Discovering Fatherhood
Reflections on everyday daddy stuff
The One Thing All Successful People Do
One of the most difficult things about being a father is managing time. I don’t know about you but it seems almost impossible to do certain things during the day. Exercise, reading, writing, etc. almost always take the back burner because there isn’t enough time to get to it.
I love reading books from all walks of life. One of my favorite genre of books is business. I love seeing what people are doing to better master best practices. There is a lot of great advice out there, that if focused on really helps.
One of the things that I have noticed in my reading is that the most successful people in all industries, and public/social sectors wake up early. Early can be a relative term, so to clarify I’m talking 4:30am early. (insert WTF face gesture here) I usually glance at that fact in my reading and ignore it, or say something witty to myself, or frankly consider the writer to be a crazy bastard. However, I can’t deny the fact that all of the most successful people I know and read about are waking up between 4am and 5am.
Now here is the kicker. The folks I read about are not waking up at 4am to go to work. They are waking up this early to begin their daily routines that help them thrive. Most of these people don’t get to work till 7am or 8am.
So what are they doing?
Well, for one thing these crazy bastards…I mean, highly successful people are exercising. Their average amount of exercise is between 20-50 minutes of high intensity training in the morning. This is something that hands down I see in all of the books I read. I recently started waking up at 5am to exercise and it has been magical. Yes I said magical. I literally roll out of bed complaining every-single-time. As I get dressed to go to my basement and work out I am telling myself over and over, “I can do anything for 20 minutes.” 20 minutes is currently how long my HIT workout takes (high intensity training).
Once I enter into the exercise it is great. It doesn’t mean I want to do it, but I push through. By the time I am done I am pumped. I get a shower, get breakfast, pray and get the kids ready. All before 7am. GAME ON!!! #AdultingLikeAPro
I am exercising like this three times a week (only on weekdays). I am definitely noticing the difference. I still hate waking up, but I can do anything for 20 minutes. I love sleep, it literally is my favorite thing ever. Well I love to eat too. If I could eat and sleep I would be in heaven. Ooo, maybe heaven is where sleeping and eating happens at the same time—cant wait!
Anyways, I know it is rough to even consider waking up a little earlier, but I am finding that getting exercise in before work is absolutely amazing, and the best time of day to do it. Once the kids get up and the responsibilities of life take over all bets are off. If you wait to exercise after work, there is a good chance you wont do it because you are so drained from the previous 8-10 hours. So this fathers humble opinion is to join the thousands of crazy bastards…I mean, highly successful people out there and exercise in the morning. Its making a difference in this busy dads life.
Just remember: you can do anything for 20 minutes!
Discovering Fatherhood 