You may have seen the memes about how you’ve played yourself the second you decide “I’ll just wake up early to finish my homework.” And man-oh-man, have I been there. In high school, I’d get home in the evenings after volleyball or cheer practice. This didn’t leave me with a lot of hours to eat dinner, finish my assignments and take a well-deserved rest. I wasn’t about to pass on eating. Or sleeping.
I guess that leaves homework.
You know what? I’ll just wake up an hour earlier tomorrow morning and finish this assignment, I’d think to myself as I yawned and struggled to keep my eyes open. You already know how the story goes. Did I wake up early? Nope. Did I still try to do this on 20 separate occasions thinking somehow I’d be a different person capable of different things? Yep.
I know. I was a fool.
But was I? Here’s the crazy thing, and I never thought I’d say this, but those days of committing to early mornings and bailing on my alarm clock are gone. In fact, it is 6:13 a.m. as I write this. What am I doing up so early? Well, for your information, I have been awake for more than an hour. My alarm goes off at 5:11 every morning (don’t ask me about the extra 11 minutes, this is something I can’t explain) and I’m starting my day by 5:30 a.m. the absolute latest. Waking up at 5 has been an absolute game changer. (sigh, or 5:11 ok?? I just feel like I want a little more time to sleep and 12 minutes seems excessive, but 10 doesn’t seem like enough. I know it’s weird, let’s just move past this.)
I’ve been doing this for over a month now and I honestly feel like a different person. I am getting more done than I ever have before. I honestly understand that meme now about having the same amount of hours in the day as Beyonce. I feel those hours being put to good use now. Is this what Beyonce feels like? Oh my gosh. Am I… almost like Beyonce? Wow.
Nothing worth having comes easy, though. The transition to waking up crazy early, if you choose to accept this mission, is going to be a little rough, especially if you’re someone who is used to waking up at 9 or 10 a.m. most days. It will take a couple of weeks for your body to fully transition and for you not to feel like a zombie.
Here are three quick tips for switching over to being an early bird:
1.) Start getting ready for bed at 8 p.m. It’s early, I know. But you’re going to be more productive with those hours in the morning when you’ve had a good night’s rest. Think about it. Were you actually getting real things done past 8 or were you distracted, scrolling through Instagram on your bed?
2.) Put your alarm far away. It’s a no-brainer. If you’re forced to get up and walk across the room to shut it off, you’re more likely to just stay awake and start your day. Bonus points if you have roommates like I do, because I run to turn off my alarm so that nobody gets mad at me for waking them up at 5. I’m in full adrenaline mode at the point and ready to go.
3.) Stick to it. I don’t know the science of habit, but I’m willing to bet my Thin Mints (shout out to Girl Scouts cookies season) that there are dozens upon dozens of books that explain it. And I’m sure the books read something like: Yo my science readers, just keep doing it —a habit is doing something over and over until you’re not thinking about doing it anymore, so yeah it’s going to be rough in the beginning, but once you pass the hump, you’re set.
If you want to feel almost like Beyonce, too, set those alarms. According to Owaves.com, she likes to wake up at 6am on Sundays, so you’ll actually have an hour on her. You can tell everyone you beat Beyonce at something. That alone should be enough encouragement.
In case it’s not, below are just a few ways my life has changed since waking up early.
School
Unlike my naive 17-year-old self who thought she could wake up at 5:30 a.m. to finish incomplete school assignments, brilliant, fabulous 23-year-old me is actually capable of it now. Just last night, I realized I wasn’t going to be able to finish studying so I pushed it to this morning. I didn’t panic or freak out, which is my usual nature. I just went to sleep, knowing I was waking up 4 and a half hours earlier than the start of my first lecture.
And by the time I get to my first class, I may as well have built Rome by then (I guess it can get built in a day when you’re waking up at 5.) I get so much done by 9 or 10 a.m. I used to never even get this much done in an entire day. The great thing about morning studying is that there are no distractions. No one is texting me, none of my roommates are making noise and nothing interesting is happening on social media. (I actually deleted everything except Facebook and put a website blocker on my laptop– more on this in a different post.)
The world is quiet and peaceful. It’s the perfect time to be productive.
Exercise
I go to the gym now. If you know anything about me, you’d be flabbergasted to hear that I even have a gym membership, but working out is now a normal part of my routine. I’m usually at the gym for an hour between 5:30 and 7 a.m. getting a good run in. I love being there early because it’s pretty empty compared to how it gets between 5:30 and 7 p.m. There are always machines available, and I don’t worry about being overwhelmed and intimidated by the amount of strong, fit people.
I also have the energy to work out now because I’m consistent in getting 8 hours of sleep. So yes, you really should be asleep by 9 p.m. and plan your schedule around that if you’re climbing onto this morning wagon. But like I said earlier, it’s not like you were going to be doing anything productive (probably, I don’t know you! Props if you were going to study.) You’re sleepy, distracted and drained from the day. Just save it for the morning when you’re refreshed.
Passion projects
The biggest benefit of waking up at 5 a.m. for me has been finding the time to work on passion projects. I’ve wanted to write a book since I knew what a book was. I never got around to working on it because I never thought I had the time. The truth is, I always had the time but I had trouble utilizing it because I was being inefficient with the hours in my day. If I work on homework or studying during the early hours, I will probably check so many things off my to-do list. This means that once my classes are over, I can dedicated a couple of hours to working on my book without feeling worried or anxious about studying. Maybe you’ve always wanted to learn how to surf or play the piano.
If you commit to waking up early every single day, you’ll find that you sometimes have more hours than you know what to do with. And what a fabulous problem to have.