If you were to ask anyone on planet Earth if they were a night owl or an early bird, chances are you will meet a lot of night owls. Even I would consider myself to be a night owl, if given the chance to sleep until noon every single day for the rest of my life, I would gladly take it. During my Fall semester, I tried to change my habits and enrolled in early classes so I could force myself to wake up earlier and start my day. However, this failed to work given that my 9AM was a large lecture and attendance was not mandatory. So whenever my alarm at 7:45AM would ring, I would automatically and continuously hit snooze or let the alarm ring until I had the willpower to pull myself out of bed.
Being the ambitious person I am, I decided that my course of becoming a morning person was not going to stop. Thus, for the Spring semester, I enrolled in yet another 9AM course — only this time, attendance was mandatory and the class size was 25 students. So I tried everything I could in order to achieve my goal and let’s just say, it was difficult but I got pretty close. Theses are the following methods that really helped me:
- Avoid naps
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Taking naps is something I often found myself doing on a daily basis and has become one of my “hobbies.” I would nap not because I was tired but because I was bored. I did not realize the magnitude napping had on my goal until one day I decided not to nap and genuinely went to bed tired. Being one of those people that cannot immediately fall asleep, it takes hours for my body to even achieve the first stage of sleep. Thus, staying up late made it nearly impossible for me to wake up early. Napping interrupts your body’s meridian clock and so when you try to sleep at night, you would sleep later and wake up later. So if you want to be a morning person, avoid taking naps!
- Avoid digital screens prior to bedtime
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Your phone and other mobile devices are right up there with naps when it comes to detrimental effects on your sleep. Our bodies release melatonin as a way to tell our brains that it’s time to sleep, however, being exposed to the blue light emitted from our phones can hinder this release. This reduced melatonin can make it harder to fall asleep.
- Do not hit snooze
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No one likes waking up to a blasting alarm in the early morning, so the first instinct is to stop the noise and what better way than to hit the snooze button. By hitting snooze and hoping for more sleep, you are making yourself sleepier and when you finally get up, you feel groggier. If you are unable to give up the snooze button, try placing your phone further away from your bed. This forces you to physically get up and encourages you to start your day as opposed to getting back in bed.
- Be productive
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Start off your day with something that encourages you to get out of bed (e.g. that workout you’ve always wanted to try or try out a new breakfast recipe). By starting your day with something productive, that productivity is more likely to stretch out for the rest of that day. In the end, you get a larger sense of accomplishment and may feel motivated to do more the following day.
- Have a nutritious breakfast
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One of the most important meals of the day is breakfast. It is the first meal you have before starting your day and that can determine your physical and mental wellbeing for the rest of the day. By eating too many carbs and sugars, your body can feel depleted later in the day, so skip that donut! Additionally, eating a more protein-packed meal not only increases your sense of pleasure, it also affects your motivation levels through the regulation of dopamine.
Although performing all these methods did help me, it may be different for you. Everyone is different and their bodies are unique in their own way, you may have different methods to help you wake up earlier. Despite this, it is biologically universal for everyone’s body to have routine so if you have a routine that works for you, stick with it! If not, make a new routine and maybe occasionally change things up, if you feel the need to do so. Additionally, changing old habits does take time so please be patient! With that being said, good luck everyone!