Have you ever done something fairly consistently with someone or a group early in the morning? Then you'll understand what I mean when I talk about the early-morning bond. It's a phenomenon I have noticed over the years from doing early-morning soccer workouts in high school to waking up early almost every day during college. There's a special, almost inexplicable camaraderie among those who are either forced to or who force themselves to wake up at a ridiculous hour to do something hard.
Those of us who used to do workouts or practices in high school have experienced the strong bonds that form from waking up early to run a bajillion stairs or laps around the field. When the season begins, not only are the athletes physically fit and ready to compete but, maybe even more importantly, they have a connection with each other that has grown to make them a real team. I experienced this connection as I played on two different soccer teams because I moved to a another high school during my sophomore year. One team I played for did these early workouts while the other never did, and I can say that there definitely was a difference. It wasn't like we weren't close as a team without doing the early workouts, but it just wasn't the same. It may not have been something you could see, but it was for sure something you could feel on and off the field. We did similar workouts, but doing them in before the sun rises somehow makes all the difference. I believe there must be an element of added respect for those who wake up early with you because the team that did the early workouts didn't really have anyone that they looked down on. As far as I can remember, there wasn't any one that was particularly picked on or disrespected by the majority of the team. Neither the average player nor star disrespected the bench warmer. We also respected the coaches who would wake up early with us more than the others. Of course, we appreciated and respected our head coach, but we didn't as much as we could have. There was an assistant coach who would run the workouts and all of the guys I played with would tell you that they had a deeper love for this assistant.
I go to the gym pretty consistently in the mornings and love it when I see the same people all the time. Over the past couple of years I have gone with some friends and the bond we created in the mornings is stronger than a lot of my other friendships. Though we don't hang out very often anymore, I feel a really deep friendship with those guys. There's the bond even with the people I see at the gym that I don't even know. Whenever I run across someone on campus that I normally see at the gym we acknowledge each other like we know each other when we never have even been introduced.
I used to go to the temple early on Saturday mornings and experienced this bond with a complete stranger. There was a guy who would go at the same time every week as I did. I didn't know who he was and never even talked to him, but I would see him every week. Then I ran into him on campus talking with some of my friends and we were finally introduced. This happened years ago, but I ran into this guy (yeah I only met him once and completely forgot his name) the other day and it was like meeting an old, close friend.
From these experiences, I have decided that if I want to really form a strong friendship with someone, one of the best ways to do that is through doing something hard together early in the morning. If it can form strong bonds with complete strangers, it for sure can strengthen already established bonds with someone.
I'm sure this blog post doesn't do a very good job at describing what I'm talking about, but those of you who have experienced it know exactly what I'm talking about.
