“Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.” My mother used that saying more times than I can remember. As a teenager, I thought she used it to justify her propensity to go to bed at 9:00PM. As a college student, I didn’t think about that advice as most nights ended the next day. Even when I entered the workforce, I never thought much of waking up early other than it was required to arrive on-time between 6:30AM and 7:00AM. This past year, however, that saying has new significance.
Early Morning Exercise: A Shock to My Routine
There were many things that changed when I moved in with my fiancé over two year ago. The most immediate was exercising at 5:15AM as opposed to 4:45-5:15PM. It was both a literal shock to my body and a figurative one to my psyche. I had my doubts about its effectiveness, but I agreed to stick to the routine for at least 90 days. That 90 days ended 760 days ago. It did take significant adjustment, but as with all new endeavors, I adjusted and began to reap the benefits of that motherly advice.
P.S. My mother originally got that advice from Benjamin Franklin, which given Becoming Polymathic is incredibly ironic.
Biological and Behavioral Benefits of Being an Early Riser
Obviously, at this point we must discuss these aforementioned benefits. We will analyze two broad categories – biological and behavioral.
Circadian Rhythm: Your Internal Clock
The biological benefits of waking up early revolve around two critical items – circadian rhythm and cortisol. You have likely heard both terms. At a high level, circadian rhythm is your body’s internal clock. First and foremost, it dictates when you should be asleep and awake. In prehistoric times before mechanical clocks, humans used the sun to determine these milestones. Nowadays, with the advent of screens, we’ve become largely disconnected from this natural timer.
Cortisol: The Preparation Hormone
The mechanism by which your circadian rhythm sets the body’s internal clock is the release of hormones, each tied to a specific state. One of these hormones is cortisol, colloquially known as the “stress hormone”, the focal point when discussing the benefits of waking up early. Cortisol prepares your body to cope with stress throughout the day, ergo it’s better to reframe it as the “preparation hormone”.
By either definition, its levels tend to peak 30-60 minutes after waking. When we couple the timing of peak cortisol levels to a circadian rhythm driven by sunlight, we begin to understand the benefits of aligning them. How closely they will is ultimately down to personal preference, which is where we’ll begin our discussion about behavioral benefits.
Rise Early: Be Above Average
Take a minute to think what a person’s average day looks like: wake up at 7:00AM, go to work around 8:00AM, leave work around 5:00PM, then go to bed around 11:00PM. If you noticed the 6-hour gap between those last two milestones, then you’re already thinking properly.
What does the average person doing with that 6-hour gap? The two most likely answers are commuting and decompressing with his or her screens. There is also a good percentage who will also mention exercise. To reiterate, this is the average person’s day, so it should come as no surprise most businesses cater to this schedule. That is well and good, but what if you desire to be more than average?
I’m going to assume by reading this piece because you fall into the “be more” category. With that precedent, let’s reconfigure that routine with the biological knowledge we now possess. If we wake up closer to dawn, 5:00-5:30AM, then not only are we better aligned with our circadian rhythm, but we also gain two hours in the morning uninterrupted by the normal flow of societal stressors. That time could be used to build a strong wellness routine, pursue meaningful passion projects, or even receive a necessary rush of serotonin from watching the sun rise. Regardless of how you spend it, it is your time to become more.
Chronotypes: Genetic Predispositions or Convenient Excuses?
There will be some who counter this evidence with a scientifically proven classification system called chronotypes: your body’s genetic predisposition towards sleep and wake cycles. 55% of people are categorized as the “Bear” chronotype, which prefers to rise at 7:00AM and slumber at 11:00PM. What a coincidence, eh? Early risers, which includes individuals such as Benjamin Franklin, Tim Cook, Immanuel Kant, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Tony Morrison, are categorized as the “Lions”, which prefer to rise at 5:00AM and slumber at 9:00PM. The other two chronotypes are the “Wolf”, which rises at 9:00AM and slumbers at midnight, and the “Dolphin, which rises at 6:00AM and slumbers at 11:00PM, but wakes up frequently during the night.
Although chronotypes are scientifically significant, they are irrelevant when it comes to maximizing individual potential. With all the known biological and behavioral benefits to waking up early, are you really going to let a mascot dictate your journey to being more? Try explaining that to somebody who you respect. It won’t go well. If nothing else, experimenting with waking up early will allow you to experience and thus empathize with the spectacular individuals we idolize at Becoming Polymathic.
Your morning is valuable. Respect its intent. It is your time to work on pursuits with meaning uninterrupted by the world’s nonsense. All it requires is a miniscule amount of discipline and a decent clock.
Be More.
Become Polymathic.
Quote of the Week: “Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.” – Benjamin Franklin