The 5 AM Pact (and My Immediate Regret)
My alarm clock blared a cheerful tune at 5:00 AM. Cheerful, my foot. It sounded like a siren announcing the apocalypse to my sleep-fogged brain. Still, I had made a pact with myself, inspired by countless articles promising the productivity and zen-like peace that came with being a morning person.
I imagined myself, bathed in the golden glow of sunrise, sipping green smoothies while jotting down groundbreaking ideas in my gratitude journal. “This is it,” I mumbled, hitting snooze for the third time. “Operation: Morning Person is a go.” Oh, the naive optimism of those early days.
My first hurdle was exercise. All the articles swore by it. Something about “jumpstarting your metabolism” and “greeting the day with energy.” So, I unrolled my yoga mat, the rubbery smell hitting me with the subtlety of a brick.
My downward dog looked more like a droopy-eared puppy, and my attempts at sun salutations resulted in me almost taking out the ficus plant. By the time I finished (if you could call it that), I felt less like a yogi and more like I’d run a marathon… through quicksand… in the dark.
The Green Smoothie Debacle
Next up, the infamous green smoothie. I crammed kale, spinach, and a suspicious-looking banana into the blender. It whirred to life, sounding alarmingly like a garbage disposal struggling with a spoon. The resulting concoction was…vibrant.
I choked it down, convincing myself that the bitterness was just my taste buds waking up. It wasn’t. It was the taste of my dreams of becoming a morning person dying a slow, leafy death.