The Lies You Hear Before Sunrise

Posted Yesterday at 08:00 AM1 day

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Most people begin their mornings in quiet defeat before they even leave their bed.

The alarm goes off, and instead of rising, the battle begins. Not against the world outside but against the thoughts inside. The ones that whisper “you’re already behind,” or “you’ll never get it all done,” or worse, “why bother?”

I know this battle.

I lived it for years.

Some mornings I still feel its pull.

The heaviness, the race, the instant pressure. The mind that wants to spiral before the day has even started.

And here’s the truth no one wants to admit, those first thoughts are not harmless.

They set the tone.

They’re seeds.

They decide how the hours ahead unfold.

Most people plant weeds before they even drink their first cup of coffee.

That realization changed everything for me.

I didn’t stumble into Meta Prayers as some lofty spiritual practice. I found them because I was tired of losing my mornings, tired of losing whole days to dread and pressure and fear. I was tired of walking around already defeated, already behind, already at war with myself.

One morning, I sat at the kitchen table, coffee in hand, and instead of listing everything I had to do, I whispered:

“Peace fills my mind, body, and spirit now.”

It was awkward at first, like speaking into an empty room. My rational mind told me I was being ridiculous. But the words landed differently than the usual spiral. They felt steady. They felt true, even if just for a breath.

And so, I whispered again the next day, and the day after that. Soon it became a habit. A rhythm. A way of re-training the first minutes of my day.

Most of us are already praying. We just don’t call it prayer.

When you wake up and say, “I’m so tired. Life is so hard. I’ll never catch up,” those are prayers too. They’re requests, sent out into the universe, repeated with conviction.

Meta Prayers are the reverse of that. They are conscious, intentional whispers. Prayers that shape reality instead of reinforce defeat. They are short, simple, raw. Not lofty religious formulas. Not syrupy affirmations. Words you can actually believe when you’re standing there in your kitchen with messy hair, coffee cup in hand, staring down another long day.

That’s what makes them powerful.

I began weaving them into my coaching practice.

Clients would show up overwhelmed, lost in fear, in grief, in uncertainty. They wanted big strategies, sweeping answers. But often what shifted them most was a single line they could cling to. A sentence whispered in the morning. A steadying breath at night.

Like the man who was drowning in fear of failure until I handed him these words: “Every fear I face dissolves into strength.”

Or the woman who carried years of shame in her body and finally began to feel free when she spoke: “I reclaim every part of myself that was lost or silenced.”

I’ve watched people cry when they hear their own mouths repeat something they never thought they could believe. It isn’t magic, but it feels like it. The kind of magic that rewrites your nervous system, your energy, your direction.

Because here’s the secret: words are not just words.

They’re instructions to the body. They’re blueprints for the day ahead. They’re signals to the spirit.

Say defeat, you live defeat. Say strength, you build strength. Say peace, you begin to feel peace. Even if only in slivers. And those slivers expand.

I don’t care how strong you are, how disciplined, how spiritual. Every one of us faces the morning battle. And every one of us has the choice: to fall back into the weeds of unconscious words, or to plant something new.

That choice is where the day begins.

These whispers, these Meta Prayers, are what pulled me back when life should have broken me.

When my son lay in a hospital bed after his accident, unconscious, machines keeping him alive, I whispered prayers not just for his healing, but for my own strength. For clarity when my fear wanted to crush me. For faith when my mind screamed despair.

When I crawled out of a relationship that should have destroyed me, I whispered words that reminded me of my worth, of my power, of my freedom.

And in the quiet, ordinary mornings too, when nothing dramatic is happening, they still hold me. They steady me so the weight of the world doesn’t decide my day before I even begin it.

That’s why I wrote this book.

Meta Prayers for Today’s Challenging Times is not a collection of pretty words. It’s a lifeline.

It’s the sentences that pulled me through grief, trauma, fear, and rebuilding faith. It’s the same words I’ve handed to clients who swore nothing could change. It’s a companion for mornings when you’d rather not rise, nights when the silence feels too heavy, and all the moments in between.

You don’t need long rituals. You don’t need to escape to a monastery. You just need words that work. Words that meet you in your humanity and remind you of your divinity.

That’s what Meta Prayers are.

They’re what I whisper to the universe each morning. And what whispers back is peace, strength, and a sense of being held, no matter what the day holds.

The morning battle doesn’t stop. But now, I win it more often than I lose it.

And that’s the difference between a life that crushes you and a life you rise to meet.

This September (fingers crossed), this book will be in your hands. Until then, I’ll keep whispering. I hope you will too.

Because every word is a seed. And what you plant each morning is what grows into your life.

Ready to stop losing the morning battle? Join the waitlist now for my upcoming book, Meta Prayers for Today’s Challenging Times. These aren’t just words — they’re lifelines for the days when you need them most. DM me “Morning Battle” for the direct link or to be added.

As always loving you from here,

Rene Schooler

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This post was previously published on medium.com.