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Recalibrating My Priorities On My Birthday

I sometimes find myself a different person than I was five years ago

Ryan Fan
8 min readMar 15, 2025

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Photo by Daniel Olah on Unsplash

Lately, I have been waking up at 5 a.m. almost every day, most of the time to go on a run or catch up on readings for law school. I don’t do it out of desire, but necessity. I am far more productive in the mornings than I am in the evenings., and can get into the “zone” much easier in the morning than after a long day of fatigue. If I wait until the evening, both my law school readings and runs become a lot more difficult.

It takes about 20–30 minutes to jolt myself awake in the mornings, usually with the assistance of some caffeine, but as a law student, teacher, and marathon runner, the morning readings or run are just the beginning to a very long day. I will work all day and then go to law school all night, and the early morning is the only time I get to spend for myself. I will be occupied from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. or 10 p.m. for that reason, and on days that I don’t have this schedule, like weekends, it’s just time to catch up and make sure I’m prepared for the very busy days.

It’s what I signed up for, but this has been my life for the past three years for nine months of the year as a law student and night and teacher during the day, and I will get time off in the summer or random breaks, but the grind…

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Ryan Fan
Ryan Fan

Written by Ryan Fan

Believer, Baltimore City IEP Chair, and 2:35 marathon runner. Diehard fan of “The Wire.”

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