Your most brilliant ideas will make their way into your head only when it’s 7 in the morning and you haven’t slept. Your brain, at that time, tolerates no bullshit. It is in a hurry. It will not go: mmm… maybe.. I dunno… It will filter out all the buzzing stupidity not by meditation but by fatigue. Contrary to scientific opinion, it does not work slower because it is tired; it works a lot faster to squeeze in as much intelligence as possible before it is put out. It is afraid it might otherwise forget. Indeed, you will make your most certain decisions at 7 in the morning when you haven’t slept the night before. You will be confident. The world has been asleep for hours and all their negativity and noise and clutter are by now residue, sediment, out of the way. You alone decide.

A different you is conscious at 7 in the morning when you’re sleepless since the day before. You are restless, you’re on a roll, agitated, fidgety, you want to start things. You have the advantage. Everyone else thinks it’s a new day when you secretly know it’s still the day before and that time is only relative no matter how much we try to control it and box it and lump it and (re)cycle it. You have time figured out and that gives you the edge. The best time to be awake is at 7 in the morning when you haven’t slept the night before.

By 9, their clutter and noise is back, a perfect hour to silence your phone and go to sleep.

Morning view from Mom's balcony in Hazmieh: Jisr el Bacha, Furn el Chebbak, Beirut