I Did My Morning Routine Hungover on Purpose. The Results Shocked Me.

So I did a thing, dear reader. I got drunk on purpose.

No, I wasn’t falling all over myself.
No, I wasn’t pinballing to bed saying things that I don’t mean or can’t remember.
No—I had about five drinks. Enough to know that I was 100% going to feel hungover in the morning.

But the reason why I’m writing to you is because I did it on purpose.

I have a ritual of sorts when I clean out the refrigerator. I have a glass of wine. My mom has done that for years, since I was a child. And so not only was I indoctrinated into this very relaxing and fun way of scraping old milk off a surface, but I quite enjoy cleaning. I enjoy making things look neat and organized. There is something oddly grounding about taking something chaotic and restoring order to it.

I usually do this on the weekend. But I did an impromptu shopping trip last night, and I thought to myself, Oh my gosh, I cannot put these groceries away without cleaning the fridge. I have a big family, and our fridge gets pretty cray-cray pretty fast.

So I said to myself, Should I have a drink?
Well, it’s Tuesday.
No.

But then I had a revolutionary idea that genuinely excited me.

I asked myself: What actually is the difference between doing my routine totally sober—totally fresh, clear-minded, no grogginess—and doing it hungover? I wanted to prove to myself why drinking on weekdays is not the best idea for me. I don’t think there’s a right or wrong. I think there are always exceptions to the rule. But I think it’s equally important to know for sure when something is a treat that should be saved for an ideal time.

So I decided to walk myself through my normal routine—rain or shine, feeling good or not—every single day.

I wake up at 5 o’clock.

Actually, let me dial it back for a second, because I want to share something that is so simple, yet something I didn’t realize for years. I used to think that morning routines had to be so kick-ass that by 8 a.m. you were basically patting yourself on the back for being a Spartan warrior.

Eight years ago, when I lived in Los Angeles, I used to jog two miles every morning. Crack of dawn. I would jog toward the Hollywood sign—not up the hill, but all the way down the road so I was closest to it and it was in full glow, looking like an arrival. Then I’d jog back. Four miles every morning.

Then I’d have breakfast I didn’t even like because I was broke and trying to stay skinny. Usually a Nutri-Grain bar and milk—which honestly wasn’t too bad now that I think about it.

But the point is, I thought an effective morning routine had to be very challenging. Because if it wasn’t challenging, then I wasn’t making progress.

What I know now—and what I have fully embraced and encourage you to adopt—is that your morning routine should feel so good to your soul that you look forward to it the night before. You should look forward to setting that alarm. You should look forward to waking up and implementing a schedule that serves your soul, the core of who you are, and what you truly enjoy—with dashes of challenge. Enough to create progress, but not so much that you dread waking up.

So now back to my routine.

I wake up at 5 a.m. I walk over to my jacuzzi and turn on the water. Then I go to my kitchen and make coffee—an actual pot of coffee. I used to have a Keurig, but there’s something old-school and grounding about pouring the grounds. Sometimes I even grind whole beans.

I add a little creamer. By the time my coffee is ready, my bath is done. I soak. There’s no rush. When you wake up at five, time is on your side.

I get out, brush my teeth, and put on a comfortable workout outfit—and let me emphasize comfortable. Because for a routine to really stick, you have to balance comfort with challenge. I used to put on tight, uncomfortable workout clothes, and guess what? I didn’t look forward to that either.

So now it’s sweats and a shirt or sweats and a sports bra. I go down to my basement, do my cardio, lift weights. I come upstairs and read for 30 minutes minimum. I set a timer, because after 30 minutes, I’m good.

Then I do my makeup, put on my outfit—and now it’s 8:30.

I’ve been up for three and a half hours. I’ve gotten my me-time in. I feel accomplished. I feel challenged. I feel cozy. I feel ready to win the day.

But I was curious—what would this routine feel like hungover?

So I drank the five drinks.

And here’s what I noticed, not just the next morning, but from the moment the alcohol hit.

The first thing I noticed was how inquisitive I became. I ask more internal questions when alcohol hits me. Why am I doing this? Why are they doing that? How do I feel? What’s on my mind? What do I want to talk about? My thoughts were moving at double pace.

I observed myself from the outside and thought, Wow, I am having a million thoughts a second. It felt good—but it didn’t feel like me. I have a lot of mental control, and it felt like someone smashed a button and things went a little haywire.

The second thing I noticed was that I couldn’t focus. I felt like I was floating. And that floating—that slight removal from the edge—is one of the reasons people drink.

Then I noticed something that really caught my attention: time stopped mattering.

To wake up at five, I need to be in bed by nine and asleep—out cold—by ten. But I didn’t care. And observing that lack of care from outside myself was unsettling.

Why don’t I care about going to bed when I know I need to wake up early?

It was fascinating to watch my brain know it was self-sabotaging and not stop itself.

I went to bed around 11 p.m. I told myself this was a science experiment. I would not sleep in. I would wake up at five.

The alarm went off, and my first thought was, I don’t feel like getting up.

I didn’t look forward to my bath. I didn’t care about my candles. And that’s when it hit me—being hungover distorts your perception of what you actually enjoy.

I love my candle-lit bath. I love working out. I love listening to audiobooks. Right now I’m listening to Iyanla Vanzant’s new book, and it is life-changing. I also read every morning. I’m reading The Power of Full Engagement by Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz.

I listen and I read—because there is a difference.

And guess what, research from cognitive psychology shows that reading activates deeper neural processing than listening alone, while audiobooks engage emotional and narrative centers. Together, they strengthen focus and retention.

And that’s when I realized something.

We are advanced, organic computer systems.

The inputs we allow are the reason we experience the outputs that shape our lives. What did I input last night? Five faulty codes.

Faulty codes disrupt the algorithm. They cause crashes. A hangover is a system error.

Another study published in Neuropsychopharmacology confirms that alcohol suppresses the prefrontal cortex—the part of the brain responsible for judgment, impulse control, and future planning. In other words, the very part of you that protects tomorrow goes offline.

But when I used the 5-4-3-2-1 method and got up anyway, I fixed the faulty code.

Action overrides chemistry.

I got in the bath and thought, I love this.

And that was the lesson.

Drinking isn’t bad.
But drinking is best experienced when the next day is vacation.

When rest is built in.
When clarity isn’t required.
When tomorrow isn’t going to ask much of you.

This experiment truly educated me.

And the takeaway isn’t restriction. It’s choosing tomorrow with intention.

So cheers to you, dear reader. May you enjoy your drink of choice on a day that makes most sense to your goals.

Until next time,
Maria 🌹