If you would tell me that one day I will decide to start waking up at 5 am, I would laugh. I would laugh so hard I would fall from my chair and roll on the floor. Maybe it sounds dramatic but you get the idea. I have never considered myself a morning person, not even for a second. On contrary, I enjoyed working late at night and was able to focus better during late hours. So why change?
Well, when I work the whole day, in the evenings I am pretty much exhausted. Plus I also need some time for my friends and family. Now, as an entrepreneur, I can decide my own hours of work but it is not so easy as it sounds. I have been struggling with a feeling of guilt all the time. In the end, my to-do list was never ending and there is always something else to do. Waking up at 5 am and introducing a morning routine helped me fight this feeling. In the end, by 9 am (when most of the people start working) I have already accomplished so many things.
Benefits of waking up at 5am
Waking up at 5 am is hard but it is also so rewarding. If you are anything like me from the past, you are probably thinking this girl is crazy, what could be rewarding in waking up so early? But think about it, at that time no one is awake except you. No emails, no calls, no distractions. Just you and your goals. If you work full time and have no time for creating your own business or a side income, I highly recommend that you try to wake up at 5 am and be as productive as you possibly could be. Attack your day before it attacks you!
Also, waking up so early gives you a feeling of accomplishment. If I, a person addicted to snoozing her alarm clock, could wake up at 5 am and start my day positively and effectively, I could achieve anything! It also feels awesome to be a part of 5 am millionaires club. One day, I will explain an interviewer from Forbes or People magazine about how I started my empire “ you know… it all started with waking up at 5 am” 😉
Success is nothing more than a few simple disciplines, practiced every day!
If you are still not convinced, check out and read these books about waking up at 5am:
But how to wake up so early?
The first time I tried waking up at 5am, I remember waking up, looking at the time (it was 5:30) and thinking “OMG, I made it! I am like Elon Musk!”. Then 30 seconds later I was asleep again, with the alarm clock in my hand. I finally managed to wake up at 6:30am and still counted it as a major win.
Since that day, I have experimented with different habits that allow me to wake up early:
I go to sleep very early. If I manage to be in bed at 10 pm or 11 pm, I have no problem with waking up at 5.30. If you are wondering how in the World, you can fall asleep at 10 pm, the answer will be in the next blog post, where I talk all about my night routine.
Plan something exciting for the next morning that will make you jump out of the bed immediately. It could be a delicious breakfast but as I am usually not hungry first thing in the morning, I came up with a different idea: I started a morning beauty routine. I figured out that it is hard to be sleepy when your skin feels fresh and vitalized. The shower also wakes you up in a second.
If you are a chronic snoozer, leave your phone in the other room. I don’t do that but somehow I learned to turn on the light before reaching for my phone.
Place a post-it next to your bed with a sentence that really “hits you”. Something that reminds you to jump out of bed and go for it! Mine is “I do not NEGLECT!” which I heard from Jim Rohn. Recently I also added, “What happened with the time you decided to go for it?” – it reminds me that I quit my job and decided to become a full-time blogger to chase my dreams, not sleep!
Don’t be lazy, be amazing!
My morning routine
Before going to sleep the night before, I plan my next day. Mostly because when the alarm rings, I start questioning whether I really need to wake up. If I know my plan and tasks for the day, it is way easier to persuade myself to get up early. I know that this step might be really hard so I really suggest buying Philips Wake up Light Alarm clock which uses natural light and bird sounds to wake you up gradually.
Buy Philips Wake up Light Alarm clock here
After getting up, the first thing I do is to open the window to allow some cold fresh air in and to open the blinders. I then head to the bathroom to start my beauty routine. I will explain it in more detail in the next post, but for now, I will just tell you that I follow Korean skin routine with 9 steps. My favorite is putting on Vitamin C serum which smells like freshly squeezed orange juice!
Read more about it here:
After that, I drink water with lemon and meditate for 3-5 minutes. The next step is writing down my thoughts: what I am grateful for, what is the goal of my day, how I will make today great and what I want to achieve this week. For that I use the 5-minute journal or Passion Planner.
Buy them here:
After that, I am ready to start my day. I make coffee, read something inspirational, usually, it is a blog post from other blogger or a podcast and start with the most creative work like writing blog posts, creating graphics, preparing webinars, etc. I don’t check my emails nor social media, as I want to be ultimately productive and feel like I did something important so early in the morning. I also check which tasks for the day are the most important for me and I usually start there.
Introducing a new healthy habit is never easy. But it is something that you should and could do. As the saying says: “Start with doing what’s necessary, then do what’s possible, and suddenly you are doing the impossible!”.
What do you think?
Will you try to wake up early to crush your goals? Let me know in the comments below!
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