Creating Habits | How to wake up at 5 AM for 60 weeks straight

This image was from December 2016. In that day I set a personal record: 60 weeks straight going to the gym.

I never thought too much about it or how I developed some kind of self-discipline to keep going to the gym for so long. It’s been 8 years now and I’ve settled into a nice routine that has been truly benefiting me across different areas of my life.

Meanwhile, people constantly ask me about how can I wake up at 5 AM at least five times per week and go to the gym. I don’t have any magic tricks on how you can stop being lazy or how can you find the motivation to wake up early. What I can say is my health, mind, career, and relationships are being benefited from this morning routine.

Waking up at 5 AM has really changed my life.

Here are some thoughts on how I did it.

Stop waiting for motivation.

Your brain has sophisticated mechanisms and tools to save energy and keep you on the couch. In fact, there are good evidences that even walking on two legs, or bipedalism, evolved because it used less energy than quadrupedal knucklewalking. There are probably more than 1 million years of human evolution behind this behavior. Actually, your laziness is backed by science. But why this is important? Because you need to realize “who” are you dealing with.

In the last years I never (NEVER!) feel like doing pushups at 5 AM. And probably you’ll never feel like exercising in a cold morning too. Believe me: it’s never going to happen! When you accept that your default condition is to be lazy… you`ll stop complaining about your lack of motivation. You`ll finally stop waiting for divine inspiration to do things you know that must be done.

To do things you don`t like it`s not crazy. The ability to set a schedule and following it based on actions you can execute is what differentiates amateurs from professionals.

"Becoming a pro doesn’t mean you’re a workaholic. It means that you’re good at making time for what matters to you — especially when you don’t feel like it — instead of playing the role of the victim and letting life happen to you." (James Clear)

• Stop waiting for motivation and start doing things you don’t like.

Use triggers in your favor.

I woke up at 5 AM for years. But every single day it’s hard. There is nothing “automatic” about it. I don’t know why people think that twenty-one magic days will turn on the “habit-creator” on your brain (probably this belief started here).

Create a new habit requires time. Time to work in 3 steps that every habit is made of:

I suggest that you start working on triggers. For example, every night around 8 PM just after dinner I also package up my lunch for work so it’s ready to grab on my way out. I can’t explain exactly why, but “dinner-time” for me act as a reminder, a trigger that reminds me that it`s time to plan the next day.

This trigger cascade other “things-to-be-done”: check my alarm clock, put clean clothes and a dry towel in my backpack, prepare my pre-workout snack or drink, hang and layout the clothing I need for the gym. And so on. Luckily I never skip dinner (NEVER!), making this trigger almost fail-proof being activated every single night. For me, wake up at 5 AM and go to the gym is a habit that gets triggered every night at dinner time.

• Figure out a trigger to remind you to plan your next day.

Plan your day before it starts.

As I said, my morning routine starts at least 8 hours before I actually wake up. This “ritual” help me to plan my day and force me to answer all small routine decisions in advance. This may seem obvious “Ok … I need to plan my day… blah blah blah”. But it’s a very powerful mindset if you want to develop habits.

Planning for a productive tomorrow has really helped me take ownership and spike commitment to what I want to achieve

For example, I live last than 1 mile from the gym and typically I go by bicycle. But if it`s raining in the morning? If it’s freezing out there? I`ll need to wake up early? I’ll need some warm clothes?

You can answer all these questions in less than one minute when you have time to do so. But if you make yourself all these questions in a cold Monday at 5 AM it`s more likely that the only thing you going to do is find excuses to stay in bed. And believe me, we all are experts in finding excuses.

Avoid making any decisions early in the morning. You can’t trust your judgment at 5 AM. Your brain is going to sabotage and he will find perfect excuses to convince you to stay in bed. What you want is to run on autopilot when it comes to smaller decisions in the morning.

• Plan your day and make all small routine decisions in advance.

Accomplish your first task of the day early in the morning.

In a simple google search, you can find a hundred benefits of early morning exercise. But for me, the most important one is the amazing feeling of finish your first task of the day early in the morning. This feeling of accomplishment can motivate you to finish all your daily tasks.

Recently, I listened to a speech from a U.S Navy Almirante. It was a kind of motivational speech. In a certain moment he said:

If you make your bed every morning you have accomplished the first task of the day. It will give you a small sense of pride and will encourage you to do another task” https://youtu.be/KgzLzbd-zT4

Every day I finish my workout I feel proud of myself. Then my “Reward System” is triggered by this new achievement. Immediately my brain authorizes a new release of dopamine. Then I feel encouraged to go for the next task of the day. And I can guarantee you that feels good!

“This is why the cultivation of small wins can propel you to bigger success, and you should focus on setting just a few small achievable goals. The more times you succeed at something, the longer your brain stores the information that allowed you to do so well in the first place.” (Monica Mehta, author of the book The Entrepreneurial Instinct: How Everyone Has the Innate Ability to Start a Successful Business)

• Boost your day accomplishing your first task of the day early in the morning.

Stop setting goals. Focus on the process.

Almost all my life I was focused on setting and pursuing of long-term goals. In fact, there is nothing wrong with long-term goals, because goals helped me to keep focused even when things went wrong. But what I’ve found is that goals are good to provide direction, and processes are better for making progress.

First time I decide to exercise in the morning, I immediately set an objective: go to the gym 5 times per week for the next 6 months. And of course: I have failed miserably! I failed because I had a goal, but no clue on how to achieve that goal. Frustrated I change my goal: go to the gym 4 times per week in the next 3 months. I failed again! I’ve slipped into this trap so many times I’ve lost count.

I`ve found that one big problem with this mindset of setting long-term goals, is that I was conditioning my reward-system to be triggered only if I achieve my goals. Until that, I felt miserable. I was stressed and anxious because I was putting all my happiness conditioned by a future goal. A future goal that I can't predict.

Today I don`t have any long-term fitness goals. A mindset shift changed my attention away from goals to focus on real progress. I'm more focus on actions I really can control rather than other external world variables that I can`t control.

Today I know that every day I get out of bed at 5 AM I`m getting better. Every day I finish my workout I`m making small improvements.

I’m committed with the (recurrent) process that allows me to stick to a scheduled.

And this process is made from daily small achievable tasks.

It`s as simple as that. It’s not rocket science.

Short Review:

• Stop waiting for motivation. Learn to do things you don’t like.
• Use triggers in your favor. Figure out triggers to remind you to plan your next day.
• Plan your day before it starts. Make all small routine decisions in advance.
• Accomplish your first task of the day early in the morning. Boost your day feeling proud of yourself early in the morning.
• Stop setting goals. Focus on the process. Setup a process that allows you to stick to a schedule.