I know you would be like what the hell is she saying? Everyone says waking up by 5 am is important, we have heard that to be successful you need to wake up early and start your day.
Early to bed, early to rise, makes a person healthy, wealthy, and wise.
benjamin franklin
This quote says it all, so am I saying I don’t want you to be healthy, wealthy and wise?
So here is the thing
First of all, I am not against anyone waking up by 5 am or 4 am and even 3 am. But I feel it is not compulsory and there is no magical power attached with waking up by 5 am or early.
All over the internet, there are videos, articles and books talking about waking up early like it feels magical and all of a sudden you become productive and happier. So if you don’t wake by this time you are wasting your day.
I am a morning person, I love getting up early to start my day. But do I wake up by 5 am HELL NO, and I am still productive. I take my time to enjoy my morning routine and finish the work I have for the day.
5 Successful People That Are Not Waking Up By 5 am
ELON MUSK
Elon Musk founder and CEO of Tesla and of Neuralink wakes up at 7 a.m address what he calls “critical emails” for half an hour.
He drinks coffee, but most mornings he’s too busy for breakfast. Next, he says goodbye to his five sons and sends them off to school.
Then Musk has a shower and drives to work. His mornings there are usually spent in engineering and design discussions, he says. According to CNBC.
MARK ZUCKERBERG
Mark Zuckerberg founder and CEO of Facebook usually wakes around 8 a.m.
The very first thing he does in the morning, even before he gets out of bed to use the bathroom or put in his contact lenses, checks his phone. According to Business Insider.
JONAS PERETTI
Jonas Peretti CEO of Buzzfeed and co-founder of The Huffington Post sleeps in until about 8:30 am and then reads the paper as he heads to work. According to The Atlantic.
PHARRELL WILLIAMS
Pharrell Williams a Grammy-winning musician, a textile manufacturer (he’s a partner in Bionic Yarn) etc starts his days at the very reasonable hour of 9 a.m.
“The first thing I do is thank the master,” he says. Then, he hops in the shower, “and that’s where a lot of my concepts come from. I write songs in there sometimes.” According to Business Insider.
AARON LEVIE
Aaron Levie CEO of the cloud file-syncing and file-sharing company Box wakes up at 10 a.m. and, he begins his day from the comfort of his bed.
“I know this is not a best practice, “but I read emails. I’m in bed for 30 minutes swiping, replying, and deleting. I try to make sure I have no unread messages by the time I get into the office.” According to Business Insider.
The list still goes on, you can see that there are successful people that wake up later than 5 am.
Everyone is not an early morning riser and you should not force yourself to wake up at 3 am, 4 am or 5 am.
3 Reason Why You Shouldn’t Wake Up By 5 am
1. THE BIG QUESTION WHY?
Why are you waking up by 5 am? what do you want to achieve?
So let’s say you have hearing everybody talking about waking up early if you want to be successful. Have you asked your self what those people want to accomplish in their day?
Do you know their goals, dreams or what they are working on currently? Sit down and ask your self what will I achieve waking up early as 5. Do you want to be up by 5 am and spent an hour scrolling through social media or just doing nothing?
“It is not enough to be busy… The question is: what are we busy about?”
Henry David Thoreau
You have to have a good reason for waking up early. This is even an important factor if you want to wake up early without feeling tired. If you have a good reason you won’t even find it hard getting up that early because you are excited for the morning to come so you can start crushing your goals.
FOR EXAMPLE
You have a 9–5 job, it takes you an hour to go through your morning routine ( waking up, meditation, exercising, getting ready etc.) whatever you do every morning, then 30 -45 minutes to get to work. So we have roughly 2hours to get to work.
This means you can comfortably wake up by 7 am and still meet up work and you would have had that extra sleep.
Waking up that early does not make you more productive instead try managing your time and you will increase your productivity.
2. WHAT IS YOUR SLEEP CHRONOTYPE?
Dr.Michael Breus The Sleep Doctor talks more on this. According to him, your chronotype is a classification of when your genetic propensity is to sleep. It’s determined by the PER3 gene.
If you have a long PER3 gene, you’re an early riser, and you need at least 7 hours of sleep to feel good. When you have a shorter PER3 gene, you’re a late riser and can get by on less sleep.
So if your social schedule is conflicting with your chronotype’s sleep schedule, then the times when you feel alert or sleepy are going to be more often and intense. As an example, if you are a naturally a night owl (what I call a Wolf) you will NOT be a morning person.
Dr Breus,” claims there are four types of sleepers: dolphins, lions, bears and wolves. Each type is categorized based on their sleeping pattern natural for them.
- Dolphins are light sleepers and tend to wake up at the slightest noise.
- Lions naturally wake up early. In prehistoric times, these people would take the morning shift of guarding the group.
- Bears have an energy cycle that rises and falls with the sun. They’re most productive in daylight.
- Wolves naturally stay up later and sleep later. They’re just starting to drift off when Lions are waking up.
“When you work with [your chronotype], you can sleep better at night, feel more energized during the day.”
Dr Michael Breus
For more resource on this topic check these posts.
3. EVERYONE IS NOT YOU
You have to know what works for you and what makes you happy. Take your time and study your body and when you are most productive and get your tasks done then.
Remember that you can be up by 5 am and not be productive whereas you wake up at 8 am a be super productive.
Don't let society or what is trending dictate what your body needs.
THANKS FOR READING XOXO
