The secret to be selfish.

You’re too busy to pursue your dream right now. That’s one of the ideas I write about in my new book, Quitter, Closing the Gap Between Your Day Job and your Dream Job. Whether it’s a book or a blog or a mission trip or a new job, life is too full to really work on your “thing.”

You’ve got a lot going on. I do too. And sometimes, when we focus on our dreams, or try to brainstorm ideas, our wives cry in the kitchen. That’s been my experience anyway.

One Tuesday during a holiday break, I spent four hours writing on a book idea. My kids were occupied with new Christmas presents and my wife was straightening up the house. At about three in the afternoon I resurfaced from our home office and talked to my wife in the kitchen.

Her words were short and quick. I asked her what was wrong and she immediately replied, “I thought we were going to spend the day together.” Then she started crying.

In that moment and many others, I failed a simple rule of dream chasing. I was selfish at the wrong time of the day with my hours. Which really weren’t mine anyway. When you’re a husband or a dad, your time doesn’t just belong to you. It’s in large part a communal property, shared by the entire house.

But that doesn’t mean you can’t be selfish with your time. Not at all. You just have to know when you can be, which is why I encourage you to be selfish at 5AM.

The mornings I get up and write from 5-7AM, you’d be surprised how little my wife tells me that I’ve been ignoring her. You’d be shocked at how little my oldest daughter wants me to watch her jump rope at 5:30AM. You’d be mystified at how few requests my youngest daughter makes to go bike riding at 5:15AM.

You can be selfish at 5AM. Or 11PM if your spouse goes to bed early and staying up an extra hour doesn’t wreck your next day. You can carve out time in your day and claim it, if you’re willing to hustle. If you’re willing to find your time at the beginning of your day or the end, chances are you can tweak your schedule a little and be a little selfish.

If you’re not married or don’t have kids, this idea still applies. Your time is still shared, especially if you have a full time job. Your company may never cry in your arms in the kitchen on the day after Christmas, that would be weird if it did, but if you’re selfish with the wrong hours it will indeed say to you, “Hey, I thought we were going to spend 8-5 together today. I thought we were going to spend Monday-Friday together all this week. Why have you been taking such long lunches and coming in late?”

We all have commitments we have to keep. In one form or another, we all have spouses with expectations that are not worth breaking. We all have dreams that need hours and hours of attention. Since time is the only commodity you can never get back and managing it can be a key to jumping from a job to a dream, I’ll keep coming back to ideas like this on this blog. But right now, let me give you permission to be selfish with your dream.

Just be selfish at 5AM.