Do you what the hardest part in having a full time corporate job was? You might take a guess but it was not about dealing with a great amount of work, not about having to work in an open space with other 50 people, not about not being able to take time off whenever you wanted. It was the horror or waking up each morning at 6am. And I know, I have my share of friends who have absolutely no issue with waking up at 5 or 6am. But I am only able to hold a conversation at that hour after a few cups of coffee. If you share the same morning issue as me, don’t stop reading!
It was rather hard to convince myself that waking up early was worth the horror, but after a thorough research, I managed to come up with a few good reasons:
For once, you have more control over your day. I mean, it’s only logical, if you wake up at 6 am, add to that the hours you spend in the office and you are still left with a great amount of daylight (unless it’s winter, but you get the point).
Also, studies have shown that early risers really do get the job done.[i] You would also become better at problem solving and anticipating issues in the first place. Doesn’t sound like that bad of a trade does it now?
Another funny thing that the same study came up with is that the number of hours slept per night actually has little to do with your proactivity throughout the day. You know what does, though? The quality of your sleep. Pay attention to your distractors, they might be there even if you don’t notice them. Background noise is one of the main sleep distractors that force you to wake up unintentionally.
Now you might ask yourself: does waking up earlier in the morning imply that you will become more proactive? I’m sorry to say it does not. It seems that proactivity might actually be rooted in conscientiousness.
You can make your morning brain calm down. Have you ever experienced waking up in the morning and almost instantly your brain goes racing around thoughts such as “wow we have so much to do today, we will never accomplish all of our tasks, we will never get it done. Oh and think about that event on Friday and that social thing on Wednesday” Now it’s high time you hit the stop button! You know how you can stop that annoying inner voice? By actually waking up early and getting stuff done! I bet it would stop nagging!
My advice for you is to take it step-by-step. I mean, if you are not a morning person, waking up early will be a real headache that you slowly need to adjust to. You can start waking up earlier with half an hour each day until you reach your target waking up hour.
Another thing that helped me cope better with these terrible mornings was planning. Need coffee? Get it ready in the evening. Need clean neat clothes? Get them done the day before. Anything that can be done a day early, do it so that you don’t add to your morning frustration useless tasks.
Another tiny secret to help you get through mornings is to eradicate the snooze button from your life! The snooze button is not your friend, ok? It will only make waking up more difficult. So the first time the alarm rings, that’s it, no point in lying further in bed!
I hope this will help you at least a bit on the long run to cope with mornings and finally beat the late waking ups. In case you have any tips or tricks that worked for you and made you hate mornings less, feel free to share them with us since there are a few late “wakers” amongst us as well. Until then, as Beyoncé said, ring the alarm and wake up!
[i] https://hbr.org/2010/07/defend-your-research-the-early-bird-really-does-get-the-worm
