The 5 AM Club - Robin Sharma
- skylawayrynen
- Oct 9, 2018
- 16 min read
This book was absolutely fantastic. One of my favourite books. I enjoyed how it was written, and all the tips and tricks it offers. Strongly suggest you read these points, and even the whole book if you can.
Chapter 2: A Daily Philosophy on Becoming Legendary
Life’s too short to play small with your talents
One that can make you an empire-builder along with a world-changer. And perhaps even a history-maker.
Ideas are worth nothing unless backed by application. The smallest of implementations is always worth more than the grandest of intentions.
regular reinvention
dedication as deep asm the sea to leaving harbours of safety, daily.
World-class begins when your comfort zone ends is a rule the successful, the influential and the happiest always remember.
Becoming legendary is never easy.
The place where your greatest discomfort lies is also the spot where your largest opportunity lives.
Chapter 3: An Unexpected Encounter with a Surprising Stranger
Warren Buffett, the brilliant investor, said the rich invest in time. The poor invest in money.
Chapter 4: Letting Go of Mediocrity and All That’s Ordinary
I only surround myself with human beings who fuel my joy, stoke my peace and excite me to become a better man. Life’s way too valuable to hang with people who don’t get you.
Who have different values and lower standards than you do. Who have different Mindsets, Heartsets, Healthsets, and Soulsets.
Uplifting humankind is a master sport of business that The Top 5% play.
“Own your morning. Elevate your life.”
Pain is the doorway into deep. Tragedy is nature’s great purifier. It burns away the fakeness, fear and arrogance that is of the ego.
‘One who sweats more in training bleeds less in war.’
‘High victory is made in those early morning hours when no one’s watching and while everyone else is sleeping.’
What’s the point of spending your best mornings and potentially productive days climbing mountains that you realize were the wrong ones when you are frail and wrinkled? Very sad.
‘If everything seems under control, you’re not going fast enough.’
Pressure is a privilege. - Billie Jean King
Failures just growth in wolf’s clothing.
The part of you that clings to fear must experience a sort of crucifixion so that the portion of you that deserves high honour undergoes a kind of reincarnation.
I’m not anti-social. I’m just anti-moron.
The first fifty years of our lives are a lot about seeking legitimacy.
If we have the courage to look within, we discover that we do this because we have a series of holes within us. We falsely believe that material from the outside will fill whats empty within ourselves. Yet it never will. Never will. Anyhoo, when many of us reach the half-time point in our lives, we make a right-angle turn. We begin to realize that we’re not going to live forever and that our days are numbered. And so, we connect with our mortality. Big point here. We realize we are going to die. What’s truly important comes into much sharper focus. We become more contemplative. We start to wonder if we’ve been true to our talents, loyal to our values and successful on the terms that feel right to us.
That’s when many of us make a giant shift: from seeking legitimacy in society to constructing a meaningful legacy.
The last fifty years then become less about me and more about we. Less about selfishness and more about service. We stop adding more things into our lives and begin to subtract - and simplify.
They evaluate their achievement by what they’ve collected versus by the character they’ve cultivated.
They measure their self-worth by their net worth.
I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work the more I live.
Chapter 5: A Bizarre Adventure into Morning Mastery
Oceanside compound.
“Victims love entertainment. Victors adore education.”
You’ll learn to rise early, regularly - so you’ll get more done by noon than most people get done in a week. Sufi poet Rumi wrote, “You have to keep breaking your heart until it opens.”
“Some people never go crazy. What truly horrible lives they must lead.” - Charles Bukowski
Nearly every morning, I envision my ideal performance for the day ahead. I also reach deep into my emotions so I feel what it will feel like when I achieve the wins I’ve planned to accomplish. I lock myself into an extremely confident state where any form of failure isn’t within the realm of possibility. Then I go out to do my finest to live out that perfect day.
Chapter 6: A Flight to Peak Productivity, Virtuosity and Undefeatability
“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become.” -Steve Jobs
Maybe instinct really is much smarter than reason."
Voluntary discomfort, whether by dressing as I did or by fasting once a week or by sleeping on the floor once a month, keeps me strong, disciplined and focused on the central few priorities my life’s built around. Anywhoo, have a tremendous flight, and I’ll see you in paradise soon. Big hug.
RULE #1: An addiction to distraction is the end of your creative production. Empire makers and history-creators take one hour for themselves before dawn, in the serenity that lies beyond the clutches of complexity, to prepare themselves for a world-class day.
RULE #2: Excuses breed no genius. Just because you haven’t installed the early-rising habit before doesn’t mean you can’t do it now. Release your rationalizations and remember that small daily improvements, when done consistently over time lead to stunning results.
RULE #3: All change is hard at first, messy in the middle and gorgeous at the end. Everything you now find easy you first found difficult. With consistent practice, getting up with the sun will become your new normal. And automatic.
RULE #4: To have the results The Top 5% of producers have, you must start doing what 95% of people are unwilling to do. As you start to live like this, the majority will call you crazy. Remember that being labeled a freak is the price of greatness.
RULE #5: When you feel like surrendering, continue. Triumph loves the relentless.
Chapter 7: Preparation for a Transformation Begins in Paradise
The life of the caterpillar must end for the glory of the butterfly to shine.
A bad day for the ego is a great day for the soul.
They viscerally understood that being inspirational and masterful and fearless are all inside jobs.
Primary aims of a wonderfully crafter life is contribution. Impact. Usefulness. Helpfulness.
“To lead is to serve.”
‘Give up the drop, become the ocean.’ - Rumi
You just can’t get to iconic alone.
To rise to world-class, you need world-class support.
Health is the crown on the well person’s head that only the ill person can see, you know?
You never want to be the richest person in the graveyard.
Elite production without quiet vacation causes lasting-depletion. Rest and recovery isn’t a luxury for anyone committed to mastery - it’s a necessity.
Inspiration gets fed by isolation.
Chapter 8: The 5am Method: The Morning Routine of World-Builders
The 20/20/20 Formula
Chapter 9: A Framework for the Expression of Greatness
THE 3 STEP SUCCESS FORMULA
1. Learning / growing / Better awareness
2. Implementation / Execution / Better Choices
3. Income / Impact / Better Results
Become a performer and person of depth
Geniuses understand that it’s smarter to create one masterwork than one thousand ordinary pieces.
Obsessive/ picky behaviour = simply the price of admission for world-class.
It could cost them a win. Or even worse - it could result in the loss of a life. *Formula One Racing
Gamble everything for love, if you are a true human being. If not, leave this gathering. Half-heartedness doesn’t reach into majesty.
The very quality that makes you special in one area is the same that makes you a misfit in another.
They were misunderstood and seen as ‘difficult’ and ‘different’, ‘rigid’ and ‘unbalanced’.
Philip of Macedonia in a message to Sparta: “You are advised to submit without further delay, for if I bring my army into your land, I will destroy your farms, slay your people and raze your city.”
Sparta’s reply: “If.”
GCA: Gargantuan Competitive Advantage
Mastery is a rarity, and people who play at a brilliant level are a scarcity.
There’s a ton of competition at ordinary, but there’s almost none at extraordinary.
Consistency really is the DNA of mastery.
Fully remember that you are most alive when you heart beats quickest. And we are more aware when our fears scream loudest.
“Today is a glorious day and I’ll live it at excellence, with boundless enthusiasm and limitless integrity, true to my visions and with a heart full of love.”
Calibration
Chapter 10: The 4 Focuses of History-Makers
Life is very, very fragile
THE 4 FOCUSES OF HISTORY-MAKERS
1. Capitalization IQ
The amount of natural talent they are born into but the extent of that potential they actualize- and capitalize.
“Their exceptional dedication, commitment and drive to maximize whatever strengths they had that made them iconic.”
The Victory Hour
World-class is a process, not an event
“I am grateful. And I am forgiving. I am giving. My life is beautiful, creative, productive, prosperous and magical.”
Picasso announced, “My mother said to me, if you are a soldier, you will become a general. If you are a monk, you will become the pope. Instead, I was a painter. And became Picasso.”
I was tired of pretending that I was someone else just to get along with people, just for the sake of having friendships.
There’s a staggering difference between being busy and being productive.
2. Freedom From Distraction
“I’m so happy I discovered how to become a magnet for miracles.”
Have fewer friends but go deep with them so the relationship is rich. Accept fewer invitations.
Stop managing your time and start managing your focus.
Continuing when you’re frightened is how you become a legend.
Early in the morning “There is no one to disturb you and it is cool or cold and you come to your work and warm as you write.”
The great ones all spent a lot of time alone.
Solitude- the kind that you access before the sun comes up - is a force multiplier around your power, expertise and connection to being human. And your escalation requires your isolation.
The solution is exactly what I’m suggesting: work on one high-value activity at a time instead of relentlessly multitasking - and do so in a quiet environment.
“Only one who devotes himself to a cause with his whole strength and soul can be a true master. For this reason, mastery demands all of a person.” - Albert Einstein
The hours that The 95% waste The Top 5% treasure.
‘The Flow State’
THE SECRET OF MORNING GENIUS: Transient Hypofrontality (page 130)
3. Personal Mastery Practice
Victories occur before warriors walk into the field.
If you don’t feel deserving of abundance, you’ll never do what’s required to realize it.
THE 4 INTERIOR EMPIRES
E1: Mindset (psychology)
E2: Heartset (Emotionality)
E3: Soulset (Spirituality)
E4: Healthset (Physicality)
Part-time commitment truly does deliver part time results
Do not die. You’ll never become a titan of your industry and an icon who makes history if you’re dead.
Everyday is just dramatically better with some exercise in it
Awake human beings work on elevating their Soulset in the serene hours before daybreak, in the sanctuary of solitude, silence and stillness.
4. Day Stacking
Small daily, seemingly insignificant improvements, when done consistently over time, yield staggering results.
Regularity is a necessity if you’re amped to make history.
Chapter 11: Navigating the Tides of Life
If you are fortunate enough to fall in love even two or three times within a lifetime, make each of these stories count fully.
Chapter 12: The 5am Club Discovers The Habit Installation Protocol
“I hated every minute of training. But I said, ‘Don’t quit. Suffer now and live the rest of your life as a champion.’” - Muhammad Ali
The hero does not become great during periods of comfort. The illustrious and noble souls of our world become strong, brave and moral whilst standing resolutely in the storms of adversity, difficulty and doubt. It is in the moment that you face your deepest strengths. Real power, then, comes not from a life of ease but one of intense effort, devoted discipline and demanding action in the direction of what your supreme self knows to be right. To continue at a time when you ache to stop. To advance when you long to quit. To persist in the instant when you feel like giving up is to claim your membership among the great warriors and honourable characters who led humanity to a better place through their earned invincibility.
The 5 Scientific Truths Behind Excellent Habits
TRUTH #1: World-class willpower isn't an inborn strength, but a skill developed through relentless practice. Getting up at dawn is perfect self-control training.
TRUTH #2: Personal discipline is a muscle. The more you stretch it, the stronger it grows. Therefore, the samurais of self-regulation actively create conditions of hardship to build their natural power.
TRUTH #3: Like other muscles, willpower weakens when tired. Recovery is, therefore, absolutely necessary for the expression of mastery. And to manage discipline fatigue.
TRUTH #4: Installing any great habit successfully follows a distinct four-part pattern for automation of the routine. Follow it explicitly for lasting results.
TRUTH #5: Increasing self-control in one area of you life elevates self-control in all areas of your life. This is why joining The 5am Club is the game changing habit that will lift everything else that you do.
The 3 Values of Heroic Habit-Makers
The 1 General Theory of Self-Discipline Spartans
To regularly do that which is hard but important when it feels most uncomfortable is how warriors are born.
The latin root of the word ‘passion’ means to ‘suffer’.
“Voluntary discomfort”
The single best way to build your willpower is to voluntarily put yourself into conditions of discomfort.
“Strengthening Scenarios”
My self-discipline muscles were very flabby because I wasn’t exercising them.
“Once a week, I slept on the floor.”
Cold showers every morning
Once a week fast
Spirit-crushing scenarios.
Confronting their fears by performing tests like jumping into the ocean from cliffs, backwards, with blindfolds on.
Bravery - It’s a voluntary practice. Toughness - and a will of iron - takes devotion.
The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man.
Self-control is more indispensable than gunpowder.
Legendary performers practice being spectacular for so long that they no longer remember how to behave in non-spectacular ways.
The Lifetime Habit Arc
1. The trigger > 2. The Ritual > 3. The Reward > 4.The Repetition > and so on
You shouldn’t have any technology in your bedroom.
Make sure you have a preset reward in place.
You need to set up a reward. That’s what the eminent researchers on willpower tell is is essential to create behaviours that stick. Your reward for rising with the sun could be a nice piece of dark chocolate for dessert at lunch. It could be taking a nap later that day. You can figure out what feels right for you.
Be absolutely delighted and excuseless in following through on this life-altering self-promise.
So the key is rest and recovery of the self-control muscle. Your willpower really is weakest when you are most tired.
Research also supports the idea that external order increases your discipline. Thats why Steve Jobs made sure the workplace at NeXT was minimalist and painted all-white when he was there.
THE HABIT INSTALLATION PROTOCOL
Stage 1: Destruction
Stage 2: Installation
Stage 3: Integration
Stick with your self-promise for at least sixty-six days. No matter what.
Do you know why the Space Shuttle uses more fuel in the sixty seconds after liftoff than it uses over the entire orbit around the Earth?
Continue at all costs. Persistency sits at the threshold of mastery.
When faced with a choice, always choose the one that pushes you the most, increases your growth and promotes the unfoldment of your gifts, talents and personal prowess.
The first twenty-two days are supposed to feel like a mild form of torture.
Conquering new territories of self-potential and accessing higher universes of human optimization.
Boredom kills the human spirit.
I do one thousand push-ups a day
I’m not afraid of failing. That’s just part of learning to fly. I’m just horrified of not growing.
The willpower you were using to lay down the early-rising habit is now freed up for another world-class behaviour.
Awesome takes patience. And genius takes time.
Not some forced laugh that so many of us hear at business meetings where good people in quiet fear wear social masks in an effort to fit in, appear powerful and look cool.
She forgave.
Perhaps, it’s when we face losing everything that we come to know our grandest selves.
If everyone would only clean their own doorstep, the whole world would be clean.
#1. To make a habit last, never install it alone.
#2. The teacher learns the most
#3. When you most feel like quitting is the time you must continue advancing.
Even as the majority called them crazy. World-class takes time and commitment and sacrifice and patience.
Doing so will make you a legend. And seal your fate as someone who is worthy of worldwide influence.
Chapter 13: The 5am Club Learns The 20/20/20 Formula
Keep a white-belt mentality around it. Because nothing fails like success.
Procrastination is an act of self-hatred
Failing to keep self-promises is one of the reasons so many of us don’t love ourselves.
The Self-Fulfilling Prophecy
The less we value ourselves and our powers, the less power we have access to.
The 20/20/20 Formula : Deconstruction
The leader who learns the most wins
You must begin your day with intense exercise. This is a non-negotiable. Otherwise The 20/20/20 Formula won’t work. And I’ll take back your membership in The 5am Club.
The real key here though is to make sure you sweat.
Sweating from training releases BDNF - brain-derived neurotrophic factor.
BDNF has been shown to repair brain cells damaged by stress and accelerate the formation of neural connections, so you think better, and process faster.
Buy an old-school alarm clock. You never want to sleep with any technology in your bedroom. Advance the time on it from the actual time to thirty minutes ahead. Then set the alarm for 5:30am.
When I first joined the 5am Club, I slept in my workout clothes.
“Train harder. Live longer.” is a smart motto I built my empires by. You now know that one of the keys to legendary is longevity. Do not die. You can’t own your game and change the world if you’re pushing daisies in a cemetery.
Tranquility is the new luxury of our society.
The great ones leverage periods of isolation.
“Twenty years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So, throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbour. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” - Mark Twain
Pre-performance Blueprint
Making things look simple to the untrained eye is the mark of a maestro.
THE JOURNALING HABIT: Deconstruction (Page 216)
The quickest way out of hard emotions is to have the wisdom and courage to go straight into them. Feel them to heal them.
Chapter 14: The 5am Club Grasps the Essentialness of Sleep
Rise First. Die Last.
Also the management of the last hour of your evening.
The blue light emitted from our tools of technology reduces the amount of melatonin within us.
You need five complete ninety-minute sleep cycles.
THE PRE-SLEEP RITUAL OF ICONIC PRODUCERS: Deconstruction (Page 232)
7-8pm: Last meal, all devices off
8-9pm: Family time, meditation, reading, bath
9-10pm: Prep for sleep in cool, dark, + tech free bedroom, set up training gear, gratitude practice
“Great fortune and weighty wisdom keep coming my way. I’m always a leader never a victim. A lion, not a sheep. I love my life and am making it even better every day. And the more people I help, the more happy I am.”
THE AMAZING DAY: Deconstruction (Page 235)
Chapter 15: The 5am Club is Mentored on The 10 Tactics of Lifelong Genius
“If you knew how much work went into it, you would not call it genius.” - Michelangelo
Life’s finest treasures live in it’s simplest moments.
The greatest of leaders were all servant leaders
The best thinking has been done in solitude. The worst has been done in turmoil.
“Being busy does not always mean real work. The object of all work is production or accomplishment.” -Edison
THE 10 TACTICS OF LIFELONG GENIUS (Page 251)
1. The Tight Bubble of Total Focus (TBTF)
2. The 90/90/1 Rule
3. The 60/10 Method
4. The Daily 5 Concept
5. The Second Wind Workout
6. The 2 Massage Protocol (2MP)
7. Traffic University
8. The Dream Team Technique
Delegate tasks. Do only what you’re great at.
9. The Weekly Design System (WDS)
Carve out and then ritualize 30 minutes early each Sunday morning to create your “Blueprint for a Beautiful Week.”
On a large piece of paper that has each day running from 5am to 11pm on it
Set clear periods for your Victory Hour, your 90/90/1 sessions, your 60/10 cycles and your 2nd Wind Workouts, loved ones, passions, errands.
10. The 60 Minute Student
Chapter 16: The 5am Club Embraces The Twin Cycles of Elite Performance
The Twin Cycles of Elite Performance (pg. 267)
HEC: The High Excellence Cycle
DRC: The Deep Refueling Cycle
Protection of the 5 Assets of Genius
1. Mental Focus
2. Physical Energy
3. Personal Willpower
4. Original Talent
5. Daily Time
Legendary in your industry is all about sustainability.
THE LEGENDARY PERFORMANCE EQUATION:
PRESSURE X REFUELING = GROWTH + ENDURANCE
Balance is vastly important to world-class performance
This day is priceless. All the money in the world will not bring it back again. And so, I seize it and I savour it and I honour it. This day, I fill my mind with big dreams so there is no space for petty doubts. I replace the psychology of can’t with the mentality of can. And I remember that my greatest growth lies at the jagged edges of my highest limits. This day, I’ll recall that until my mission becomes my obsession, my gifts will never become my glory. And until my hunger to serve transcends the insecurities of my self, I’ll miss the grand chance of these precious hours to be a vehicle for helpfulness. This day, I reload my devotion to avoid a counterfeit nobility, staying sincere, humble - with both feet on this sacred ground. Should naysayers and bad actors throw rocks at me, I reply with kindness and love in the face of their bad behaviour - even if they don’t deserve it. Should critics make fun of me - as they always have since I was a kid - I’ll take the rocks they throw at me and make them into monuments of mastery. And should anyone call me strange, as often as they do, I’ll smile with the blatant wisdom stuck deep in my heart that it’s only misfits, oddballs and eccentrics that change our world. Being different is pretty cool. And eccentricity is very hip.
I own my things, but they don’t own me.
JOY AS A GPS (pg. 280)
1. People Fuel
2. Pursuit Fuel
3. Place Fuel
Follow your joy, only be around those people who fuel your joy. Only perform those pursuits that feed your bliss. Only be in those places that make you feel most alive.
Your heart is always wiser than your head. It knows where you must be. Follow it. Trust it. You’ll find the magic.
THE BILLIONAIRE’S MAXIM #1
TO CREATE MAGIC IN THE WORLD, OWN THE MAGIC WITHIN YOURSELF.
Look in the mirror. Your relationship with you predicts your relationship with the world.
All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.
A flight from solitude really is an escape from freedom.
Long stretches spent in noiseless contemplation is one of the secrets of the advanced mind. You’re the only person you’ll be with your entire life.
THE BILLIONAIRE’S MAXIM #2
COLLECT MIRACULOUS EXPERIENCES OVER MATERIAL THINGS.
Never sacrifice your well-being and quality of life for greater annual income or larger net worth.
The more vividly I value everything in my life, the more everything in my life climbs in value.
Become a collector of awesome experiences instead of a consumer of material things.
THE BILLIONAIRE’S MAXIM #3
FAILURE INFLATES FEARLESSNESS
THE BILLIONAIRE’S MAXIM #4
PROPER USE OF YOUR PRIMAL POWER CREATES YOUR PERSONAL UTOPIA.
THE BILLIONAIRE’S MAXIM #5
AVOID BAD PEOPLE
Stay away from all drama queens and negativity kings.
Even one enemy is an enemy too many.
THE BILLIONAIRE’S MAXIM #6
MONEY IS THE FRUIT OF GENEROSITY, NOT SCARCITY.
Money is a currency that must flow like electricity.
Give more to receive more.
Positive expectancy, active faith, ever-increasing gratitude and extreme value delivery.
I always maintain a mindset where I expect money will come to me regularly and from highly unexpected sources.
You behave in a way that shows life you trust it in its abundance and benevolence.
Bless your money when you pay a bill.
THE BILLIONAIRE’S MAXIM #7
OPTIMAL HEALTH MAXIMIZES YOUR POWER TO PRODUCE MAGIC
Peak health really is true wealth.
THE BILLIONAIRE’S MAXIM #8
CONTINUE RAISING YOUR LIFE STANDARDS TOWARD ABSOLUTE WORLD-CLASS.
THE BILLIONAIRES MAXIM #9
DEEP LOVE YIELDS UNCONQUERABLE JOY
I expect to pass through life but once. If, therefore, there can be any kindness I can show, or any good thing that I can do to any fellow-being, let me do it now, and not defer or neglect it, as I shall not pass this way again.
I once met a man who told me he felt abounding happiness at the very sight of a live person. “Why?” I asked him. “Because I’ve seen so many dead people in my life that meeting someone alive is a special gift,” he said.
Always be more interested in other people than being concerned with coming off as an interesting person.
THE BILLIONAIRE’S MAXIM #10
HEAVEN ON EARTH IS A STATE, NOT A PLACE.
THE BILLIONAIRE’S MAXIM #11
TOMORROW IS A BONUS, NOT A RIGHT.
Postpone not your heroism and never delay your peacefulness. Your life can fall apart within an hour.
Chapter 17: The 5am Club Members Become Heroes of Their Lives
THE HEROIC HUMAN CIRCLE:
The 7 Virtues of World-Changers (pg. 308)
Bravery
Forgiveness
Integrity
Understanding
Sincerity
Politeness
Humility