Mouna Traoré rises well before dawn.
The Toronto actor, who lives in Los Angeles, follows the 5 a.m. Club routine developed by Canadian “elite performance expert” Robin Sharma more than 20 years ago. Within five minutes of waking, she embarks on a “Victory Hour” broken into three 20-minute parts: movement, reflection or meditation, and “growth,” which Traoré said she devotes to reading poetry or spiritual-leaning books, or reviewing her goals.
Traoré said she’s actually a “night owl,” but finds this routine helps her manage stress, especially after a chaotic start to the year that included moving away from L.A. during the January fires. “If I don’t prioritize this hour, then I often forget to meditate. It’s so easy to just get on your phone, and get so consumed by whatever is stressing you out in your inbox.” And she’s far more productive when she’s risen early. “I’ll look at the time and it’ll be 9 a.m. and all my chores are done and my apartment’s clean,” said Traoré. “I feel like I’m living a higher version of my life.”
The 5 a.m. club has famous adherents, from Gwyneth Paltrow to Michelle Obama, but now there’s a new frontier in extreme early-rising: when it comes to viral morning routines, 4 a.m. is the new 5 a.m.
The craze hit the mainstream earlier this month, when influencer Ashton Hall’s six-hour-long morning routine racked up 1.2 million views on TikTok. Beginning at 3.55 a.m., he dunks his head in an ice bath spritzed with lemon juice, eats a banana and rubs the skin on his face, and slams some push-ups — all of it bare-chested until two hours in, when an unidentified hand passes him a shirt.
Actor, writer and producer Issa Rae recently spoke about waking up at 4 a.m. on the It Takes a Village podcast. Rae, who runs her own production company while also helming a coffee shop and haircare brand, said she uses this pre-dawn time for a 90-minute workout, journalling, catching up on the news, or just sitting in the dark with a coffee. The podcast’s host, Delina Medhin, responded that she’s now a convert to rising at 4 a.m. as well, and the two high-fived.
But is getting up so early, when it’s not strictly necessary, good for you?
“It’s a bit of a flex, to be completely candid,” said Dr. David Greenberg, a Toronto family practice doctor with a particular interest in sleep. “There’s a famous story about Tom Brady: A veteran player got traded to New England, and showed up for a workout at 5:30 in the morning. He walked in and Tom Brady said to him, ‘Good afternoon.’”
But taking lifestyle cues from the rich and famous doesn’t always make sense for the rest of us. “People have to remember, as Scott Fitzgerald said in ‘The Great Gatsby,’ the rich really are different,” Greenberg said. “Tim Cook [who gets up at 4 a.m.] is not the CEO of Apple because he’s a normal person. When you’re watching Taylor Swift, dancing and singing for three hours non-stop, you watch her with unbelievable awe but it never occurs to you that you should get up and do that. So, why would it occur to you that you should get up at 4 o’clock in the morning like somebody who does this for a living?”
There is some research that suggests getting up early can be good for you: early risers reported greater levels of happiness in a 2012 study out of the University of Toronto. But some people may just be more naturally predisposed to getting something out of a 4 a.m. wake up than others. When it comes to our circadian rhythm, the internal clock that governs our preferred sleep patterns as well as body temperature and hormonal secretion, we fall into a range of chronotypes — the larks, the night owls, the in-betweens.
“There are all kinds of people who do shift work, for example, who are really good at having their sleep schedules shifted around,” Greenberg said. “There are other people that I write notes for to say they can’t do shift work because it completely messes them up.”
Greenberg pointed out that many of the viral hacks and trends are just repackaged concepts, like “cognitive shuffling,” which is basically a rebranding of counting sheep. “Any time you’re going to implement a change in your lifestyle, it has to be sustainable,” he said. “That’s why most of these fads, most of these hacks, just don’t work in the long term. People are not going to be taping their mouths shut or spraying magnesium on their feet for the next 30 years.”
Greenberg’s advice isn’t likely to go viral: Stick to a regular bedtime, give yourself time to unwind before sleep, and try to use your bedroom only as a sleep space that’s free of screens. If you do want to get up at 4 a.m. and spend hours working out and perfecting your algae-protein smoothie recipe? “There’s a Yiddish expression: abi gezunt [as long as you’re healthy],” said Greenberg. “If you want to do that, give it a try. But I promise you, a year from now, you won’t be doing it.”
Viral morning routines often glorify optimization and productivity, but rising early can actually be a way to push back against hustle culture.
“I resist that it’s to be more productive. It’s to be more creative — or to be more calm,” said Christian Smith, a Toronto medical research scientist and author who contributed to the 2024 book of essays “Bad Artist: Creating in a Productivity-Obsessed World.” “You’re not rushing around getting ready for work. You’ve got that free, anxiety-lifting moment of time when you don’t have to think about deadlines.”
Smith often starts his morning with writing by hand, without the usual distractions. “Partners are asleep, babies may be up but then go back to sleep, pets are certainly asleep — that’s why I get up early — and then of course all the work noise isn’t there, depending on your field. It gives you that time to do whatever you want.”
In Smith’s experience, the mind is most creative when it’s quiet, like Issa Rae sitting in the dark with her coffee. “Anything that sparks inspiration always comes when you’re in that quiet space, and that’s very hard today. A lot of people are maybe resorting to this schedule because we are working all the time since COVID. There are a lot of expectations that we’re available pretty much 24/7,” he said.
For better or worse, the pre-dawn hours can be the only part of the day when nothing is expected of you. It’s “free time,” said Smith. “You’re just hoping other people are asleep at 4 a.m.”
