It is believed that waking up early is a universal and mandatory habit of all extremely successful people. Reporting research for the Wall Street Journal (18+) found that a number of global businessmen consider the period around 4:00 am to be the “golden hour” of high productivity.
Reasons for effectiveness
Successful people value morning time not so much for its length, but for its quality. They gain a strategic advantage by using the time before the world wakes up:
This is a period of absolute silence. With no work calls, no urgent requests from colleagues or management, and no typical family distractions, you can achieve near-perfect concentration.
A person’s consciousness is not overloaded with the need to respond to other people’s priorities. This allows you to fully devote yourself to your own, most important task.
Early risers use this precious “personal productivity hour” exclusively for activities that require maximum mental or physical output: this could be strategic planning, exercise, reading, meditation or spiritual practices.
In fact, successful people turn morning silence into a powerful tool that allows them to stay ahead of the competition and lay the foundation for success before the overall work day begins.
Alternative opinion: why not everyone can wake up so early
Despite all the advantages, psychologist Michael Breus believes that not everyone can successfully copy the regime of billionaires. This is due to the chronotype – the body's genetic predisposition to sleep and activity, which is classified into four categories: Lion, Bear, Wolf, Dolphin.
Only about 15-20% of the population, according to psychologists, belong to the “Leo” type – innate “larks” whose peak productivity occurs in the early morning. Most people are “Bears” with productivity in the middle of the day, or “Wolves” whose body clocks simply don't allow them to fully function at 4am.
The opinion that the specialist wants to convey is: you don’t need to mechanically set the alarm clock for four o’clock, you need to find and stick to your own chronotype.
Breus advises that to understand whether waking up early is right for you, you must first ensure that you get sufficient and high-quality sleep, going to bed in accordance with your body's needs. Otherwise, forced early rise will not lead to success, but to chronic lack of sleep.
