Over the last couple of weeks I’ve been writing articles and teaching classes on how to be productive from Fajr.
A common question I’ve been getting is:
“That’s all well and good if it’s winter, or you live somewhere northern where Fajr (the pre-dawn prayer) is at 6am. But what if Fajr is already over by that time?”
Well, the simple, but deceptively powerful answer is:
Wake up earlier. (And sleep earlier!)
Take all the advice I’ve given over the last couple of weeks, and set your alarm for 5am instead of 6am.
That will just about take you through to Ramadan, a month which is designed to completely re-set your eating and sleeping patterns and re-orient you towards your true purpose: To be devoted to Allah, the Most Loving.
A couple of weeks after Ramadan, and the 5am time will work again, even in most northern countries like the UK & Canada.
However, this poses a few problems:
- With Isha (night-prayer) at nearly 10pm, that won’t give you much more than 6 hours of un-interrupted sleep, if you’re lucky. That’s unsustainable for most people.
- What if your life-style just doesn’t allow for you to join the 5am Club?
- And, what about the few weeks in the year when the timings really are too early to even do 5am?
In this extreme case, (again, only about 4-6 weeks in the entire year), here’s another Fajr life-hack:
Most people sleep in 90 minute rythms. So, you tend to naturally be inclined to wake up after 3, 4.5, 6, 7.5 or 9 hours.
After Isha go to bed leisurely, let’s say at 11pm.
Then, instead of waking at 5am (do-able, but not sustainable for most), set your alarm for 3:30am. At this time, Fajr hasn’t even started yet. However, it will be easy to wake up as you’ve had 4.5 hours of sleep. (Especially if you use the strategy I share in this web-class.)
Wake up fully, brush your teeth, do wudu, all the while knowing that you’ll get plenty of sleep again after your prayers.
Now, it’s 3:45am and Fajr still hasn’t started. That means you’re in the most blessed, beneficial time of the night: Tahajjud.
Remember this hadith..?
‘The Lord descends every night to the lowest heaven when one-third of the night remains and says:
“Who will call upon Me, that I may answer him?
Who will ask of Me, that I may give him?
Who will seek My forgiveness, that I may forgive him?”
–The Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings upon him
Many Muslims put so much effort into just about managing to wake up for Fajr at around 4am or 5am, then rush back to bed.
However, with roughly the same amount of effort, and a bit of strategy, you can actually do one of the most blessed prayers there is and easily pray Fajr on time.
Simply get 4.5 hours of sleep, wake up a few minutes before Fajr, pray Tahajjud, do zikr, pray Fajr, then go back to sleep, with plenty of time left to get another 3 to 4.5 hours of sleep before work.
Heck, a couple of days a week you may even want to do a Sunnah Intermittent Fast, and get ripped abs in the process. (More on this in a future blog post, insha’Allah.)
When you wake up the 2nd time for work, you’ll arise a champion.
If you build this into your summer-routine, the momentum will start to build very quickly and you might find, as many generations of humbly grateful servants have before you, that insightful, life-changing wisdom is gifted to you, while the rest of the world sleeps.
If you want to pray Fajr on time & be productive all year round, you’ll appreciate Productive From Fajr, which is now available as part of The Ocean.
