What time do you wake up?

I work a lot.  I have a regular job and I am starting a business, Book Worm Laser & Design.  Over the past few days I have begun to ask myself if all this work is worth the effort?  How long am I going to work like this before I see some sort of payoff?  Am I working all these hours for a reason?

What time do you wake up?  In a recent blog post from Andy Traub, “Anything that motivates you to get up at 5am is healthy”, he discusses some of the reasons he wakes up early.  I don’t get up quite that early, but I am usually up by 5:30a.  Since I don’t get to bed until around 12:30a, I have been missing a lot of sleep (although I do sleep until 7:00a or so on the weekends, maybe a little later at times).  Am I being productive?

When I wake up at 5:30a, I get ready and go to my normal job.  We have a treadmill so I have been known to run on it for 15 – 30 minutes when I first get there.  Otherwise, I get started with my business at around 6:15a.  That gives me about 45 minutes before work to do assorted business stuff (check blog posts, write blog posts, get products ready to ship, etc).  I spend my lunch (or at least 75% of my lunch) reading, creating designs, writing blog posts, or any number of other business related activities.  After I get home and spend some time with the family, I get back started with the business stuff around 8:00p and work until after midnight.  I get about 5 1/2 hours worth of work done on my business per day, or about 35 hours per week.  It is hard to say if I am being really productive, but I am accomplishing something.

Is it worth it?  I’m not sure.  Will it be worth it later?  Again, not sure.  Is it stressful? Yes it is, very stressful, but it is a different stress than I have had in the past.  I don’t like stress in general, but this stress is not that bad.  At least I can see progress.  I may only be building a hobby but it is 100% mine.  I am not working to make someone else rich while trading my time for money.  I am in control, like it or not, good or bad.

So what time do you wake up?  Are you losing sleep to pursue your passion and calling?  Are you doing what you were put on earth to do.  If so, good for you.  If not, what are you waiting for?  Wake up and go to work.

(Photo credit: domdeen)