I have never been an early riser. For as long as I can remember I have been setting my alarm for a reasonable hour, then finding myself hitting that oh-so-tempting snooze button sometimes for two or three hours before I actually drag myself out of bed (terrible, I know!!!). For a long time I have been jealous of people who have the ability to be awake, bright eyed and bushy tailed at 7 o’clock in the morning. Now, at the ripe old age of 21, I have come to accept the fact that I am highly unlikely to wake up before 10am, unless I absolutely have to (e.g. if aliens take over Aberdeen, or if Justin Bieber tickets are going on sale that morning… you know, the important things). Some people might argue that this is a waste of valuable time which could be spent studying, or writing that all important essay. Luckily, I pride myself in being a night owl, and a productive one at that! If you can peal yourself away from a Netflix and chill session and keep your mind alert, it’s amazing what you can accomplish at 1am! Here are a few tips on how to be productive late at night if you’re like me and need that extra-long lie in the morning!
One. Drink plenty of water!
Ok, so this may seem pretty obvious as you should be drinking water all through the day, but you’d be surprised at the amount of people who don’t! Drinking water late in the evening will help maintain your concentration and keep your mind sharp for the evening ahead.
Two. Turn off social media.
There have been many occasions when I have been up late working on an assignment, but I have found myself constantly procrastinating to find out what Kimye are up to, or what Boohoo outfit I want to order for my next night out. Before I know it, it’s 2am and the only thing I’ve done is find out the age gaps between the Jonas brothers… Well, yep, you guessed it! There’s an app for that. It’s called SelfControl, and can allow you to block specific websites for a set amount of time up to 24 hours. A perfect way to help you avoid stopping at that very tempting procrastination station! You can find the app here: www.selfcontrolapp.com
Three. Listen to music.
No, I don’t mean find the latest chart playlist on Spotify- this can be very distracting, especially when working on assignments! Relaxing music without lyrics is great for keeping your mind focused on the task at hand (for example, give Ludovico Einaudi a listen). If you’re planning on using your evening to choreograph a new routine for Beyonce’s next music video, however, maybe chart music is the way to go!
Four. If you’re working on an assignment, give yourself regular breaks.
Bare this in mind for when you’re working on assignments at any time of the day! Our brains work best when we work for 1-2 hour bursts at a time, so make sure you take 10 minutes every now and then to keep your mind alert.
Five. Don’t stay up too late!
I know we’re all night owls here, but what good is it staying up until 5am doing all things productive, when you’re just going to sleep until 2pm and waste an entire day?! This can set your body clock to a very unusual sleeping pattern which can be hard to snap out of. If you can, try to limit your late nights to 1 or 2am at the very latest. This way you can still have a reasonable 6-8 hours sleep and be awake by 10am. It also means that if you need to wake up early for some reason (dun dun dun!) you won’t disturb your sleeping pattern too much. Perfect!