I am 100% not a morning person. I can sleep in until 11am with no problem, and I despise waking up, feeling cold, groggy, and tired. Since I have later classes in college, I have gotten into the habit of waking up later, and it has really thrown off my productivity. So, as an experiment, I wanted to force myself to wake up at 7am for one week and see if it changed my daily routine. Here’s what happened:
Day One: Monday, Feb. 6th
Not surprisingly, I failed day one. My alarm went off at 7 AM and I snoozed until 8. My excuse is that I was up late for the Super bowl, but really I’m just not a morning person at all and have had a bad habit of hitting snooze 4+ times every morning since high school. I felt pretty good all day, and started getting tired around 6pm, which is normal for me. I feel asleep at 11:30 PM.
Day Two: Tuesday, Feb. 7thOddly enough, I ended up waking up naturally at 6:50 AM, which is unheard of for me. Once I got up I was able to get some homework done in peace and quiet until class at 9:30. Exhaustion hit around 3 PM, but once I got a second wind, (thank you, caffeine) I was able to be pretty productive all day. I was so tired that I ended up falling asleep at 10:30 PM.
Day Three: Wednesday, Feb. 8thWaking up at 7 AM was difficult as I did not sleep through the night. I woke up about 5 or 6 times, probably because I was so stressed about everything on my to-do list. But I woke up and went to class at 9AM, then meetings, and then did six hours of homework. I was exhausted and in bed by 9:30 PM.
Day Four: Thursday, Feb. 9thFunnily enough, I woke up naturally at 7, despite the snowstorm, cancelled classes, and a perfect reason to sleep in. I got laundry done and got a head start on my work, and was able to do a lot within the morning hours. However, I did sneak a little nap in at around 2 PM, which interfered with my trying to fall asleep when I needed to.
Day Five: Friday, Feb. 10thOn my last day, I woke up at 7AM and was able to do homework and relax a little before going through 8 hours of class. I was bit sluggish throughout the afternoon (I had not time to get any caffeine) and was completely exhausted by 7PM. I had no problem getting into bed and falling asleep before 11PM.
Waking up at 7 AM every morning (except Monday) did a lot for me in terms of productivity, and it’s definitely something that I want to keep doing. I felt better about the course of my days waking up early than I did by sleeping in. I was able to fit in more homework, exercise, and time to do all the things I am usually rushing around to finish. Overall, I think my week-long experiment was a success.
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