The 5AM Club

Free journal and worksheets to help you use the 5 am club method to increase your creativity, energy, focus, happiness, and productivity

The 5 am club gets you to wake up at 5 am or an hour before your family and use that distraction-free time to focus on three things: exercise (20 minutes), meditation and journaling (20 minutes), and learning or reading (20 minutes). During this time, you fuel your mind, body, and soul. The author claims that the solitude and enhanced brain state that you’ll experience at 5:00 a.m. will increase your performance and help you reach new heights. People who have adopted the method described in the 5 AM club increased their creativity, energy, focus, happiness, and productivity.

What is the 5am club?

The 5AM club book by Robin Sharma shows what a great impact your morning routine can have on your life. The idea is to use the first hour of your day to drive personal growth and start your day right. This will ultimately help you get the most out of life.

How do you get started? Buy an alarm clock (don’t use your phone if possible) and set it for 5 AM. When it goes off, jump out of bed immediately before you start thinking of reasons to go back to sleep. Follow the 5am club routine described below. You can also use our free custom morning routine maker to customize a morning routine for your specific needs.

The benefits of waking up at 5AM

The isolation that comes from getting up at 5AM has many benefits.

People have limited mental capacity or cognitive bandwidth. During the day, we reach our limits and therefore become less focused. The idea is to start your day at 5 AM and to focus on one high-value activity without your brain getting distracted.

At 5 AM you are more likely to trigger transient hypofrontality. At 5 AM the brain’s prefrontal cortex, which handles rational thought, temporarily shuts down. Therefore, you tend to analyze, stress, and worry about things less than you do later on in the day. At 5 AM, the peace and quiet stimulate the production of the neurotransmitters dopamine and serotonin. The causes you to enter a state of “flow”. You feel energized, focused, and in the zone. You will be less likely to worry and over-analyze.

Therefore, when you get up at 5 AM you will be more focused and productive during the entire day.

How does your 5 am morning routine help you succeed?

Self-discipline and perseverance are more important for success than talent. Therefore, instead of thinking you don’t have what it takes, capitalize on the gifts and talents you have to make a difference. Most people are not prepared to get up at 5AM to help their personal development. Therefore, if you do what 95% of the population is not prepared to do, then you already have an advantage.

In order to be successful, you need to focus on what is important. Gaining a distraction-free hour at 5 AM is one of the most effective things you can do.

Small things done daily are more powerful than big things done once in a while. This is called day-stacking. If you improve one ability or skill by just one percent every day, it amounts to a 365 percent improvement over a one-year period!

Own your morning, elevate your life. Robin Sharma

Balance your mind, health, heart, and soul

The 5am club book explains that we each have four “interior empires.” They are our Mindset, Healthset, Heartset, and Soulset.

• Your “mindset” is driven by your thoughts. Think positive and optimistic thoughts and you will improve your life.
• Your “heartset” is your emotional life and well-being. You cannot perform at your best if your emotional life is a mess. When you don’t express your emotions then they will come forth later in uglier ways. When you focus on a healthy heartset, you will feel much better and you will be able to better communicate with others.
• Your “healthset” is your physical health. According to the author, one of the key ways to get ahead in life is longevity and when you commit to optimal fitness, you get more productive years. Exercise helps you gain energy, reduce stress, and increases your happiness.
• Your “soulset” is your spirituality. Take some time in the quiet moments of the early morning to remember who you truly are. Bond with yourself and mediate to reconnect with yourself.

When you give each of the four interior empires attention, you can master yourself in your chosen field. In order to live a balanced and successful life, you need to focus on your mind, health, heart and soul. The 5 am routine helps you to focus on each of these things.

The 5AM club 20 20 20 formula

The book describes the perfect morning routine to make the hour between 5 and 6 your own and become a true member of the 5 AM club. The first hour of your day is divided into three blocks of time. Each block is 20 minutes long.

According to the 20/20/20 rule, you use 20 minutes to move, 20 minutes to reflect, and 20 minutes to grow. The 20-20-20 formula for productive mornings can transform your creativity, performance, utility, wealth, and productivity.

First 20 Minutes

Move for 20 minutes – perform vigorous exercise for 20 minutes. It is important that you sweat. Sweat gets rid of cortisol (the hormone of fear and stress) and generates the protein BDNF (which repairs brain cells and accelerates the formation of new neural connections). Therefore, by sweating for 20 minutes, you will think faster!

Next 20 Minutes

Spend 20 minutes on reflection with a period of deep peace and solitude. Reflect on what is most important to you. You will be amazed how 20 minutes of self-reflection enables you to step back and reflect on what truly matters. You will suddenly gain perspective and inspire visions and a deeper understanding of things than you would have had. Write these thoughts in a journal. Write about your ambitions, the things you’re grateful for in your life, your achievements, and your disappointments. This will help you gain clarity, better understand your vision, and let go of toxic negative thoughts and energies. Spend this time on meditation, which helps you stay calm and reduce your stress.

Last 20 Minutes

The last 20 minutes are spent on growing. Use this time to learn. Read biographies to study the lives of great achievers, learn about different topics that interest you, watch documentaries or listen to audiobooks. Use this time for self-development and learning.

If you wake up at 5 am, the 20 20 20 5 am schedule is as follows:

• 5:00-5:20 – exercise
• 5:20-5:40 – reflection (meditation, journaling)
• 5:40-6:00 – reading and/or learning

The importance of sleep

According to the book, research has shown that sleep is one of the key factors in predicting life expectancy. How you spend the hour before you go to sleep is almost as important to peak performance as how you spend your first hour in the morning.

The blue light emitted by your devices reduces levels of melatonin (the chemical that induces sleep). Therefore, turn off all devices by 8 PM at the latest. Otherwise, they will prevent you from sleeping properly. Go to bed no later than 10 PM in order to get enough sleep before 5 AM. Balance is important. It is important to not only work but to embrace rest, relaxation, and fun. This will actually improve your performance.

5am club worksheets

Why don’t you try the 5 am challenge for 30 days? Try the five am club morning routine for 30 days and see how you feel. If the 5am club morning routine described above does not resonate with you, then adapt it to your specific needs. You might prefer to work out for 10 minutes, read for 50 minutes, and meditate for 10 minutes. Do whatever works for you.

The following free 5 am club worksheets will help you follow the routine.

Read the 5am club summary above or better yet, buy the book and read it!