The Five A.M. Club
The magic of waking up really fucking early.
Growing up, there was a lot of shame associated with standing in the self-help aisle of a bookstore. If you were caught there, rumors would spread around town about how sad, pathetic, and lonely you were. If you were really desperate to read a book that could change your life for the better, you’d either have to wear a disguise to the library or break-in at midnight and steal it.
I’m happy to report that a large portion of humanity has evolved since I was a child, because now it’s cool to be flawed and imperfect. The self-help aisle has been rebranded as the Self-Improvement aisle, the Self-Transformation aisle, or the Personal Growth aisle. People are doing the work. And if your TikTok algorithm is about Green Flags, you’ll know that going to therapy is the most loving thing a person can do for themself.
I’ve been going to therapy regularly since 2016. I arrived completely broken. I had been assaulted by my boss a few months earlier, and it caused me to sink into the deepest depression I’ve ever felt. And that’s really saying something because I grew up in Alaska, where we have the highest numbers of depression and suicide in the nation. Woohoo, we did it! I developed severe PTSD, and I could barely sleep. I numbed myself every day and night with wine or gin to get some reprieve from being alive. Eventually, I hit rock bottom. I knew I needed to get help after I location scouted the Pacific Coast Highway, looking for a cliff to drive off. I wanted to die, which was a new feeling for me.
The only thing that stopped me from driving into the ocean was my car. I couldn’t be caught dead in it. Literally. When I moved to LA, I was afraid I’d hate it and move right back to NYC, so I bought a cheap car that I could easily abandon on the side of the road or toss the keys to a teenager and tell them to keep it. There was no way I could die in a 2007 Dodge Caliber. I had more respect for myself than that.
After the assault, I left my job and lawyered up. I called the best lawyer who ever lawyered, Gloria Allred. And she took my case. This is going to sound strange, but I was really lucky because I was assaulted by a billionaire and not some junior copywriter who makes twenty-two dollars an hour.
The battle to stand up for myself was exhausting and long and scary. I called my lawyers one day and told them I needed help. I needed to see a therapist because I was a danger to myself. More so than usual. They sent me to a woman who has now been my therapist for the last seven years.
I think of my therapist as a bomb expert, she’s undoing the wiring in my brain, and plugging the red wires and the blue wires into the correct sockets. I also look at therapy as an ongoing renovation of your life. But, because I was a shell of a human, I needed more than just a renovation. I needed to tear down the entire structure and rebuild myself from the ground up.
It was so fucking hard, and it took forever, but it worked. And now I am perfect, the end. Just kidding, perfection is a form of self-sabotage. And I’m actively trying not to do that anymore.
Since I started going to therapy, I realized that being broken wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes you have to completely shatter so you can put yourself back together in a different way. Now, I’m on an endless quest to improve my life, and I’ll do anything to be a better, hotter, richer, gayer, and more joy-filled person. My end goal in life is to achieve total enlightenment and be the best, highest-vibe version of myself I can be, which means we have A LOT of work to do.
I’ve read all the books you’re supposed to read to improve your life; The Power of Habit; Laziness Does Not Exist; Change Your Thoughts, Change Your Life; Ask and It is Given; The Law of Attraction; The Four Agreements; The Mountain Is You; Get Out Of Your Own Way; The Power of Now; The Power of Habit, The Path to Love; No One Succeeds Alone; The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck; The Happiness Hack; The Happiness Project; Doing Nothing; Buy Yourself The Fucking Lilly’s; Big Magic; Untamed, Dare Greatly… you get the picture. But one book fucked up my life in the best way possible. The book is called The Miracle Morning by Hal Elrod.
Miracle Morning is about what happens when you start waking up at five o’clock every morning to start your day. I can literally see you rolling your eyes right now, but hear me out.
There’s one thing I complain about that I don’t have enough of. You probably think I’m going to say money, yes, but no, time. I want more time. There are only two dozen hours in a day; if you are normal, eight of those are spent sleeping, and that’s time you could be spending on something else. Like writing a manifesto or reading a book about waking up really fucking early.
If you need or enjoy sleeping, I get that. This book is not for you. I wish we didn’t have to sleep. I’d throw out my bed and turn my bedroom into a lesbian version of a man cave. And then I’d stay awake forever and never leave.
After I finished reading Miracle Morning, I tried it out. I started getting up at five a.m., excited to see what would happen. I’m an early bird anyway. I’m also a night owl. I do both.
The first three mornings were the hardest. It also didn’t help that my bed was extremely comfortable and cozy. I splurged on a new mattress a few years ago after my dog Perci tore apart my memory foam mattress while I was out getting a haircut. I got home, and my entire bedroom was covered in foam. It looked like one of those pits gymnasts use to practice dismounts. And Perci was having a fucking blast, that was probably the best day of his life. I’ll never forget how he smiled at me with a huge chunk of foam dangling from his mouth like a psychopath. I turned around, got in my car, put my hands on the steering wheel, and screamed at the top of my lungs. Then I went back inside and ordered a new bed.
My girlfriend at the time was not a fan of my early morning alarm, and I don’t blame her. It had to be loud and annoying so I’d hear it and get up. Unfortunately it jolted her awake, too. She’d ask me not to set my alarm for five a.m. on weekends, which is a very reasonable request. And I’d offer her a compromise: either I wake up at five, or you sleep at your own house. I’m sure the next person I date will also hate it. In fact, I’ll probably be single forever, unless I date a woman who works the opening shift at Starbucks. But my early mornings are sacred, I feel like I’m on crack. And I’d probably love being on crack.
Shortly after I started my early mornings, I found a routine. I’d jump out of bed feeling excited, like it was Indictment morning. I’d make my coffee, light some candles, write three pages in my journal, cast a spell on my enemies, meditate, do my Wordle, ride my Peloton thirteen miles, walk my dog, and I’d be eating lunch by nine-thirty. I was giving myself the gift of more time. I used to wake up at seven. Now, I get two bonus hours in my day.
One of the things I loved most about my early mornings was that it was still dark outside. I love the darkness. And the quiet. The only other people awake at that time were thieves, Uber drivers, and me. I’d sit in front of my living room window and watch men go by, casing cars, trying to unlock them. Or I’d see a pack of coyotes trotting down the middle of the street with blood and clumps of cat fur spilling from their mouths.
I’ve wasted so many years of my life sleeping, and now all I want to do is be awake. Because when I’m awake, I feel alive. And I want to be alive until the day I die. I’ve realized that time is my most valued possession. I have to get up. I’m excited to get up. I get two extra hours every day, and that is fucking everything to me. And I get that some people can’t wake up that early, especially mothers; they’re already up and will probably never sleep again. But there’s a whole community of people who, like me, discovered the magic and excitement of giving yourself the gift of extra time.