The Ungodly Hour: Description of my first day doing the 5 AM Club — Part 2 of 2

See the first part of this experience under this link to read about the preparations and reasons for starting with the 5 AM club …and to find out how the first 34 minutes went!

Contents

1. Morning routine part Two: Soul — journaling and planning

2. Morning routine part Three: Mind — learning something new

3. The Impact of 5 AM Club on the rest of the day

4. Would I do the 5 AM Club again?

Morning routine part Two: Soul — journaling and planning

05:35 — I walk back to the living room and sit on a comfy chair there, pulling a few comfy blankets over me to feel warm. It is winter after all.

Last night I also set up a moka pot in order to be able to quickly make a coffee in the morning but to my surprise I don’t crave it at all.

I’m feeling somewhat calmer than before and start to write, again reliving all the emotions I have been experiencing during this experiment, through writing them down. The self-deprecating thoughts when waking up, my fears, the strange dream I had… Writing takes longer than the 20 minutes initially planned but it doesn’t matter to me. I’m in a flow and want to remember how I felt this first morning of waking up at 5 AM and it’s worth taking extra time for it.

I can feel a bit of weight being lifted off from my soul with every word. My heart rate slowly drops. It’s easier to breathe and I feel less anxious. It’s not easy to write about everything, though. There is the heaviness from many memories and decisions inside me that I don’t want to face. But I then remember a message from The 5 AM Club book, stating that our outside world reflects what’s going on in our inner world. Our life outside can’t change before we find clarity and peace inside. And boy do I have things to figure out! My burn-out, depression, fears, anxiety, the list goes on and on… I’m aware I will not solve my life’s problems in one sitting but today is the day I make a start.

06:17 — I think I’ve written myself empty. Now, though, my daily schedule is starting to creep up on me. I’m thinking of all the things I should finalise today, things I have been procrastinating for days… Response to my ex-boss, private life tasks, personal projects, client commitments, … — and this makes me feel insecure.

Yes I’m up early but I don’t feel particularly different from any other day. I think I was hoping that waking up at 5 AM will give me such a big confidence boost that doing my daily tasks wouldn’t be challenging anymore. That’s obviously not the case and how could it be!? I get insecure again, wondering if I’ll manage to keep a better focus today compared to my usual self… The only thing I can do to calm myself down is to do some planning: I start a to-do list for the day and hope that this time I’ll actually keep to it. I’m famous for creating to-do lists that never see a tick in them…

On top of the insecurity I’m getting tired. The workout woke me up, the writing kept me focused but now I can feel the urge to sleep getting bigger by the minute.

It doesn’t help that it’s still completely dark outside.

Or is it? With some effort it’s now possible to make out the silhouette of a neighbouring building on the background of the sky that is slightly lighter than just some minutes before. I also notice a light turned on in an apartment across the street …that gets switched off again seconds after I notice it. Pee break?

06:35 — My morning routine is taking significantly longer than initially planned! I don’t mind it though. However, I’m still getting more and more tired with every minute! Yawning often. It’s a struggle to keep the eyes open. Yesterday I did go to bed early enough to theoretically have enough sleep but it was hard to force the body to fall asleep 2 hours earlier than usual. In the end I only got 5–6 h of sleep.

I’m starting to really crave that coffee — but I decide to postpone having it and rather take a nap after I’ve finished the 3rd part of the routine. In the book it’s encouraged to think of rewards for yourself for getting out of bed early and one suggestion that I found really desirable was to have a nap later in the day. The idea of extra sleep later today sounds like a dream right now! So, this means coffee after the nap.

My to-do list is ready now and yet again featuring many more tasks than I could realistically finish in a day. At least it’s calming to see everything on paper, lessening the fear of having forgotten something important.

It’s time to move on to the last part of the morning routine: learning.

Plus it’s exciting to see it getting lighter and lighter outside with every minute.

Morning routine part Three: Mind — learning something new

07:00 — In the book there is no real rule as to what “learning” means. One could watch an educational YouTube video, listen to an audiobook or podcast, read a book. As I’m interested in personal finance and financial independence topics, and recently picked up learning trading, I decided to devote the learning part of the morning routine to reading about technical analysis of the financial markets. Side income, here I come (not 😂).

Reading is going so much slower than usual! I want to sleep so badly! However, I decide to push myself through the 20 pages I committed to reading. From time to time I get up and do a couple of squats to not fall asleep. But I’m now also feeling really cold, despite being wrapped into 3 blankets so it’s getting harder and harder.

08.15 — I FINALLY finish the 20 pages! It took me more than 2 times longer than usual! The topic was really interesting but a bit hard to tackle when feeling sleepy.

I’m officially finished with the morning routine of my first 5 AM club! 3 hours instead of 1 — but I’m proud of myself for succeeding at it!

The Impact of 5 AM Club on the rest of the day

08:16 — I’m still feeling cold and decide to take that nap now. However, my boyfriend is just waking up and I end up chatting with him for a while and talking about my experience so far.

Yesterday he was laughing at me for trying to wake up at 5 am because he knows how much I love to sleep. He also knew I had failed at attempting the 5 AM club for two days already due to not going to bed on time (staying up until 2 am…). Even if that laugh came from a good place, needless to say, it’s extremely nice to be the one laughing now 😎

Today, for a change, he’s slightly and saying something in the lines of “people always first laugh at individuals taking their first steps in changing their lives.. or the world”. Well well well. The attitude has changed from laughing to encouraging! Works for me 😎

09:10 — He leaves for work and I get back to bed: the thing that I’ve been longing to do for the past 4 hours and 10 minutes… or so. I’m slowly starting to feel warmer under the fluffy blanket and set the alarm clock for 1.5 h away to attempt and sleep one full 90 min cycle. I haven’t completely finished The 5 AM Club book yet and am thus listening to a new chapter of it, hoping for the calm voice of the narrator to help me to doze off more quickly.

However, the calm narrator doesn’t work. Instead of the well-deserved extra sleep, I stay in the strange borderline state of sleeping and not sleeping.

10.45 — I get out of bed and am still not feeling good: cold, still tired, I now have a slight headache also and feel a bit of anxiety again. I make the bed and know it’s time to take conscious action towards improving how I feel, even if my body isn’t directly asking for anything. The poor thing is probably still shocked from the strange schedule today!

Very likely I’m dehydrated as I’ve only drunk one glass of water since waking up. So, I have another big glass of water now. I’m not feeling hungry but I must be as I’ve only eaten one chocolate chip cookie during the morning routine, nothing more. So, I eat a nice big sandwich. Most importantly, I must be decaffeinated. And I LOVE coffee. Easy to solve with our moka pot.

To be honest, despite not feeling very good, getting out of bed before 11 am for the second time today feels…. kind of cool! Seriously, it’s the time I’d usually wake up in the morning but today I’ve already done so much by this time!

11:20 — I start working on my daily task list which is… long! It feels so late to start but in all honesty, I never start working on my task list earlier than that. So, objectively, today I’m doing better than usual.

15:43 — I often write task lists which I don’t complete! This is related to the whole thing of not having self-accountability. Today, however, I finished more than half of the tasks that I had been dreading for a week. This is very good for me. I can’t say it was easy to do them but I acknowledged I don’t have an excuse to not do them (that thought hasn’t helped me before but for some reason worked today). I’m quite baffled about being productive for more than 4 hours without losing focus for long periods of time.

It did require self-discipline to keep going and I did have several distractions which I gave in to (checking phone, reading news, dealing with an instagram impersonator…) but in general I’m quite happy. The time I actually spent working was around 3 h 30 minutes.. Better than I usually would have done. It helped that my headache subsided after eating and drinking and I felt a bit more fresh.

It’s now almost 4 pm, I’m getting really tired and calculate my productive hours. I’ve been productive for 3h and 15 min (the morning routine) + 3h 30 min (afternoon working) = 6 h 45 min altogether. It is better than I thought. I’ve completed less tasks than I hoped to (but more than I usually would have) from my to-do list. I constantly underestimate the amount of time I need for various tasks. Probably the expectation of doing things faster than possible is something that has added an extra level of dread and procrastination in the first place.

A small part of me is proud of myself for managing to wake up at 5 AM today and having a relatively productive day so far. I mentioned earlier that I have let myself down on so-so many promises and accepted that this is the way it is. Maybe there still is some light at the end of the tunnel? In a weird way, this experience has started to heal my long-lost trust in my self-discipline.

I’m again starting to feel tired now. Plus I’m somewhat exhausted after using the full capacity of my “self-discipline” muscle to wake up and go through my to-do list. As a result, I feel like going outside… for a walk! I’m not sure whether it’s procrastination (because my to-do list is still looong!) or a well-deserved moment of recharging?

19:07 — The walk was nice and I also ran an errand (more productivity, yay!) while listening an audiobook in parallel. My battery is really empty, I feel like I have no energy for being productive left in me anymore. The unusual daily rhythm today has enabled me to get things done but has also drained me — and objectively I’ve been awake for 14 hours now!

However, I’m not anxious anymore, I am also not feeling the usual regret of wasting my time. I’m a bit less hopeless. I trust myself slightly more. I feel like I deserve to relax the rest of the evening guilt-free without my unfinished tasks bothering me.

21:27 Time to go to bed again. I’m still not certain whether I’ll be able to get up tomorrow… still the self doubt. Let’s find out tomorrow!

This day is just a dot outside the long line of the days I’ve spent in my comfort zone. But I deeply hope that instead of being an exception, this point marks the start of a new long line of personal growth.

Good night!

Would I do the 5 AM club again?

TL;DR: Yes.

Long version:

I consider this experiment quite successful. My success might be due to the exciting opportunity to try out a new thing but I did see many benefits compared to my usual days. What are my conclusions from the first day of this experience?

• The hardest part of my day was fighting with the anxiety and self-deprecating thoughts after waking up. These feelings subsided throughout the day and by the evening, I felt better than most days.
• It was hard for my body to stay awake and adjust to the unusual rhythm. This, however, is something I expect to get better over time.
• On my first day of 5 AM Club I was more productive than on days without 5 AM Club. I didn’t feel the usual regret of having wasted a day in the evening thanks to being productive throughout the day.
• Waking up at 5 AM is hard. However, I found it slightly easier to do tasks I usually dread after having started the day completely out of my comfort zone!
• Waking up at 5 AM gave me a feeling of self-trust and having achieved something.

To be honest, I’m interested to see if I can push myself to continue with the 5 AM club and if the benefits stay long term. Also, I’d like to find out if my body gets used to the new rhythm — is it possible to change a night owl into an early bird?

How about you, would you try the 5 AM Club?