yeah. No, but it’s, it’s just, it’s living within your design and your kind of energetic blueprint, so I love that. Okay, last, last question. What is on the high, the horizon for rise centered?

You said maybe you’re working on some different iterations of the product. Yeah. Um, I’m personally gonna request one that diffuses the smell of coffee in the morning. I love that. I love that. Um, yeah, if only we could send Yeah, send some smells. Um, so we’re working on, um, this fall, we’ll launch another color.

Um, so a new wood base color, which I’m really excited about. It’s really beautiful. Um, but then next year we’re working on a 2.0 version, so it will have. A couple of different alarm options as well as sleep sounds for those who are wanting kind of a more juiced up version. Um, and then we’re also working on a travel version, um, [01:00:00] because I, oh my God, stop.

I’m very, very excited about the travel version. Okay. It’s been, it’s, it’s hard to make ’cause it’s small, it’s, it’s different materials. We’re not gonna expect you to travel with a giant, um, salt sphere because that would be crazy. And I have done it and I don’t recommend it. I literally take my sunrise alarm clock when I travel.

Like I will, I refuse to wake up to in any other way. I that, yes, I love that. We actually just had a customer. I’ve traveled with ours just because, like with launches and things like that, I like needed to be taking videos and stuff like that. And it, ours is 10 pounds because it three out a natural materials.

It literally is a Himalayan top security people are like. And I’m like, it’s salt. And they’re like, is it really salt? Like, you know, you’re, they think I’m trafficking something and I’m, um, but yeah, I feel like when you travel, assuming you don’t, most people don’t travel with a [01:01:00] sunrise alarm clock with them.

Um, it’s so, like, I get so much more addicted, especially when I’m in a hotel room and like I am out of my routine and I’m usually like away from friends and family and like whatever. So I’m really, really excited about the travel version. Oh my God. Okay. Well I’m gonna be tracking that diligently because I will be one of the first people getting that.

That is so, so cool. But the two things I kind of like religiously travel with are my sunrise alarm clock, and then I have a grounding blanket that I sleep on in bed. I love that. And those are the two that I’m just like. No, not, I’m not going a day without these. Not a chance. Good for you. That’s great. I mean, you are bringing your routine with you, which is huge and must be so helpful.

Yeah, and they’re just, you know, there’s, they’re simple. Like I usually, I’m actually pretty good, like I don’t take a ton of supplements, but those are two things, like optimizing my morning. ’cause it literally, I, I honestly cannot stress guys for the audience. Like, what a difference it makes waking up with a sunrise alarm [01:02:00] clock, like once you do it and then you have a day where you like, whatever, you’re somewhere else and you don’t have it, and you wake up to the glaring alarm again, you’ll be like, oh my gosh, I cannot believe I was waking up like this for so many years.

Yeah. And then the grounding blanket is just like, we’re in bed eight hours a day, let’s optimize that time. And if we can be like grounding the whole time, that’s just huge. So. I love it. That’s great. Well, Emily, this was so much fun. Thank you for coming on. Yeah, thanks so much for having me. I loved, loved chatting with you.

Yeah, I’m super excited for the audience to get to because I’ve, I’ve talked about my sun, the sunrise alarm clock for years now, but my audience also knows that I, aesthetic is so important and I don’t want anything in my space that’s ugly. Yeah, yeah. But the sunrise alarm clock is the one thing that I’m like, this is all that’s out there, so I’ll take it a hundred percent.

Um, but I’m absolutely gonna get one of the rise alarm clocks ’cause it’s perfect. Great. Well, I’m excited to hear what you [01:03:00] think.