Alsamu Alykum

We all know how hard it is to wake up for Salat Al-Fajr. No, let me rephrase that, we all know that waking up for Salat Al-Fajr every day at dawn is one of the hardest things every Muslim has to do. So InshaAllah in this article I will give you some tips that will make waking up for Fajr easier.

First of all INTENTIONS, INTENTIONS, AND INTENTIONS! You have to get your intentions straight. You have to ask yourself why you are waking up at dawn, are you waking up so that you can tell your friends how you stayed up until 3 a.m. and then woke up for Fajr or are you doing it because it is a pillar of Islam and Allah ordered us to pray? Either way, you still have to get up and pray. Yes, it’s important to have your intentions straight, but that doesn’t mean if they’re not you shouldn’t pray. It just means if they are straight it will make waking up a lot easier. 

Next, you have to have determination. Just like you schedule to watch a movie or like you take the time to do anything that you want to do, you have to put that kind of motivation into waking up for Fajr. You have to realize how important it is to pray Salat Al-Fajr. (It’s obligatory to pray all five prayers, but I am writing about this one because it’s the hardest in my opinion.) You have to know that during Salat Al-Fajr and Salat Al-Asr the Angels switch places. They take turns during the day and during the night and they switch places during Salat A-Fajr and Salat Al-Asr as the hadith Sahih Al Bukhari will explain below.

Narrated By Abu Huraira: Allah's Apostle said, "Angels come to you in succession by night and day and all of them get together at the time of the FAJR and 'Asr prayers. Those who have passed the night with you (or stayed with you) ascend (to the Heaven) and Allah asks them, though He knows everything about you, well, "In what state did you leave my slaves?" The angels reply: "When we left them they were praying and when we reached them, they were praying." (Vol 1, Book 10. Times Of The Prayers.
Hadith 530. (Shahi Bukhari)

What do you want the Angels to tell Allah, I left your slave sleeping in bed? I don’t think so and I hope not.

Okay now that we got that straight; let me give you the tips for making waking up easy.

Number one, sleep early; this is common sense. If you sleep early, by the time Fajr comes, you’ll have had enough sleep and you won’t have a difficult time getting up. Just like you would sleep early if you have work or an exam the next day; make it a routine to sleep early everyday. 

Second get at least three to four clocks in the house and at least two in the room you sleep in. Set the alarm on all of them to be about 13 minutes apart from each other. Also set them earlier than the actual Fajr time because you’re not going to get up right away. That way each time one alarm comes on and goes off or you shut it off and fall back to sleep, the other one will ring in 13 minutes, then the next until you finally get up. The reason I say 13 minutes is because some clocks have 10 minute difference between each snooze, so by doing it this way all clocks won’t ring at the same time.

If you have a cell phone, us the alarm clock on it. I use the alarm clock on my cell phone and I use the calendar alarm clock also on my cell phone. I put it under my pillow and if I accidently shut off the snooze on the first alarm, the second one will sound in 13 or so minutes. 

Last is the obvious way, have someone else wake you up. Be it your mother, father, brother, sister, wife, husband, or who ever is in the house with you. Or you could have someone call you during Fajr. I know people who have had this done and it works especially if the phone is far. They get out of bed and this action wakes them up.

InshaAllah these tips will help someone out there. Please correct anything I said wrong and I’ll edit my article.

Jazakum Allahu khair.

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