It is stillness. It is effortless. It is a sense of order. I’m referring to the quiet hours of the morning when everything seems to slow down and almost cease to operate. It may be dark outside, or the sun may have risen but this is the time when most are sleeping but some are taking advantage of what it means to be a human. As Marcus Aurelius once said, “nature puts limits on things like sleep and if you’ve reached your quota it’s time to act as nature intended for you.”
What he means by this is that if you’re a human, you must not give in to the temptation of being comfortable and resting when you’ve had plenty already. It is your duty as a human to carry out your obligations and the practice of learning new things daily. Translated into modern-day terms, the early bird does in fact get the worm.
In a 24 hour day sometimes we make the mistake of not realizing that before your requirements of the day kick in, lay the most impactful hours of your day. We see this thread in everyone who struggles to succeed or execute things in their life. We call them lazy, or label them as not “morning people” but maybe they just don’t realize how important that time is. Maybe to them, at this point in their life, the comfort of the blankets and covers is more important than the growth and advancement of their life.
In 40 or 50 years from now maybe they’ll look back and say they were glad that they slept all of those extra hours and wasted those moments of life in the early morning. Or, maybe they won’t. Maybe at some point, they will realize that they’re not growing and because they are not putting themselves in a position to win the day, there are no worms. They can’t find the worms because they’re not even awake enough to see where they are.
We plaster phrases like “Carpe Diem” everywhere but the one who ceases to extrapolate the few precious hours before the chaos ensues does not seize anything but anxiety starting the day from behind. Every day there are parents whose day is dictated by the wake time of their children. How does this provide order and stillness? If you do not get ahead and take advantage of the hours of YOUR life then you live by someone else’s request.
If on the other hand, you realize that the morning stillness is your platform to create the life you want, then you will see how quickly opportunity presents itself. It doesn’t matter if you do not have a job or you work a 9-5 job, the early hours of the morning are yours to do as you wish. Wouldn’t you want to look back on your life and say you got all the worms you could?
This doesn’t mean that you have to wake up at 2am and just mindlessly grind yourself into a stump. It means that you seize those moments learning, growing, reading, thinking, sharing or maybe just being. When was the last time you felt the stillness of just being without interruption? Why is it that it’s more common to become frustrated by interruptions than it is to say I’m so happy I got to sit this morning for several minutes or hours with just my thoughts and silence? Let us not forget this.