My Secret To Getting Up At 5 AM

Believe me, I never thought I'd be writing anything about getting up early! I've never been a morning person. In fact, I distinctly remember my dad barging into my room at about 11 AM on Saturdays, "You're sleeping your day away!" I started drinking coffee at about 10 years old, when my Mom thought it might help her drag me out of bed for school in the morning. It has always taken a team and a load of caffeine to get me upwardly mobile, but then I went through this whole transformative thing and realized that the way to 'escape' the mundane and live a more joy filled life is to spend more time doing the things that light me up. There are books about it, and a million productivity coaches out there who swear by getting up early, but I wasn't a believer for the longest! I protested like a toddler before I realized I was getting nowhere. I needed to make time for actual living and pursuing passions, while still working a regular-degular. The only window of unused time I had to work was early in the morning, before everything and everyone else started vying for my time. I realized I was going to have to make more time by getting up early and going to bed at a consistent time. You can actually make time! Here's what has worked for me:

Stop hitting snooze!

It wasn't easy at first, but every time that it was hard to pull myself upright, I remembered something I read somewhere: hitting the snooze is like putting your life goals on hold. My life goals had been on hold for half a lifetime already, so there is no more time for snoozing. It's also like accepting failure at attaining your goals as soon as you wake up. If you don't make yourself get up, you've already failed your first goal for the day: to get up early. That has a domino effect into the rest of your day and other aspects of your life. I kept telling myself these two things every time I wanted to hit that snooze button. Once my body adjusted to getting up at this time, it became easier and easier. Now, I get up before 6 AM with no alarm. 

Start your day with something you love to do!

Ultimately, I think this helped me get up early more than anything! I wanted more time to do the things I loved. I had been living with this motto of 'work before play' my entire life. That basically meant I never had time to play. There's always work to be done. For me, getting up early goes hand in hand with actually putting myself, my wants and needs, first. Starting your day with something you love to do gives you something to look forward to. It's so much easier to get up, when you have something to look forward to. 

Fix your diet!

You know what it takes to get up at 5 AM and basically hit the ground running for the next 16 hours? It takes energy. You know how to get energy? Give your body the fuel (nutrients) it needs. Eating clean helped me tremendously! So many things we eat cause chronic fatigue and inflammation. If you suffer from an overall sense of lethargy, take a closer look at what you eat. "You are what you eat," isn't a joke. I had to do an elimination diet as a means to figure out what foods were triggering my migraines. In that time frame I had to create a food journal and take notes of what I ate and how I felt. I had the most energy and actually felt good while I was on the elimination diet! To spare you loads of time and research, what it boils down to is one rule of thumb: if it comes in a package, don't eat it! And you have to drink water. Your organs need it to function properly. If you want to keep feeling the way you've been feeling, by all means keep pretending like water isn't essential. If you're fed up with feeling crappy all the time, you're going to have to start chugging. The answer is not caffeine, sorry. I do still drink coffee, but only one cup. It's more of a ritual now than anything. Coffee actually further dehydrates you, thus continuing that general feeling of lethargy that you're trying to beat. I had to ween myself off of caffeine, but I learned that if I let myself actually get dog tired, I slept so much better and woke up with more energy naturally.

Be patient with yourself!

I think the misconception with getting up early is that it's just going to magically happen overnight. That's not how it happened for me. I put up a pretty good fight with myself for about 6 months before my mind and body reprogrammed to this way of living, but my want to feel like my highest and best self more regularly eventually knocked out my want to stay warm and cozy under the covers for just a little bit longer. I guess you could say it takes time to make time! Any new habit needs a que, routine/system, and reward to work. For me, the reward of actually getting the time to do the things that bring joy far outweighs the pain of getting up early.

Much Light & Love,

Gawa