The 5 AM Club Isn’t for Everyone — And That’s Okay
There’s a very specific kind of guilt that creeps in around 8 a.m., right after you’ve checked your phone and seen someone’s “morning routine” reel, from the cold plunge to the journaling, to the 10K steps before sunrise, and you’re just now rolling out of bed. If you’ve ever felt like a failure for not being a member of the 5 AM Club, this one’s for you.
Expert Sources
- Jamie Bronstein, LCSW, is a licensed relationship therapist, author of “MAN*ifesting,” speaker, and podcast host, recognized by Yahoo Finance as “The #1 Relationship Coach Transforming Lives.”
- Laura Bojarskaite, PhD is a neuroscientist and sleep researcher at the University of Oslo, where she studies how sleep supports brain health, memory, cognition, and the brain’s waste-clearance system. Her research has been published in leading journals including Nature Communications.
- Tom Hensen is a physiotherapist with a degree in Applied Therapy Sciences, certified workplace health manager, and certified sleep coach with a background in sleep product development and sleep ergonomics.
Where the 5 AM Obsession Actually Came From
Sivan Weitz/DupeWaking up early didn’t used to be a personality trait. It became one. Somewhere between the rise of productivity influencers and the cult of “hustle culture,” early rising got rebranded as a moral virtue. It became proof that you were disciplined, driven, and destined for success. Books, podcasts, and LinkedIn posts turned the alarm clock into a status symbol: the earlier you woke up, the more serious you were about your life.
But the roots of this obsession go back much further than social media. According to Jamie Bronstein, a licensed therapist and coach and author of “MAN*ifesting,” the “wake up early to succeed” mindset dates back centuries, to when people in agricultural work rose with the sun to make the most of daylight hours, and factory workers during the Industrial Revolution needed to clock in early. Religious traditions reinforced the idea too, tying early rising to discipline and virtue.
Cora Pursley/DupeThe problem is that the narrative was never built around actual human biology. It was built around necessity, and centuries later, we’re still treating it like a personality trait instead of a work schedule that made sense for a very different world.
Dr. Laura Bojarskaitė, a neuroscientist and sleep researcher at the University of Oslo, points to Benjamin Franklin’s famous line — “early to bed and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise” — as a phrase that’s shaped our cultural attitudes toward sleep for centuries. She also points to a well-documented psychological quirk called the halo effect: we tend to assume traits we admire, like discipline and ambition, cluster together. See someone up at 5 a.m., and we automatically assume they’re more successful, even though there’s little evidence that any particular wake-up time is inherently superior. As Bojarskaitė puts it, there’s no magical productivity hour: some people do their best work at 6 a.m., others at 10 p.m.
Your Body Has Its Own Schedule — And That’s Not Laziness
Alli Guest/DupeChronotypes are real, and they’re not simply a matter of willpower. Bronstein explains that chronotypes are typically biological, but environment and circumstance shape how they show up. Someone who needs to be up early for work might go to bed earlier than they’d naturally choose to, just to stay sharp on the job. On the flip side, an early riser dating a night owl might trade some of their own sleep to spend more time together. Biology sets the baseline, but life bends it.
That’s exactly why forcing a night owl into a 5 a.m. wake-up doesn’t automatically make them more productive. Instead, it just makes them tired and irritable, running on borrowed energy for the rest of the day.
Bojarskaitė’s research backs this up on a genetic level. Scientists have identified hundreds of genetic variants tied to chronotype, many of them involving the molecular clock genes that govern our circadian rhythms, the internal systems that determine when our brains naturally feel sleepy versus alert. Chronotype also shifts across a lifetime: children tend to be early risers, teenagers swing later, and many adults gradually drift earlier again with age. Environment and habits absolutely play a role too, but Bojarskaitė is careful to draw a line between someone with genuinely poor sleep habits and someone whose internal clock is just wired differently.
Marianna Ripa/Dupe“Chronotype is not a personality flaw,” Bojarskaitė says. “It’s partly written into our biology.”
Tom Hensen, a physiotherapist and certified sleep coach who co-founded the sleep consultancy Feder & Kern and has conducted more than 5,000 personal sleep consultations, sees this play out constantly in his practice. Genetics set the foundation, he says, but light exposure, work schedules, and lifestyle habits shape it further. In his experience, some clients simply have a later chronotype from the start; others have gradually drifted later over time through habit.
Why Late Risers Get Unfairly Stereotyped
Part of the problem is that our entire concept of “normal” hours is outdated. Bronstein points out that society’s standard schedule is a holdover from centuries of agricultural and industrial work, and today’s school and job hours are still largely built around it. That means anyone who operates best outside a typical 9-to-5 window gets side-eyed — even though, as she puts it, plenty of people who go to bed and wake up late are still highly productive; they just work different hours. People can’t help how they’re wired or when they’re naturally at their most creative, so judging them for it isn’t just outdated, it’s unfair.
De Alencar/DupeBojarskaitė sees this play out constantly in her work: if an early bird wakes up naturally at 5:30 a.m., we call them disciplined. If a night owl naturally falls asleep at midnight and wakes at 8:30 a.m., getting the same amount of sleep, they get called lazy. Biologically, there’s nothing superior about the earlier time. “We would never call someone lazy because they are naturally left-handed instead of right-handed,” she says. “Chronotype is similarly a biological variation.”
“Society tends to moralize wake-up times,” she adds, “even though the biology tells us they are, in part, a matter of genetics.”
Hensen sees it the same way from the clinical side: for generations, getting up early has been tied to discipline and productivity, largely because school and work schedules were built around early hours. The result, he says, is that we end up judging people based on when they work rather than how well they work — someone who wakes at 9 a.m. is often perceived completely differently from someone who wakes at 5 a.m., even when both are getting identical amounts of sleep and performing equally well.
The Real Cost of Forcing an Early Routine That Doesn’t Fit
Natalia Grabarczyk/DupeWhen you override your natural rhythm to chase someone else’s routine, you’re not gaining an edge — you’re accumulating sleep debt. Bronstein is candid about this from her own experience: she says she personally feels and performs better when she can stay up late working and wake up a little later, though she’s also noticed that on days she has to be up early for meetings, she can end up having some of her most productive days — proof that night owls can adapt when they truly need to.
That said, she pushes back on the idea that early is inherently better. While plenty of medical professionals maintain that an earlier bedtime supports better mood and overall health, Bronstein’s take is that it should come down to the individual: as long as you’re getting your 6-8 hours and have enough energy to get through the day, when that sleep happens shouldn’t matter.
Everyone responds differently to going against their natural chronotype, too. Some people adjust just fine; others struggle and end up dealing with real mental and physical health effects. Bronstein’s advice for night owls stuck with an early work schedule: “sleep bank” on the weekends, and get as much rest as you can while you have the chance.
There’s actually a name for what happens when you consistently live against your biological clock: social jet lag. Bojarskaitė describes it as a mild, ongoing version of the jet lag you’d feel from constantly crossing time zones — without ever getting on a plane. A night owl who naturally sleeps midnight to 8 a.m. but has to wake at 6 a.m. is repeatedly cutting short the final hours of sleep, which happen to be especially rich in REM. Research has tied chronic social jet lag to worse mood, more depressive symptoms, impaired cognitive performance, poorer metabolic health, and a higher risk of burnout.
@iam_os/Unsplash“Many night owls aren’t tired because they’re lazy,” Bojarskaitė says. “They’re tired because they’re trying to live in a world designed for early birds.”
The psychological toll can compound over time, too. Bojarskaitė notes that when your biology consistently conflicts with what’s expected of you, it’s easy to start believing something is wrong with you — even when your sleep schedule is completely normal for your chronotype. Repeatedly falling short of an unrealistic standard can chip away at self-esteem, and research has linked evening chronotypes to higher rates of depression and anxiety, likely driven by a mix of biology and the social pressure to conform to an early schedule.
Hensen sees this frustration constantly in his consultations, too. The core issue, he says, usually isn’t that night owls can’t force themselves to get up early; it’s that they still struggle to fall asleep early enough, so they end up chronically short on sleep, which affects concentration, mood, recovery, and energy over time. Add in the comparisons to colleagues, friends, or productivity influencers, and people start assuming they lack discipline when really, he says, they’re just comparing themselves to people with a different chronotype entirely.
A Healthier Way to Measure Your Own Productivity
Sash Gabriel/DupeMaybe the biggest shift isn’t about what time you wake up — it’s about who you’re comparing yourself to. Bronstein calls the habit of measuring yourself against others “comparisonitis,” and she considers it genuinely harmful to mental health. Her advice: stop comparing yourself to other people, and start comparing yourself to your own past self instead. If you’re learning, growing, and achieving in a way that feels good to you, that’s what actually counts.
“Own who you are, and honor what makes you happy and feel most productive,” Bronstein says.
Bojarskaitė agrees, and reframes the question entirely: instead of asking why you don’t wake up at 5 a.m., ask when your brain naturally performs best and protect those hours. Productivity, she says, should be measured by the quality of your thinking, creativity, and wellbeing, not by the number on the clock when you open your eyes.
“There is no Nobel Prize for waking up at 5 a.m.,” Bojarskaitė says. “The healthiest schedule is often the one that works with your biology rather than against it.”
Hensen puts it in even more practical terms: most people aren’t paid for waking up early; they’re paid for solving problems, creating value, and doing good work. For some, that happens at 7 a.m. For others, it happens at 10 p.m. The question worth asking isn’t how early you wake up, he says, but whether you’re getting enough sleep and performing well during the hours you’re actually awake.
@ganinph/UnsplashSuccess Isn’t a Wake-Up Time
Some of the most accomplished people you can think of are famously not morning people. Success has never actually required a 5 a.m. alarm; it requires knowing yourself well enough to work with your energy instead of against it. That might mean a sunrise workout. It might also mean your best ideas come to you at 11 p.m. with a cup of tea and total silence. Both are valid.
The goal isn’t to wake up earlier. It’s to wake up rested, on a schedule that actually works for your life, your job, and your body. If that’s 5 a.m., great. If it’s 9 a.m., also great.
As Bojarskaitė puts it: “Success isn’t about becoming an early bird. It’s about understanding when your own brain does its best work.”
Mike Von/UnsplashThe Bottom Line
The 5 AM Club can be genuinely life-changing for the people whose bodies and schedules are built for it. But it’s not a universal formula for success, and treating it like one just sets everyone else up to feel like they’re behind before their day even starts. Sleep in if you need to. Your worth was never tied to your wake-up time.
