I woke up every day at 5am for 365 days in a row. My goal was to prove if there would be this awesome life improving results. To be honest, the results are not what I hear many people claim. I have heard claims of massive health improvment, vast income and productivity gains. Claims of getting more done, and having a better mental disposition are also common. After struggling out of bed every morning at the same time, I can report back what I discovered.
Getting more done – true.
This claim is definitely valid. Waking early provides you an opportunity to get more done in a given day. I have discovered that this is true for a couple of primary reasons.
- When you are up before anyone else, there are less distractions. Even the spammers know not to try to reach you at 5:15am. Your own household is not a busseling hive of activity yet, and that gives you a few hours to get things done.
- Consistency is the soul of productivity. When you wake at the same time everyday, you create a pattern. That builds a foundation for keeping and maintaining habits. This is the single best reason that I would recommend early rising. The time does not matter as much as the consistency of the time.
Rising early gets easier as you go – true.
People claim that this becomes so habitual that your natural rythym will match the habit. This is true. My experience is that it takes about 90 days for any real habit to solidify. The rising at a specific time, happens fast. My estimate is 3 weeks of completely consistency, even on weekends, will get you into this zone. After 3 weeks, you will start waking between 15 and 30 minutes before your alarm.
Gain massive health benefits – false.
You do not gain massive health benefits from rising early. You do not start to do the right things. There is a good chance, if you do not watch it, you will fall into bad routines. You are susceptible to poor behavior at 5am and at 8am. Your primal brain does not care what time it is. You can sit in a chair for 3 hours. You can write for 3 hours. You can go to the gym for 3 hours. You can do a lot of things before 8am, waking early does not help you do any of the above. If you do not use the time to develop good habits, you will experience exhaustion. Tired people do bad things.
Become a magnet for the laws of attraction – false.
There are some immediate benefits to waking early. These are obvious. You get more done. You are not as lazy. You are in more control of your day. You get ahead of all the distractions. These are all great reasons for getting started early. Those benefits start to recede over time. You end up with good old fashioned hard work. People that wake early and people that wake later are both potential victims to laziness. Your morning habit of rising early does not protect you from that. You still have to do the work, sorry.
You will be the life of the party – false.
You will actually become a boring person. You will get tired by 8pm and your body will start to want to shut down. You will find yourself trying to supplement your energy level with bad things. Too much caffeine, too much sugar. The rest of society is trying to get your attention after 8pm and you are looking to go to sleep. Your spouse will get annoyed at you, because they want to talk before you go to bed and you will be drowsy. So no, you will not be the life of the party and you will not be fun to be around. If you push this too much and stay up to late, you will still get up at 5am but you will increase your sleep debt. This is bad and produces bad results.
After spending a year doing this habit, I do have some tips for those of us who value our morning time. If you want to maintain this type of habit then here are a few tips that I would suggest.
Bedtime is more important than Wake time.
After you establish the habit of a consistent waking time, the time you get up will no longer be hard. What will be hard is going to bed at the same time. That is the hard part. When people hear me say, I wake up at 4:30 to 5:00am every morning they are in shock. What is even more shocking is when they learn that to do that, I have to go to bed at 8:00pm every night. To gain the benefits of rising early you must retire early and consistent. You cannot cheat sleep. It will get you.
Most important things first.
When you do wake up at 5am, build a set of core habits that you get done right away, no matter what. Do NOT allow anything to get in your way. Structure your life so that this happens. Do not allow travel plans, vacation plans, life disruptions to get in the way. You must get the important things done first. If you wake early and scroll on the Internet for 3 hours then you might as well have stayed in bed. Your REM sleep is a whole lot better then filling your head with a bunch of marketing.
In fact – shut the tech down.
When you do wake up every morning, do not turn on the phone or anything else until you get the analog things done first. You have and always will have analog things do to that are important. Getting ready. Reading. Thinking. Praying. Meditating. Planning. Pushups. Running. These are all analog activities and not a single one requires tech. So STOP the tech in the early morning hours.
My final piece of advice is that the time does not matter. You can join Jocko with his 4:45 thing if you want, but at the end of the day the best routine is any routine. Consistency is the strength behind all good behavior. What your body does by itself is usually the best thing. So when you are doing good behavior with consistency the best plan is to wake when you wake. Sleep when your tired. Rise when you are ready. Be consistent.
Guy
