It’s Day #2 of the Get Up Early Challenge! This morning, when my alarm went off at 5 AM, I did not want to get up. My bed was warm. The house was cold. And I came up with a dozen other excuses as to why I should go back to bed.
But then I reminded myself that the first week of any habit-building is always the hardest. If I give up on Day 2, I’ll not only set up today for failure, I’ll also miss the benefits that are waiting for me in the coming weeks.
So, I got up. Reluctantly. And not with the greatest attitude. But I got up.
And that’s half the battle. Sometimes, you have to just do the next right thing — and your attitude will change as a result of your actions.
It certainly did today! Because it’s 5:45 am now and after spending time reading, praying, journaling, and thinking, I feel so much better. And I’m ready to face today!
I’ll be hopping on Periscope at 7:30 a.m. to share some Morning Motivation encouragement and to some thoughts and insights from The 5AM Miracle book. I’d love for you to join me or watch the replay (just download the app and search for @MoneySavingMom).
Are you joining me for the Get Up Early Challenge? If so, leave a comment on this post to let me know how you did with your wake-up goal this morning.
We’re in this together… And if you didn’t hit your goal, that’s okay! Give yourself grace, don’t beat yourself up, and know that you can try again tomorrow!
P.S. Read more about the Get Up Early Challenge here. Need some help and inspiration to use your mornings well? Download Day 1 of Make Over Your Mornings for free (scroll to the bottom of this page to sign up for it!)
Day 2 was a success for me, but mainly because of work 🙂 It felt good knowing I had a routine though. Sooo much easier to get out of bed!
Up at 5:07 — hit that 7 minute snooze again. I think I’m going to have to try getting up earlier to create a block of writing time. It seems like all I’m doing right now is being more leisurely about my usual morning routine.
I did it! Now I need to work on going to bed early enough to get 8 hours of sleep before my alarm goes off at 6. Living on 6 hours of sleep isn’t smart for me, but I can’t seem to shut things down by 10! 🙂
Woke up at 6 am as planned! It was only 20 degrees out, but I donned all my warm gear and headed out for my walk as normal. My reward? Getting to see a beautiful sun rise! That really made my day!
I was up at 5:57 when three phones (the house phone, my cell, and my husband’s cell) started ringing like crazy. We also received two text messages and an email. Apparently the school district really wanted us to know that school was canceled due to the snow (I am grateful that they notify us, though).
At any rate, I went back to bed. I have been having the hardest time going to bed and then falling asleep at night, so I am really looking forward to Red & Honey’s Go To Bed Challenge! I start saying “I should go to bed” at 9:30 every night, and then midnight rolls around and I’m still puttering around the house.
I did it–5:30! Despite being completely exhausted, and hoping that a miracle snow fell last night (meaning school would be closed) and realizing it hadn’t, I pulled myself out of bed. So thankful that I gave myself the gift of extra time this morning before everyone else was up.
I was actually awake at 4 a.m. (when my husband leaves for work) but stayed in bed (cold house) and told myself that I would read my Kindle until 5 a.m. Sigh. Big mistake. I fell asleep and didn’t wake up again until almost 7. But I’m inspired by everyone else’s success and will try again tomorrow.
5:30 – as planned. It’s true that I have to fight the cold and the darkness but the first thing I do is make some delicious hot tea. I journaled, went over my day and read. It helps to jump directly into these activities rather than start getting ready first. Because -at least it’s true for me- one thing leads into another : shower into laundry into picking up stuff and suddenly a whole hour has gone by! I still find that I loose maybe 15 minutes during this morning me time – just waking up, staring into space ?I love reading in the morning quiet! Good luck tomorrow everyone!
I set my alarm for 5:15 but ended up sleeping until 5:45. I did get up and exercise, though, so I will consider it a win. Tomorrow, I hope to get up when my alarm goes off, which means that I will need to go to bed early. Very difficult for a night owl like me but I will do it.
My alarm went off at 4:40am and I debated about getting up or not. I had stayed up later than I should last night, 10:00 and regretted it. I got up and was so glad I did once I got going. I got my workout in and into the shower on schedule. It’s all good today 🙂
FAIL! The baby (9 months) was up a lot last night. I was so tired when my alarm went off, turning it off felt reflexive. Maybe tomorrow will be the day :/
Still pushing for my 4:30 wake up time! I managed to get up at 5am; 30 minutes earlier than yesterday. Had time for a shower, devotion/prayer, and a quick good morning FaceTime call to my mom before getting kids up. I probably could’ve pulled off 4:30 this morning if I hadn’t been awakened at 2am by what sounded like a gunshot in my house, only to fine out a mouse got snapped in a trap. Kinda hard to get back to sleep after a scare like that LoL. Oh well, I’ll try again tomorrow!
I love this challenge and it definitely inspired me to get up earlier (I did already get up at 5:30AM as I have to leave the house with my 2 kids by 6:30AM to get to daycare and work), but now I am trying for 4:45AM so that I have some quiet time to reflect/pray/plan for the day prior to the morning bustle! I do have a question though, how do you handle unexpected interruptions to your “morning routine” i.e. – our 15 month old woke up at 5:00AM to nurse and wouldn’t go back to bed. I typically do not wake her and our 2 year old son up until 6:00AM to get the dressed and fed, but about once or twice a week she has other plans. On top of this, I am 11 weeks pregnant with our 3rd child and am dealing with morning sickness and exhaustion. I work full time outside of the home, so in the evenings once the kids go to bed I have a lot to get accomplished, so I can’t realistically go to bed earlier than 9:30PM, but I don’t think I could get up earlier than 4:45AM and not be a zombie. Would you just chalk this up to a time in my life when this is just my reality, or do you think there is something I could do differently? Thanks so much, I love your blog but this is my first time commenting!
I was up today at 5:40, which is 20 minutes before I wake up my kids. So, I was able to get ready and start a load of laundry before I got them up. It made the before school routine much easier, and the little ones and I were out the door by 6:40. That meant that I was at my school by 7, where I was able to work for half an hour in peace. I actually got an entire blog post written! Yippee!
I’ve been getting up 15 minutes earlier than the previous day until I get to 5AM so that it doesn’t feel like such a shock. So today I got up at 5:45AM and tomorrow I’ll get up at 5:30AM and so on. I felt cold this morning so immediately jumped into a hot shower. Feels great to be up before everyone and get in my meditation and devotional time in peace.
I tried SO HARD to get up at 5am this morning. I felt so great yesterday (after the initial push to actually get myself physically out of bed), and felt like I had such a productive day. BUT, after staying up to watch the Championship game (Roll Tide!) and knowing there was going to be 4 inches of snow and negative wind chill…I laid there, completely awake, until 5:30. I did have a kid and husband free 40 minutes to get some things done, so it wasn’t a complete waste!
Beautiful watching the snow come down at 7 this morning. Would have missed the quiet and serenity of the moment had I stayed in bed. I really was hoping the boys (13 and 10) would sleep a little later so I could enjoy the quiet but…..
I actually managed to get up a half an hour earlier than my planned time. I surprised myself!
Now to get an organized morning routine in place. I managed to come downstairs and get my morning tea, check emails, and put a reminder in Google Calendar for today’s Periscope.
I’m working on getting up early because my days go so much better when I’m up before my kids. Cold, winter mornings make it hard though!
The first week of any new habit is always the hardest, like you say. Well done on getting up!
I made it to the gym this morning. My aim is to go three mornings a week while my toddler is at daycare and I can put baby in the gym creche.
I’m got up at 5:30. I haven’t been super productive, but I am up! 3/4 of my children have been up since 6:15 though. I’m nursing the baby and getting my plan together for the day!
I am joining your challenge but will have to delay the early wake-up. I have a sick little one and nights are rough, so I need the extra time for sleep in the morning. Once we’re through this I’ll be ready to jump in! ?
I’m up. I’m trying for 6, because that’s a time I’ve been able to establish as an alarm-free wake up time in the past. It will be MUCH easier in June!