2 Simple But Effective ways to Champion Any Early Morning Routine

The Problem statement: But if I don’t wake up at 5 AM then my commitment to myself will break, correct? Most probably this is the case when you take some kind of challenge to wake up at certain time, let’s say at 5 AM, for next 30 days without fail, and now you are at a Saturday night party and it’s 2 AM in your watch 🙁 . You might use all of your will power to wake up at 5 AM the next day but trust me it’s going to be an interesting day for you to survive through it. And in case you have to attend lot of office meetings that day then God bless you 🙂  even coffee will give up 🙁

But in case you weren’t able to wake up at 5 AM even though your alarm clock rang at 5 AM, you subconsciously or someone else turned it off and you find yourself waking at 8 or 9 AM in the morning feeling dizzy and stunned what the hell just happened? You might start cursing yourself about how come you missed the 5 AM call? And then all the doubts, fear, depression creeps in, you might say to yourself looks like you aren’t meant for 5 AM wake up time or many other never-ending negative things. Plus, you will feel more dizzy, sleepy, unfocused with lot of Brain Fog . I have been there, done that and trust me it’s not worth at all. Like positivity, negativity also spreads into other areas of your life way quicker than you can think. You might have stuck in this loop of failing to wake up at 5 AM, and if you don’t use right techniques described below you might be there for rest of your life

Sleep gravity needs to be addressed else it can affect your life directly or indirectly. Sleeping while driving a car, hair fall, low energy levels etc., are some problems which are bound to happen if you compromise on your sleep for too long.

To solve this issue, we need to learn right techniques to overcome situations like this where we miss a target by a day or two or some similar situation like the one, we have on hand above. Goal should always be how to go back to regular morning routine.

Techniques

NAP:

 I will write an entire new topic on naps as it’s that intense and big, but for now assume nap is a very smaller fraction of sleep/rest that you normally take during a day, yes DAY, when you are feeling super tired or sleepy. The optimum duration of nap is somewhere between 13 to 20 minutes, and it has to be timer based else you will miss the boat entirely. You can take nap on a sofa, in a car and if lucky on a bed also, so no excuses there, goal is to either sit down or lie down for almost 20 minutes with eyes closed. The goal is not to get the sleep, if you get it good! but to have rest. As Sadhguru says, it’s not the sleep but more rest that a human body needs. If you want you can rinse your face with cold water after a nap, I do this once in a while but this is not mandatory but something to think over as at times you might feel you need bit more rest after a nap and that might force you to extend your nap, which is dangerous, so cold water comes to rescue during that time. After cold water on your face tiredness will go away entirely, this is practically proven formula 🙂

CAUTION: If you go above 20 minutes to get some more rest then you will feel more tired it’s as simple as that. But you can take multiple naps in a day, you will observe that after a nap you are good to function at your optimum level for next good 2 – 3 hours, so you can take another nap after that. I hope this is making sense 🙂 , try it to see the benefits, you won’t repent trust me.

Also, while driving if you feel sleepy then don’t take chances, take your car off the road asap, stop it completely, take a nap. Driving under the influence of sleep is very dangerous, you will never know when you might slip to sleep. So be careful when driving, remember naps!

PUSH YOUR ALARM CLOCK BY AN HOUR OR TWO FORWARD:

My thumb rule is if you get 4 – 5 hours of sleep during a tough day then you can survive that day without much trouble. That said let’s assume if I go to bed at 2 AM then before I sleep I will push my alarm to 6 AM instead of 5 AM. But when I wake up at 6 AM I follow the exact same routine which I would have followed if I get up at 5 AM. At times, there will be some time constraints so you might need to cut short few of the things from your Morning Routine/Ritual that day, goal is to keep your Morning Ritual consistent that’s why they say it’s not when but how you wake up is more important, I hope I am making sense.

Examples:

• if you do 10 pushups on a normal day when you wake at 5AM, do 2 push ups during a tough day.
• If you do 30 minutes’ walk on a normal day when you wake up at 5 AM, do 5 minutes’ walk on a tough day.

Above are just examples so adjust as per your needs. Slow down but never quit should be the motto.

In case during a day you feel super sleepy/tired after 3-4 hours of sleep then you can leverage a nap to bypass it.

The reason why we need to keep the Morning Ritual same so that our subconscious side of the brain remains happy, if it’s happy then you day will go happier and productive else Brain Fog will hunt you down.

Most of the days you should be able to get good sleep but there will be days (5-10% on a yearly basis) when you will be tested, so prepare for those days in advance, keep telling yourself they are coming supplemented by the statement “I am ready for those tough days” let them come I am waiting. That way you are anticipating the challenge, looking into the eyes of the challenge , and you know internally that you can easily overcome it no matter what. During those tough days above approaches help me to sail through the day.

Generally, out of 365 days in a year you will have almost 25 to 35 days which will test you to the max in terms of your morning routine, don’t let these 25-35 days disrupt your  remaining 90% (~300) days of the year. If they do then you will be at the receiving end always.

This has added new dimension to my life, and I am sure if you will follow the above techniques you will never miss your morning rituals, accordingly you will see you are achieving your every goal way faster than you could ever imagine.

One more thing I want to say that never ever make a mistake of hitting snooze button on your alarm clock, there is a saying:

“If you snooze, you lose” by Phyllis George

And this is so true and powerful statement. Snooze is like you are almost there, a step away from a finishing line, and someone holds you there forever, you won’t be able to go pass the finishing line. Google has millions of article on side effects of snooze in case you need more data. Do let me know I would be more than happy to write a detailed post on side effects of snooze in case google takes you to rabbit whole 🙂

As mentioned above, I case you want more sleep push your alarm by an hour or two the night before, this is covered in detail under technique #2 above.

Will appreciate a comment below in case you have some feedback or  question.

Good luck & stay strong!