I didn’t want to get started today. The body and the mind where in cohorts… ‘don’t get up. No need to get started. Chill out more!!’

I was hearing this first thing this morning.

But, I always do get started. It takes effort though.

There are days, like today, where the alternative to the morning routine that I have set up is so appealing.

It’s a freezing cold morning in Beijing, and having left the heating on high overnight, it is toasty right where I was. Bed.

I never use an alarm clock. I never have, and for some reason I have always been able to wake up around the time that I want to wake up.

Like clockwork. But…

On the very odd occasion… my internal body clock seems to need a jolt. It either runs fast or in the very extremely odd occasion it runs slow and I sleep in.

I don’t remember the last time I ever slept in.

Waking up early is more my bag…. the time of 4:42am and stirring awake seems to be a favourite of mine. No idea why, but it always seems to be the same time.

Does this happen to you? Do you awake at the same time through the night?

4:42am… an awkward time, it is the time that is too early to get up, but also too early to go back to sleep….

So you end up being awake, but asleep, and your mind has an internal battle about what to do next.

It’s at this point where people go back into a sleep cycle, awake late, and then have a groggy day.

So what is it that I do to avoid the grog?

I do what I did this morning. This…

My 3 things I do when I am not in the mood to get up:

1. I call bullshit on my inner voice. I call out that pest. I tell it to shut the f*** up and then put it back in its box and replace it with the words ‘Now Go’… this springs me from bed.
2. I hear the words ‘Now Go’ and I get up and I immediately drink a cold bottle of water from the fridge. I feel the cold water trickle down through my dehydrated body – sleep dehydrates you and so you should always do this when you wake up. (Cold water on days to kick start your body – like today)
3. I then run on the spot for approx 5 minutes… five minutes if I can hit the goal. The goal: I set the timer, I run and I count 5 minutes in my head. When I think it is 5 minutes, I stop running and then stop the timer.. the game is to get bang-on the 5mins on the timer.

I stopped the timer at 5.03 this morning. That was my best time ever.

Result.

This morning, after the forced awakening routine, the clock winked back at me.

It was 5.18 in the morning and I was ready to start my day.

Bonus, I had an extra 23 minutes to spend on my daily, morning routine.

The outcome from all of this is that I was back in control of my day and my mood had shifted to a much more positive state.

I then reflected on this in my morning gratitude practice.

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