The Article is written by Bhavna Singh, Fairfield School of Law, Kapashera affiliated to Indraprastha University, Delhi.

Every day when we sleep again while pushing the snooze button, at the same time world-class leaders/businessmen and entrepreneurs are working to improve their health and skills. 

The list includes billionaire Naveen Jain, famous actor Dwayne Johnson and Akshay Kumar, Richard Branson (founder of Virgin Group), Jack Dorsey (Twitter’s CEO), Tim Cook (Ex CEO of Google), Barack Obama (Ex-president of USA). 

Famous author Robin Sharma in his book ‘5 AM Club’, writes about the good habit of waking up early in the morning. According to him top performers wake up early in the morning and sharpen up their skills. We all should have this habit if we want to succeed in life, but what to do after waking up. The book suggests us to follow the 20/20/20 formula.

What is the 20/20/20 formula?

The formula has been made to improve our overall productivity. It says that we need to divide our first hour in 3 part of 20 minutes each. 

The first part of 20 minutes 

During this period we should do some exercises most probably high-intensity exercises which result in the release of sweat in our body. Exercises help us to reduce stress. It improves our focus and thinking power. It is scientifically proved that when we exercise, our brain produces a protein named BDNF (Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor). It helps us to reduce our stress level. BDNF accelerates neuro connection processes in our mind. These connections help us to concentrate and improve our thinking power. That means till 5:20 AM we will get done with a new neuro connection-making process when our competitors were sleeping.

The second part of 20 minutes

During the second 20 minutes, we should reflect our life. We should analyze our goals and actions while being in isolation. We need to think if we are taking suitable actions to reach our goals or are we just becoming a part of the rat race. In his book, Robin suggests us to make a note of our goals and daily tasks to analysis how many steps closer we are to our goals. We should analyze if our day is long enough to complete our daily tasks. It will help us to make good decisions. We can choose important tasks which can help us to reach our goals. These 20 minutes shall give us a chart of our progress, a good idea of steps to be taken in the future. It will make us realize where we exist and how we can make ourselves better.

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The third part of 20 minutes

During this time period, we have to grow by enhancing our knowledge in our field of interest. We can increase our knowledge by reading books, biographies of world class-leaders or brilliant personalities. If we don’t have enough time to do so, we can even read book summaries. We can listen to audiobooks, etc.

If we follow this 20/20/20 formula daily for a year then after a year we will be done with 122 hours exercise, 122 hours life analysis and consumption of top quality knowledge for 122 hours. Most of the billionaires have been following this formula for many years.

Famous Indian personality Naveen Jain belongs to a middle-class family. He worked hard and became a billionaire. He is an IITian. Even after becoming a billionaire he spends most of his time to charity and always work to improve the lives of the poor.

He said that “he wakes up early in the morning and take care of his mind. After that, he works out and takes care of his body. Then he meditates which takes care of his soul. He says that business is like a war. You have to be completely prepared and unless you haven’t have mind body and soul, You can’t fight that battle.”

What is Twin Cycle of Elite Personality?

Since childhood, we have been taught to work hard for long hours to reach our goals. But Robin told in his books that a group of elite personality has a balanced ratio between their work and rest. We not only grow when we are working, however, but our progress is also going on when we are in rest mode.

In farming, a farmer works hard during a season. Then a workless phase comes when the farmer has nothing to do. People think that nothing is going on however that’s the most important part of farming. During that phase, the soil is on its rest mode and it is restoring its nutrients which are going to decide future production and quality of crops.

We feel guilt when we are in rest mode and we ignore it. However, the author says that rest is as important as work. It improves our productivity. It is impossible if we decide to work for 6 days a week and to have food on the seventh day. We need to have food regularly to work continuously. Food and rest restore our energy and inspire us to work again with double energy and enthusiasm.

Why Sleep is important?

We need to understand the value of sleep. Research proves that sleep is an important factor which tells us how long we are going to live. Our sleep-Wake Cycle is regulated by Melatonin hormone. All electronic devices emit a blue light which negatively affects Melatonin level. It causes a reduction in the quality of our sleep. We should switch off our electronic devices an hour before going to sleep. During that hour we can talk to our family members, read books or we can take a hot bath. It helps us to have a good sleep.

What is Four interior Empire?

Our fulfilment or true happiness is based upon four-factors. The author has named these four factors as ‘four interior empires’. These are:

• Mindset
• Heart set
• Health set 
• Soul set

Mind Set

We need a strong mindset to make good decisions. Strong mindset helps us to deal with the struggle. It gives us the power of visualization. The strong mindset has a commitment to succeed. It gives us the ability to adapt and fix the negatives. Strong mindset helps us to be a good performer. That’s the reason top performers work on their mindset.

Heart set

These days every motivational speaker gives strategies to improve our mindset. A good mindset can provide us with only 25 % good results, what about the remaining 75 % result? Heart set deals with our heart. The heart is concerned with our emotions, relations with our family and friends. What, If we don’t have good relations with our loved ones? We must have a brilliant heart set to run a business effectively. A good heart set helps us to make good decisions.

Health set

Everything is useless if we don’t have good health or if our life has medicines more than anything else. If we want to leave a large legacy behind us, we need to live for long years and for that we need good health. Bad health improves the chances of our dependency on others. A dependent person can’t run a business effectively. Once a billionaire sarcastically said that “you can’t make good business if you are dead”. Elite personalities know this secret. They always work to improve their health however, an average person thinks that exercise is a waste of time. 

Soul set

It is the last and important factor. We are so busy with our lives that we always run for materialistic things. Every day, with a peaceful mind we should ask ourselves who we are? Some people meditate to do this, some call it a prayer. We can increase our spiritual power by connecting ourselves to our maker.

What is Habit Installation Protocol? 

According to Author, it takes 66 days (approximately 9 weeks)  to install a habit into our mind. We need to go through 3 stages of 22 days each to install a habit inside our mind. These three stages are:

Stage one: Destruction phase

Stage two: Installation phase

Stage three: Integration phase

Destruction Phase

This stage is the toughest stage when we lose our old habits and try to install new habits. We need will power to cross this stage. We need regular motivation and determination.

Installation phase

This stage is the most frustrating stage. When we ask ourselves, why we are doing it? Is it giving any good results to us or it is just wastage of time. We want to quit but we should not quit. We have to keep it continue.

Integration phase

It is the last and easiest stage when waking up early in the morning would be easy for us however, it wouldn’t be a habit. After completing 66 days of the habit installation process, we will feel happy. Everything will look easy to do. We won’t need any willpower or struggle to wake up early in the morning. We wouldn’t be needing any alarm to wake up early in the morning and this habit will become a part of our life.

Conclusion

Good Health, peaceful mind, emotions, soul, etc. are really important for a person to get success in life. A person who wants to succeed never forgets to keep a balance between all these. But most of the time we ignore it and become a part of the rat race. We must analyze our existence regularly and must always keep ourselves away from the rat race. If you are able to follow all these habits then congratulations you are a part of The 5 AM Club.