I've always been a negligent sleeper. From November 8-14, my sleep app clocked an average of 5 hours and 7 minutes in bed every night. Throughout the month of November, I clocked an average of 5 hours and 52 minutes. This is unhealthy and leads to intense challenges in keeping up productivity and a happy social life. I have tried everything I could from alternative sleep methods and "willing myself" to wake up, to systematic sleep deprivation. Here are 7 tips to help you wake up in the morning.
1. Have a reason to wake up.
If you have no good reason to wake up, you are going to spam your snooze button until it breaks. It doesn't have to be an urgent reason like an appointment or a deadline. Sometimes, having an early routine is good enough of a reason, if it gets you awake and ready for what comes later in the day. Avoid getting up just before an important event.
2. Try to set several alarms.
I have grappled with the urge to shut off my alarm every day. Mesai made a short animation titled "Alarm"
that sums up my attitude toward these digital heart attack generators. Unless you're confident in your ability to wake up at a specific time or go to bed early enough, you're going to need to set several alarms. I have an alarm clock and a phone alarm. That tends to be enough for me, but I have distinct memories of getting up, pulling my alarm clock out of the wall, and going back to bed.
3. Start the morning off right.
If you don't treat yourself to a routine of some kind, you're going to be miserable and drift right back to sleep. I start off my day with some optional yoga and mandatory coffee. If I have time, I'll do some reading or watch some videos to relax before I start work. I also have mornings when I wake up with five minutes to get ready for the day before starting my shift. On these days, productivity is low and my blood pressure is high.
4. Monitor your progress.
My girlfriend opened my bullet journal and made me a chart that allows me to record the time I fall asleep, the time I wake up and the total hours per night. This may have been in response to me going to sleep at 4:30 am last night. Either way, it's something I've tried in the past that will always be a neat tool to help me understand where I need to improve my sleeping schedule.
5. Take a pragmatic approach.
When it comes to waking up early, nobody is asking you to cling to a set of principles. Do what works, change it up. If your routine stops working for you, break it up. When you get up in the morning, you start to shift your circadian rhythm and adjust to whatever got you up. Sometimes it gets easier to wake up early, sometimes harder.
7. Stay out of bed once you wake up.
The fatal error once you commit and wake up is going back to bed. I feel the urge to crawl back into my sheets about half an hour after I wake up, and then right after I eat my lunch. This is a killer, and it's cost me hours in a day before. I remember waking up a while back to an irritated call from my boss one afternoon asking where I was. Not fun.
If you take anything from this, it should be that getting up can be painfully difficult sometimes. There is no perfect method and no "quick trick" that's going to be a perfect solution that works for the rest of your life. See what works best for you, and remember these tips.
If you like what you just read, consider checking out my other work on Medium and at samuelsprage.com. You'll find links to my social media and my work. I have a lot to say, so I'm just going to write it down.
