Yes, you read that headline right. I do get up and start my day at 5am.
And I love it.
It all began like this…. (cue harp music, screen goes blurry to show a flashback…)
I was experiencing anxiety in the form of panic attacks. I sought help from a GP and a hypnotherapist.
“Start meditating,” said my GP.
“Start meditating,” said my hypnotherapist.
“Did you start meditating?” asked my GP, on a follow up visit.
No, I did not.
My sister told me to read a book called Happy This Year, by Will Bowen. Good read. I ignored the bit about meditation.
Question: How many experts told me to mediate before I bloody meditated?
Answer: Three. The GP, the hypnotherapist and Will Bowen, aforementioned author and world authority on complaining.
So I started to meditate using Headspace.
I have three cherubs and a busy freelancing career as a website copywriter. So finding time to meditate was difficult. I chose 8pm, after the kids were in bed.
But they were not in bed. Oh yeah, they were in their bedroom. Kickboxing, bellowing, perfecting creepy American accents they’d learned off YouTube. Not the right environment for my attainment of peaceful enlightenment.
So, I’d wait till they nodded off.
By that time, I was almost ready for snooze town myself. Meditating at night was a struggle. You know the end of the story, you saw the headline, right?
Hello 5am
I like self help books, so I looked for something on the joys of getting up early. And, I found Hal Elrod’s Miracle Morning. Hal describes the ideal morning routine, where you complete the SAVERS:
- Silence (meditation)
- Affirmations
- Visualisation
- Exercise
- Reading
- Scribing
I like acronyms. And I was sort of doing the miracle morning already because I get up for 6:15 exercise classes (mostly).
Hal makes big promises. Amazing transformations and success in all areas of life: health, wealth, family etc. Who doesn’t want all that?
So here I am, getting up every day at 5am (6am on weekends) to complete the Miracle Morning routine.
My 5am routine
- Use fitbit for silent alarm so as to not wake husband
- Stumble to bathroom, stare blankly in mirror
- Brush teeth, spray face with invigorating essential oils
- Take daily medication for blood pressure (one goal is to get off these pills)
- Cuddle, then cruelly banish the cat
- Review my day from yesterday, write down steps taken on fitbit (goal = 10k per day)
- DO NOT, DO NOT, DO NOT look at mail, facebook, tumblr or instagram. If I do, the whole hour will be gone faster than Pauly Shore’s career
- Meditate using the app Headspace
- Repeat my daily affirmations, about how awesome I am and so forth
- Visualise my abundant awesomeness, as above
- Write down my journal for the day. I start with three good things that happened yesterday. Then I write freely about anything on my mind
- Plan my day using Google calendar, because calendar based living is the bomb
- Exercise. I am currently alternating between a 20 minute jog one day and 20 minutes of yoga the next day.
The only part of the Miracle Morning I don’t do is the R for Reading, but I do that at night.
The results
I have eliminated panic attacks completely: hurrah! My goals are in sharp focus and I feel new clarity on what I want to achieve this year.
The affirmations and visualisations part feel a bit weird. But I don’t worry about it and affirm and visualise as best I can.
I just generally feel better and calmer too.
So, I plan to get up this early for the rest of the year and see where that takes me. World domination would be nice. But I will settle for being Melbourne’s favourite redheaded copywriter. And a fun person to be around.
What do you think? Could you get up early, or are you a night owl? Do you hate me just a little for being such a morning person? Let me know in the comments.
14 Comments. Leave new
I love your approach to this and it’s great to hear how it is helping you!! Do you do this every day or have some rest days too?
Thanks Jeni, I sometimes skip a day, but I try really hard to stick with meditation at the very least. If I don’t meditate for a few days the anxiety starts bubbling up again.
Beautifully writte. Also look into avid morning routine as well. It’s a podcast on Hal s website. The d in avid stands for debriefing. You debrief or scribe at the end of the day about your day intentions and how you acted on them that day.
I like reading and then ending my night by Scribing or debriefing.
I will check it out, thanks!
Awesome, you know Kate, I used to read a lot of self help books to boost confidence, get motivated to do that I want etc.. and some f them I read was
a. You can win by Shiv Khera
b. 2 of robin sharmas books
c. Stories of the companions of prophet Mohammed
And a couple more as I’m not getting the names and I knew the power of mornings and have tried this in the past.
As I knew the power of mornings, I just typed morning in search on YouTube and found a guy explain that book in 5 min in Hindi.
I sidti myself that I need to read it as Hal went through a major accident and he overcame it, since a guy who overcame his situation and made his weakness his greatest strength, I had to read it.
I read it and SAVERS was just superb. Like you A and V is quiet weird but still I record A’s on my iPhone voice memo and listen to it everyday. A is generally my achievements. S is the best, my phone isn’t connected to the internet and it really helps to forget everything in the world. For E, I follow SWORKIT which is superb so I do stretching if I can’t actually run. R is studying for me, I read self help book every night before sleeping.
Why I’m writing this is because I’m just amazed at the way I am feeling, my wife’s proud, the optimistic outlook is noted by all.
I don’t have anything specifically achieved as it’s only been 20 days but I hope to share what I’ve achieved.
Finally thanks for your post. I hope we all have achieved a lot in our next post.
Thanks, glad MM is working for you too! It’s great that you have customised it to your life. This is just the beginning!
Sorry, forgot to add.
You can search for “Self Journal”, it’s from best self co
That’s my ritual at night
That should be of help. Let me know if you don’t find it
Will do!
I enjoyed reading this. I’m not a morning person generally, and certainly don’t like to get up at any time beginning with 5. That being said,I do enjoy getting stuff done in the morning before the kids are up, and getting sorted for the day.
Yeah I used to be the same, struggled to get out of bed by 7am – I’ve surprised myself!
Great article, love the positive vibe, it’s motivating me to try harder, thank you!
Glad you like it!
I know Kate. It’s the Nike thing… JUST DO IT! So far 6am yoga is as early as I’m managing, but perhaps I could sneak in a little meditation at 5.50am?????
Sure you could Denise! Give it a try for ten days.