Hour-by-Hour Morning Breakdowns of the World’s Greatest Individuals
How the richest people spend the beginnings of their day
Mornings are often romanticized or emphasized in recent articles, podcasts, and books — for good reasons, too. Mornings are when most of us first open our eyes to another day. Both our minds and our bodies have reset, and we have a clean slate of opportunities, potential interactions, and things to do.
“Write it on your heart that every day is the best day in the year.” (Ralph Waldo Emerson)
Countless articles across the internet write about the routines and morning practices of the rich and famous, but few talk about the order in which they do it in.The first few hours of our day are important — and they play a huge role in how successful you can and will be.
From the recent interviews and talks I mentioned a moment ago, we now know what we didn’t before: the day-by-day schedule of some of earth’s “mightiest heroes.”
4:00 a.m.
Yes. I just had to put 4:00 am into the first time slot. Funny, this is actually when Tim Ferris, the author of The 4-Hour Work Week, Tools of Titans, and Tribe of Mentors have been known to finally go to bed after enjoying his peak time of writing. He prefers to wake up later in the morning, more towards 8:00 a.m. or even 10:00 a.m. I digress.
“You’re not going to find happiness. You have to make it. So get out there and make some happiness.” (Jocko Willink)
On the other hand, Jocko Willink, former Navy SEAL and co-author of Extreme Ownership, one of my all-time favorite books, wakes up EXTREMELY early as evidenced by his own social media posts. Every morning, just about, he posts a picture on Instagram of his watch with a time on it that is always pretty close to 4:30 a.m. Why?
Despite not being in the Marine Corps or a SEAL anymore, he still says semper fi to the habit of waking up early — he stays faithful to something that works for him. He wakes up, goes to work out, and starts his day. All of this is done several hours before the sun comes up.
5:00 a.m.
Sticking with Jocko, he lays out his workout attire the evening before. In the morning, he puts it on and works out in his home for an hour — doing a variety of different intense exercises, all depending on the day.
Anna Wintour, the editor-in-chief of Vogue can usually be found playing a tennis match before the sun even rises and the clock strikes 6:00 a.m. Fast Company described this routine as much more energetic than the rest that they had found.
6:00 a.m.
Gary Vaynerchuk, although not an extremist early riser like Jocko, wakes up at 6:00 a.m. basically EVERY SINGLE DAY. And, because he’s such a creative person, he knows the value of taking in lots of information. And while he’s not much of a podcast listener or book reader as many of us are, he knows how to find and take in (quickly) the most valuable information regarding the various industries that he’s a part of.
“Life shrinks and expands on the proportion of your willingness to take risks and try new things.” (Gary Vaynerchuk)
After consuming information and checking out his social media, he moves on to working out for around 45 minutes, he told Business Insider.
7:00 a.m.
Tony Robbins, as he’s gotten older, has certainly had to change the way he fills his mornings. The different articles written about his routines discuss how he’s taken a turn to really focus on his health and well-being in order to maximize the great amount of life he still has in him. Around 7:00 a.m., he wakes up and drinks a health drink of his own creation that he infamously refers to as his “adrenal support cocktail.”
Elon Musk is another successful individual, often referred to as the “real-life Tony Stark,” that doesn’t wake up too surprisingly early. However, after rising around 7:00 a.m. from roughly six hours of sleep, he skips breakfast and immediately gets to work. Some days he’ll work out, but for the most part, he is flying through his days working furiously at Tesla and SpaceX.
“You can’t control how you feel. But you can always choose how you act.” (Mel Robbin)
7:00 a.m. is also when speaker, CNN contributor, and author, Mel Robbins, goes through the ritual she has deemed as her “thirty before seven-thirty. This ritual is intentionally carved out time, usually thirty minutes, that she utilizes to advance her goals. Before she checks email, before she checks voicemail or even made a serious task list or schedule for the day, she ensures she has time to stick to what she wants and needs to do to advance herself and what’s at the heart of her business.
After waking up and eating breakfast, Tony Robbins will do a very short but remarkably intense workout with what’s been referred to as his own “personal torture machine.” His trainer has designed a workout regimen that focuses on intensity rather than length.
Once Tony Robbins has completed his workout, he moves on to what many would consider the most famous facet of his morning routine — the sauna and cold plunge, designed to wake him up and give him a daily reminder not to hesitate, even with the sudden changes in temperature that life may bring.
8:00 a.m.
I love that Gary Vaynerchuk, despite being the guru and successful business owner that he is, still makes sure to spend time with his kids every morning, albeit only for a few minutes every day. He knows it adds up and that it’s just as important an investment as any investment decision he’ll make during meetings that day.
Oprah Winfrey, admittedly, is a queen when it comes to her mornings. Her routine has helped her go far in life and change lives over the course of her career. Every morning, Oprah brushes her teeth, takes her dogs out, and makes her favorite coffee.
“Be thankful for what you have; you’ll end up having more.” (Oprah Winfrey)
Nothing too fancy there, but it’s ordered in a specific way to show her, well, priorities. Fully wake up and prepare yourself for the day, take care of what’s around you, then energize yourself for what’s to come. In her article for HarpersBazaar, she tells about her bedroom and the “Promised Land” that she’s made it with all of the “growing things” in her garden.
Read More: 5 Ways To Incorporate Productive Laziness Into Your Life
Bill Gates, one of the richest men in the world, like many successful people, reads. However, unlike Gary V, he does recommend reading longer forms of material — like the five books he recommends on his website from 2018, all of which you can look at here. Two of the books include A Gentleman in Moscow and Presidents of War. (I checked, it would only cost you $102.16 + tax to purchase them all hardcover from Amazon.)
“Don’t compare yourself with anyone in this world…if you do so, you are insulting yourself.” (Bill Gates)
Every morning, after getting around seven hours of sleep, he reads books, reads several of the top magazines that pertain to his fields of work, and works out. 8:00 a.m. is also when Mark Zuckerberg, founder, and CEO of Facebook, wakes up and starts his day by checking his various Facebook-related apps for notifications and messages.
(It would make sense that the founder and CEO of FaceBook would start his day off using his own products, right?)
On the ride to his first meetings of the day, which usually begin before 9:00 a.m., Gary Vaynerchuk calls one of his family members. They’re on a bit of a rotation, but every day, he calls his mom, or dad, or sister and makes sure to make time to talk to them and catch up. Around this time you’ll find Oprah doing her own rather spiritual version of a meditation practice she treasures.
“It is in your moments of decision that your destiny is shaped.” (Tony Robbins)
This is also when Mark Zuckerberg tends to work out, usually consisting of running with his dog purely for the laughs, he says.
9:00 a.m.
Around this time, you can find Oprah doing her one-hour workout, and Jeff Bezos spending time with his kids. Business Insider reported that he prefers never to have morning meetings, as he uses this time to stay at home with his family.
10:00 a.m.
Around this time you can find Tim Ferris finally arising from his slumber and going off to eat a breakfast that tends to run high on protein.
The founder of Tumblr, David Karp, prefers to wait until 10:00 a.m. to finally open his email and deal with what he needs to for the day. He keeps a notebook nearby to write down action steps based on what he reads in his email inbox from his staff.
“What we fear doing most is usually what we most need to do.” (Timothy Ferriss)
I could go into the 10:45 and beyond time slots until noon, but Chick-Fil-A stops selling breakfast at 10:30 a.m. so I’m going to stop here. This is when Tim Ferris begins to start writing or recording an interview for his next podcast episode of the Tim Ferris Show.
What should you do with this information?
The question now remains, what are you going to do with your day? Writing for Business Insider, Gary Vaynerchuk wrote the following — “The day started the moment I opened my eyes.” I love that philosophy, and it ties in well with the idea from Mel Robbins of the 5-Second Rule and how it can help you bounce out of bed and face the day. Through brave and courageous 5-second decisions, she writes in her book, The 5 Second Rule, you will one day have a life that you don’t dread waking up to.
And it all begins with morning routines.
What I’ve always loved about the morning routines of our world’s finest in business, government, and the creative arts is that their morning routines span a spectrum that goes left and right in an infinite direction, because they are all different in what they choose to do every day. They are all different, period.
Keep Reading: To learn more about morning routines and rocking the beginning of your days, check out my article 7 Things You Need To Do To Have Consistently Incredible Mornings
And so are we.
We are all different, but we all have one thing in common — our days start with our mornings. Well, there’s one more thing — we all are in control of our mornings, too. You can decide, and hopefully, this breakdown of the some of the most successful individuals in our world’s morning routines have inspired you in some way to have a more successful morning routine yourself.
Stay tuned for more articles featuring the morning, evening, and daily habits of leaders of the past and of the present. Also, if you’re interested, click the link below to read my new Kindle eBook, Benjamin Hardy’s Wisdom In 5,000 Words or Less.
