The first message read can place someone else’s concern inside your waking thoughts.

The order of a morning matters more than its length. Whatever you read first becomes what your mind chews on while you dress and make coffee, and if it arrived out of someone else’s evening, their problem now occupies your quietest hour. Nothing about the message is unreasonable. It is simply that the first thought of the day is unusually sticky, and you gave it away before deciding to.

Try leaving the phone unread until after the first ordinary thing you do. Even twenty minutes means the day starts with something of your own in it rather than an inherited concern.