I only have one new year’s resolution in 2019 – to keep CEO hours.

I am committed to getting up at 4.30am each morning this year because I want to be more productive (including writing two books – a novel and nonfiction, getting fit, creating a small startup NGO, meditating each day, maintaining my friendships remotely via regular WhatsApp, performing a random act of kindness for strangers once every three days, working at the Guardian, making the majority of my food from scratch, swimming in the ocean, keeping two journals – one for gratitude and one documenting my normal life which is mostly complaint and angst, and time set aside for spontaneous “play”).

I have been studying the routines of successful people, and none of them get up at 10am like I usually do. They get up at 4.30am and not only have time to empty their inbox and complete a day’s work, but also exercise, meditate and FaceTime loved ones who live different time zones.

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So on New Year’s Eve, I say no to all offers to party, and go to bed at 8.30pm wearing an eye mask and noise cancelling headphones playing rainforest sounds. I need to be fresh for my 4.30am lyfe.

Day 1

Bad sleep due to pain caused while rolling over wearing enormous headphones. Sleep through 4.30am alarm, wake up at 9.30am.

Day 2

Alarm goes off at 4.30am. I silence it and sleep until 8am. A friend with small children threatens the digital equivalent of breaking my legs if I don’t wake up at 4.30am.

He promises that tomorrow, “I will FaceTime you if you are not confirmed up.”

Go to bed before 8pm again in order to maximise chance of getting eight hours sleep before my alarm sounds at 4.30am.

Day 3

4.30am – alarm goes off. I have already been awake for a while because I had a nightmare (fear of being FaceTimed???). I stretch in bed by moving my limbs around to send a message to my brain; you awoke mow.

I send a text message to my group chat. “i am awak”. They keep me accountable.

4.40am – 20 minutes of vedic meditation, which is beautiful at that hour because vedic is meant to mimic some of the aspects of deeper sleep. As it is so early, my body is in that zone already. Twenty minutes whizz by.

5am – Look at Twitter. The algorithm is horrible. I am reading tweets from seven hours ago that are appearing at the top of my timeline. What’s the point of getting up at 4.30am if the tweets aren’t fresh? Talk to other people on Twitter who got up at 4.30am – early morning news producers, breakfast radio people, insomniacs. They say, welcome to the special CEO club, bitch!

5.15am – Feel gratitude that is overtaken by feeling of superiority. It’s still dark, and I look out at the lights at the apartment block. Only one is on. Losers! Asleep! Not achieving! Try to WhatsApp friends in the UK but no one answers.

5.40am – First coffee of the day. I’m dying and starting to feel tired again. Maybe I could work from bed? Only have energy to scroll Twitter. I contemplate the awful reality: I have got up at 4.30am only to spend more time on Twitter.

5.46am – The sky is a lovely pink and birds are starting to wake up, but no kookaburras … I listen out for their cries.

6am – I read a review of the book Why We Sleep.

6.05am – Check news websites and weather in various cities around Australia. Scroll Instagram.

6.50am – Still no kookaburras. Start working on novel. Second coffee. Four strawberries. Send three tweets. Starting to feel very tired.

7am – Cave in and take a prescription stimulant. Write a to-do list of CEO things I need to accomplish that morning.

7-9am – Write 1,500 words of my novel. Astonished at my focus. I can do anything! Maybe I can even do my taxes????!!!

9.15am-9.17am – Tackle in-box. Doesn’t take long as it’s 3 January and no one has emailed me. Instead, focus on unsubscribing from mailing lists.

9.30am – Breakfast: homemade sourdough with avocado and lemon juice, cracked pepper and some chilli flakes. Getting up at 4.30am requires some serious fuel. I clean the house.

10am – Start working on a difficult travel feature that I have been putting off for months. Even though it is not yet afternoon, it feels like 6pm.

11.30am – Finish 2,000 word travel story on the Yala national park in Sri Lanka. Do 30 minutes of YouTube yoga.

Midday – Write a column in defence of Karl Stefanovic who has recently been retired from hosting duties on Nine’s Today Show. Most of the column is in CAPS. Walk to local cafe and buy a $11 green smoothie for lunch and try to WhatsApp friends in Asia. No one answers. At cafe journal things I am grateful for: the smoothie, the sunrise, Karl, the … the ... the??

2pm – Home. Do taxes. 20 minutes of vedic meditation. Book in a 7am personal training session for later in the week. Join Fitness First. YOU GOT THIS!

4pm – I have run out of things to do. Maybe CEOs are busier than me? Suddenly full of doubt about whether this lifestyle is for me.

4.30pm – Hit by wave of depression. I can’t go on like this. This CEO life is horrible. Walk to Bronte beach. Swim in the ocean. It is freezing. I feel better.

5pm – Walk into the city. There are drinks at the Hollywood Hotel with colleagues. When I tell everyone I got up at 4.30am and reel off my achievements, they don’t seem that impressed. They are too busy laughing about the story of the cane toad who tried to have sex with a snake. I should be hanging out with other CEOs. Start to feel weird. Out of it. Getting up so early is hell.

8pm – Walk home from pub. Run into friend who later reports to group chat: “I ran into Brigid randomly earlier. She was extremely out of sorts. Like a space cadet.”

9pm. Home. Why am I not tired? I have to get up in a few hours and do it all again. Set my alarm for 4.30am while also feeling sick. This CEO life, is it really for me?

*

That weekend, I go to Berry with friends, sleep a lot and wonder whether to restart my CEO life when I return to the city on Monday.

I read a collection of AA Gill’s writing and a line jumps out at me. He is talking about being in the Middle East and invited into locals’ homes.

I considered joining in Ramadan for a weekend, but you can’t be a tourist in other people’s souls.

And those other people include CEOs. I was trying to be a tourist in a CEO’s soul – and I’m here to tell you, there’s nothing there.

I unset my brutal alarms.