How to Wake Up Ready to Rock | Hacker News Reader

How to Wake Up Ready to Rock

pickthebrain.com

85 pointsCWIZO45 comments

Whenever I see an article title that indicates a list of X things that might interest me, I always find myself wanting just the bullet point list without the surrounding content (at least until I decide whether or not the bullet point list merits reading the rest of the article). So:

1. Exercise During the Day

2. Stop Work in the Middle of a Task

3. Avoid Caffeine in the Evening

4. Set Out Your Clothes the Night Before

5. Don’t Eat a Heavy Dinner

6. Journal or Read Before Bed

7. Know What You’re Doing First Thing

8. Get to Bed On Time

9. Visualize Sleeping Well

The article can indeed be digested into this bullet points. But number 2 requires some more explanation as it can't stand on its own like that. Maybe "At the end of the day, stop working in the middle of a task, to make it easy to start again the next day". But this is rather too long for a bullet point.

Another way to put it might be, "Stop before you reach a 'stopping point'." Supposedly this is one of Haruki Murakami's writing tricks.

or in a positive sense:

"leave a task opened"

We need less of these "how to be great in the morning" posts and more "how do you get through 8 hours of a mind-numbing day job and then kick-start your brain at 8pm when you can work on something interesting" posts.

Take a 25 minute nap. Seriously, try it.

Good idea, as some researchers just showed that naps work:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8524549.stm

I usually tend to turn the 25 minute nap into 2 or 3 hours. My body just doesn't want to get up in 25 minutes.

Then I think you're doing biphasic sleep, something I want to try in the future

I did this the last time I had a full time job. 3-4 hours at night before work, 3-5 hours when I got home from work. It worked just fine except about once every week or two I would take my post work lap and accidentally sleep for 12 hours through the night.

I find that cycling home, then dinner when I walk through the door after having planned what I want/need to do in the afternoon mentally on the way home or during the workday helps me a lot with this.

However this is exercise, routine, early nourishment, and knowing exactly how I'm going to get stuck in -- all things the article touches on.

If you are motivated enough and the issue of not making non-job progress nags you day in and out, you _will_ work at 8pm.

A great tip is to work on something after reaching home every single day, no matter how trivial it might be. A regular schedule essentially translates your 8pm work into a regular job - so you have to do it.

Someone mentioned take a nap, and I completely agree. Here's what you do: pack your lunch every day (its cheaper, and you'll most likely eat healthier, both making you more alert). Go to your car at noon (or whenever you take your lunch break), put the seat down and take a 30-45 minute nap. Keep the AC or heat on, and if you're like me, turn the radio on and keep it on very low volume. Set your phone to wake you up.

Go back to work, eat your lunch in front of your work station (while working, responding to emails, tickets, etc.) and you'll be very refreshed.

Eat some foods high in natural fat (uncooked/unroasted raw almonds are great) later in the afternoon, but do not eat a lot of sugar or carbs.

This has been working for a while for me so when I get home I can still work away on personal projects.

Would upmod you to heaven, were it possible! :-)

I'm in Asia and 8 hours is a fantasy, by the way. 10 hours to 12 hours is the new 8 hours here. HR folks' jaw drops when you talk about part-time, by the way.

Invert your projects. Get up earlier and work on your project before you go to the day job. When the day job is done go home and go to sleep so that you get enough rest.

If your project is fun and exciting you'll want to get up to work on it.

Sorry if this next part sounds a bit harsh, I mean it in a positive way: Consider changing your username. Identifying as "hopeless" indicates a negative attitude which will almost certainly put an anchor on your whole life.

I took it as "hopeless romantic" where the romance is found in the ideal of a successful start up.

I work at a massive Japanese company, and napping during lunch is an old trick of the trade. Between a quarter and a third of my coworkers power nap daily during lunch. We even turn off the lights for an hour, but that's meant primarily for energy conservation.

After a long hard day at a job I dislike and a pile of my own hopelessly incomplete projects staring me in the face, I couldn't agree more.

I think it's about time to quit.

Try getting a toddler in the house. There will be no more sleepins after that.

Seriously, the most important thing in this done is getting to bed on time, and having a routine in the morning. That, and don't berate yourself for a sleepin, just make an extra effort to get up on time the next day.

I honestly think that getting out of bed early and getting on with your day accounts for a large variance in personal productivity.

Exactly. Not only do my young kids help with getting up in the morning (they rise at 6-7 AM) they sufficiently wipe me out during the day to the point where sleeping isn't a problem either. Problem solved.

Nice advices. I can agree with nr. 1, but I have to admit that I break nr. 2 quite a lot of times. There's nothing like a coding session til the early morning hours! For me it's really difficult to stop in the midst of an unfinished coding task. :)

I have another advice, although it has indirectly something to do with the wake up process: Assumed you can make it to the shower, try to take a James Bond Shower (http://artofmanliness.com/2010/01/18/the-james-bond-shower-a...). I do this every morning, and it really helps :)

I think stop working in the middle of a task really should mean leave some task unfinished. Thy way, you'll know clearly where to start when you begin again. I think this was posted on HN as a hack by Hemmingway.

One point I have found really helps for me, which is also mentioned in one of the comments, is always getting up at the same time. No excuses, and this counts for weekends too. You can go to bed when you are tired, but always get up at the same time. It's hard the first few days, but after that it gets easier and easier, and I feel much "fresher" in the mornings.

Best advice is not eating anything at least 3 hours prior to bed time. Your body will do the rest and makes sure you're ready to rock in the morning.

You should also eat breakfast early and at same time each day. Don't eat breakfast when you wake up too late, so your body will remember that. ;-)

I.e. don't eat after 7:00pm, eat breakfast only between 8:00am - 8:15am, don't eat after 8:15am.

My key to waking up ready to rock is to no "hack" your biorythum.

If you are a start up and/or not working 9-5 for the "man" go with what your body tells you, sleep when you are tired, work when you are inspired, rest when you need a break.

I know "easier said than done" but is it really?

This actually does NOT work for me. I try it sometimes in the weekend, I sleep as long as my body "tells me", but then I get up at 9am and feel totally tired. I feel much better when I set my alarm clock to get up early.

What helped me was waking up at the same time every day. So if I decide 7 am is the time, no matter what time I get to bed, I wake up at the same time it really helped me not feel tired (trick credit goes to my calculus teacher in high school).

I do the same after reading an article on zenhabits.net. Of course, I get up at 5:50 am, but only because it allows me to get a seat on the bus and train.

If anyone is really interested in how sleep works and how to manage your sleep, you should really read William C. Dement's conclusive work "The Promise Of Sleep". He's a pioneer of sleep science from Stanford with a great experience and thousands of helped patients. His book is as exciting as it is useful and full of research data, analytics and explanations. A real pleasure to read. After this book, all articles would seem a drop in the ocean.

http://www.amazon.com/Promise-Sleep-Medicine-Connection-Happ...

My personal favorite is still the dawn simulator I got as a present 2 years ago:

http://evolvingworker.com/2008/5/5/how-to-wake-up-easily

I just started (today) a 30 days experiment of waking up at 5 every morning and I'm recording it on my blog. I think that going to bed early will be a key factor for this experiment, but I'm also going to try some others of those points.

Please do hang on to the experiment & keep your blog updated. I have changed my habits so that I now can get up at 5am to get an extra 3 hours of coding before heading off to work. Not every day, but when I need to, at least 3-4 days a week. I plan the days when I will wake up early in advance & go to bed early accordingly.

Rule 10: for the wintertime, invest in an electric blanket. That way you don't lose the first 20 minutes of sleep having to warm up the bed.

Coming next week: the 12 rules for helping you to remember all the other rules you learnt :-)

Buy cheap Polyester fleece blanket - they are warm like wool but easy to wash, allergy free, and very cheap (about $10). Don't torture yourself.

I think he omitted the single biggest part of helping me wake up: eat breakfast!

I use a daylight lamp this winter, which works wonders. It results in less sleep and I'm not so tired.

Locally in Scandinavia, the shops generally charged ca 200 Euro for such a lamp. I got a cheap one for 70 Euro from a net shop.

Can you post the link where you found it?

Sorry for not adding that from the beginning, I didn't want to look like I was doing advertising. :-)

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B001P1DX3Y

It only has 7000 LUX, but that was enough for me (ymmw). Read the manual about how to start using it carefully... a too large dose too fast might give headaches. (I think they have raised the price a bit since I bought mine in November.)

The same page had these links, which might be better deals. (Amazon wouldn't ship some other models outside Britain when I was going to buy.)

http://www.amazon.co.uk/SAD-Light-000-High-Lamp/dp/B000YSDHZ...

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Full-Spectrum-Lighting-LitePod-Light...

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Philips-HF3330-Seasonal-Affective-Di...

Disclaimer: I have no relationship with Amazon, except being a satisfied customer. But I'm starting to think of them as the Microsoft-of-stores.

I bought Philips "Wake-up-light" and I am happy with it.

for $200, does this thing actually work well?

I bought something similar (see my other comment in this thread) and I find it very useful (after 2 winters).

Cons: Cost is huge, quality of FM radio sound is poor, it produces 50/60HZ noise also, so I cannot place it near to my bed.

Pros: It works. I often wake up at first light or even slightly before that. :-/

I've loved this idea - and always wanted to push it a bit further. Here's my idea for a high-tech bed.

http://www.halfbakery.com/idea/TechBed#1170289786

Don't real rockers wake up with a couple of groupies and do a few lines with a fifth of Jack?

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