For most of my life, mornings have been an ordeal. A test of will. The most positive thing that I could say about the morning is that the day was likely to get better because it was hard to see how it could feel much worse.
For a long time, I accepted the idea that this is just how it is for everyone, and that there is very little that I could do about it. Sometimes, thinking that it was a lack of sleep that made me dread the mornings, I would focus on consistently getting a full 8 or more hours every night. While it is true that getting a good amount of sleep at a consistent time every day has many benefits, I still wasn’t looking forward to the first hour or two of my day each morning.
Things finally changed after my son was born. It was the result of what, at the time, seemed to be an insurmountable problem. I was at work all day, and then in the evenings, my wife would work, and I would watch my son. With this schedule, my habit of going to the gym a few times a week was becoming a problem to maintain. Although I found some opportunities to exercise while my wife wasn’t working, I was using up what little time we had to be together as a family. On my list of priorities, family trumps gym, and that’s how I intend to keep it. Although I can’t say enough about the benefits of maintaining a steady exercise routine, I knew that I would have to find a way to get exercise that didn’t interfere with my precious family time too much. After many failed attempts, this turned out to be a challenging problem to solve. Until…
One day, I stumbled across a book called “Extreme Ownership” by Jocko Willink and Leif Babin. I don’t know how I found it, but I read/listened to it (I don’t remember if it was an audiobook or a physical copy), and I became interested in learning more about the authors, both former Navy Seals. I found some interviews online with Jocko Willink where he talked about how he wakes up very early in the morning each day. It sounds funny to me now, but I never seriously considered this approach to making more time in the day to get things done. If I did, it was just as a wild notion that I didn’t think deserved much contemplation. After all, who could keep that up for very long?
My son went to bed around 8:30 or 9:00, and I knew that I wasn’t using the time between then and when I went to sleep, just after 10:00 or so, very productively. I just didn’t know what to do about that. I try to restrict the types of activities that I do before bedtime to those that are the least stimulating. I go so far as to limit the types of books that I read at night to those that won’t call me to action in some way, or illicit a strong emotional response. Long ago, I discovered that this is one of the keys to being able to fall asleep quickly. So, while attempting to engage in non-stimulating activities that I could do in an hour or hour and a half, I found myself filling this time with activities that were neither productive nor meaningful to me. This constrained time at night was a lousy time to try to get important things done that I didn’t have time for during the day, ESPECIALLY EXERCISE! I realized that If I started to go to bed just after my son went to sleep, I wouldn’t be missing that time at night very much, and the time that I gained in the morning would have far fewer restrictions. Eureka! Now I have a plan!
After I listened to Jocko make his case for an early start, it was one of those moments where puzzle-pieces start to click together in your mind, and the world seems to unfold in front of you as if it were designed just for you. As I write this, I am, again, astounded by how such a simple notion, uncovered at the right time, can be life-changing. It turns out that waking up early (I set my alarm for 4:20) helps me address several problems at once……
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