Welcome to Change, Logged, a weekly newsletter offering 5-minutes of honest thoughts about life, design, and everything in between.
When was the last time you tried something new and fully committed to it?
Everyone that knows me — friends, family, co-workers, will know that I’m a night owl who works late, sleeps at 2am and rarely start the day before 10 in the morning. It’s bad for you, I know that.
David Keil, a well known Ashtanga yoga teacher was visiting and offering a week of intensive Mysore classes from Monday to Friday. I surprised myself by deciding to sign up to his 8am class, despite the 9:30am class being available. There’s no going back, I had to wake up at 7:20am every morning for 5 days in a row which is something I’m pretty sure I haven’t done since 2017.

Ever since a few months ago, I’ve been keeping a notebook. It’s just a small space where I jot down quick thoughts or observations during the day. Many of them eventually find their way here, into this newsletter.
So what has a week of experimenting as a morning person taught me?
Same sights, new light.
Experimentation opens you to new perspectives.
When you live right in the city and walk down that same main shopping street everyday, you are numb to everything around you. The window displays are a blur, you stop noticing the people and familiar sounds.
But walking down that same street at 7:30am before the morning rush felt different. The streets were empty, things were quiet and on the clear mornings with the sun, it was beautiful. I may not be fully awake, but I felt oddly calm, in the nicest way possible.
I may hate it, but my body loves it.
When trying something new, always listen (openly) to your body.
I was fully bracing for the shock and post-yoga crash but to my surprise, my body hardly felt tired. My breathing was smoother without much effort, and I felt so energised after my 2 hours of morning practice. I still missed all those extra sleep hours in bed, but my body embraced the morning practice, much more than my regular evening practice after work.
Did you know?
The morning momentum is a real phenomenon. The most productive work usually happens between 8am and just before lunch. After that, decision fatigue kicks in. This is why crucial decisions and big tasks are best to be done in the earlier half of the day.
I can cheat time.
The richest person in the world and the poorest both get twenty-four hours in a day. The same seconds tick by for everyone.
- Scott Gallaway, The Algebra of Wealth
Perhaps the natural morning people can relate but during those five days of early mornings, I felt like I had 48 hours in each day. Before lunch, I had already done my yoga, walked the dog, had a shower, caught up to messages and planned my day.
By starting the day earlier, my days felt expansive because I had created space around everything. On top of that, I could sign off from work, cook a proper dinner, and actually relax for the rest of the night. No rushing from the dining table to yoga, squeezing in a 20 minute dinner, then powering through emails before bed.
Every morning, I braced myself for the fatigue to hit. It never did until Friday rolled around. But then, who isn’t tired by Friday?
It’s all in your head.
Over the weekend, I kept wondering about how I managed to not only survive, but thrive so well with the 5 day morning experiment. I realised it came down to one thing — mindset.
When you have something you’re genuinely excited about, committing to early mornings feels a lot easier. For me, that was the Mysore with David Keil. I was looking forward to it so much that every morning, my body was naturally awake 5 minutes before my alarm every morning. None of that horrible morning drag that we all dread.
Try something new, even if it’s a small change.
As humans, we like certainty and security, which is why most of us stick to familiar routines. Someone once told me that should shake your houseplants occasionally to help them build up some resilience (it’s not a joke). Thankfully, we don’t need to be that harsh with ourselves, but sometimes, it is good to step out of autopilot.
Most of the time, it’s just our mind holding us back. So ask yourself, when was the last time you tried something new and fully committed to it with an open mind?
For the curious reader
Books that inspired the thoughts on this page — and are worth a read:
Good for you sweetheart, be the early bird that catches the worm. 一日之计在于晨 🌅