So during those first moments of the day, which are yours and

The great teacher and spiritual guide, Menachem Mendel Schneerson, known to many as the Lubavitcher Rebbe, once gave this counsel: “So during those first moments of the day, which are yours and yours alone, you can circumvent these boundaries and concentrate fully on spiritual matters. And this gives you the opportunity to plan the time management of the entire day.” In these words lies both the wisdom of discipline and the fire of faith. For he knew that the dawn, fragile and silent, is not just another hour, but a sacred threshold. To master it is to master oneself, and to master oneself is to master the day.

The origin of this thought comes from Schneerson’s lifelong teaching: that the sacred must be woven into the daily, that no hour of human life is too ordinary to be infused with meaning. He urged his followers not to drift into the day unprepared, for once the world’s noise awakens, it pulls the soul in a hundred directions. But in those first moments of the morning, the soul stands unencumbered, the heart is unburdened, and the mind is clear. This is the time to anchor oneself in spirit, to lay the foundation upon which the rest of the day is built.

The ancients also revered the dawn. The Romans offered sacrifices to Aurora, goddess of the morning, believing her light carried renewal. The Greeks sang hymns to Eos, bringer of day, as a herald of new beginnings. Even in the East, the sages of India practiced meditation at sunrise, believing it to be the hour when the veil between the human and the divine was thinnest. Thus Schneerson’s teaching stands in harmony with the wisdom of ages: seize the dawn, and you seize the soul of the day.

History, too, gives testimony. Consider Benjamin Franklin, who rose each morning with the question, “What good shall I do this day?” It was in these quiet hours that he charted his path, aligning his tasks with his principles. Or look to the warrior-emperor Marcus Aurelius, who began his mornings in meditation, steeling himself against the trials of empire. In each case, the principle was the same: to touch the eternal before touching the temporal, to order the inner life before facing the outer. This is the secret Schneerson laid bare.

The meaning of his words is this: if you wait until the day has already seized you, your soul becomes a servant of distraction. But if you take the morning as your own, you become the master of your hours. Those who begin with spiritual grounding find clarity, strength, and purpose to endure whatever storms arise. Those who do not are tossed about like leaves upon the wind. The morning is not merely time—it is opportunity.

Therefore, the lesson is clear: claim the dawn as your own. Begin each day with prayer, meditation, or reflection. Use those first moments not to worry, nor to rush, but to root yourself in what is highest. From that root grows the tree of your day, strong enough to withstand the winds of distraction. The first act of your day sets the rhythm of all the hours that follow.

In practice, I counsel this: rise a little earlier than the demands of the world. Give yourself a span of silence before the noise begins. Speak words of gratitude, read words of wisdom, or simply sit in stillness. Then, with clarity, write your intentions for the day—what matters most, what you will not neglect, and how you will guard your time. In doing so, you weave purpose into the very fabric of your hours.

Thus, remember the Rebbe’s teaching: the first moments are yours and yours alone. Use them wisely, and the day bows to you. Neglect them, and the day rules you. For those who master the morning, life itself becomes a vessel not of chaos, but of order, meaning, and light.