Ask HN: How can I get up early in the morning?
The life is too short to be sleeping a major part of it. What do you do to getting up early, or do you think it is not really important at all?
If your schedule can handle it, try just going to sleep when you are tired and seeing when you wake up (ie. don't use an alarm at all).
I tried this for about six months, and the following happened.
The first week or two I slept upwards of 10-11 hours a night, and woke up in the afternoon.
The next couple months, my schedule kind of rotated around the clock (I'd wake up about 30-45 mins later each day), but I only slept 8-9 hours.
By month four, I was only sleeping 7-7.5 hours at a time, and my schedule rotation had slowed to where it was only shifting about 15 mins a day.
The best part was that I always woke up extremely fresh and ready to go. I never felt like the walking dead, and generally was happier.
Before I tried this, I thought I was a night person, just because I always seem to stay up too late and dislike waking up... but I realized what I really liked was the quiet, and found that early morning quiet time (4-7am) was actually more productive, just because I wasn't worn out from a whole day of being awake.
Sadly I had to return to a day job for a bit before grad school, so now I survive mostly on coffee, but it was fun to try when I had the chance.
Instead of having an alarm BAM wake up, it's much more natural - you'll find yourself thinking "hey I'm awake". Much, much more pleasant.
I used to wake up to my nokia mobile phone alarm (which are excruciatingly loud). I'd snooze it about 4-5 times... Terrible habit. It would totally wreck me for the morning.
I also tend to exercise in the morning. I find this motivating. Doing this, or taking a walk, or something similar - you hit the day in peak form.
So in London in the middle of summer it's light from 5am or so and I have to use an eye-mask. That early light was not my friend. On the other hand in winter the dark at 8am wasn't my friend either. A "wake-up light" (google for "sunrise alarm clock" or "daylight simulator") for winter might help.
One thing that I noticed with the light thing is that an ultra-bright, dim-able lamp works wonders. It somehow puts me in a decent mood even if I'm sleeping at weird times.
1) No caffeine after 5-6 PM, and generally less than 100mg of caffeine per day.
2) Exercising for at least 30 minutes/day, 3-4 times/week (but not right before sleeping). Although in my case, it's closer to 5 hours total/week.
3) Avoiding too much artificial sugar in a given day. I limit it to one "thing" (pastry/small piece of pie/etc) per day. After that, just eat fruit.
4) Keeping the area in which I sleep completely free of things that would distract me from sleeping. That is, I absolutely never use my laptop, watch TV or do anything similar while laying in bed. At least for me, this has turned out to be really important (and something my doctor recommended).
Also, some things that might help:
* Create a routine; start each morning with something you enjoy (coffee or watching tv or catching up on your news).. You'll find it gives you an incentive to wake up, rather than if you knew you were just immediately getting ready and leaving
* If you feel less tired than normal on a particular day, you can drink chamomile tea, or warm milk, both of which seem to mildly increase sleepiness.
* If you're overweight or in bad physical shape, then you will sleep much better after getting in shape. So if this is the case, you should work to make it a priority.
Sometimes being out of synch with everyone can be a boon to productivity.
(That's advice given to me by a sleep expert at Hasbro Children's Hospital in Providence, RI many years ago, when I was afflicted with a rare sleeping disorder.)
She also told me never to do anything but sleep in my bed (don't read there, don't eat there, don't work, don't watch TV, etc.). Beds are for sleeping and training your brain to recognize that will help you keep to your regular sleep cycle.
If you're having trouble falling asleep, get up, go sit in a chair and read for 15 or 20 minutes, then try going to sleep again.
By the way, have a look at this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delayed_sleep_phase_syndrome
The exception I have is reading. Doesn't seem to make any difference. In fact, I usually drift off better if I read.
I am a night owl. When I'm not working, I naturally phase shift until I go to sleep at 5AM. When my workplace instituted a less flexible flex time so that I had to get there before 10AM as opposed to before noon, it allowed me to get to sleep early enough to be well rested.
I have tried drinking some tea made from lime/tilia-tree blossoms and some other plants, but it wasn't quite enough. It makes me sleepy, but just a bit and for a very short time. If I don't go to bed in the next 5 minutes or so, its effect seems to vanish in thin air.
Natural ways to induce drowsiness include sex and turkey. A good workout and a hot shower a couple of hours before bed also makes it easier for me to fall asleep.
If you got 2 hours sleep the night before, going to bed at 9pm is not too difficult.
This means no tv, no internet, loud music etc. At first, this was extremely frustrating for me, I felt that I needed some kind audio/visual stimuli to keep sane. But after a while, I started to embrace this boredom and focus my awareness inside. Sometimes I meditate, write in my journal, take a slow walk to a beautiful viewpoint or just chill out to an old Bob Dylan album and really try to focus on the music.
These days, I manage to do this about half the time, and it usually makes me calm enough to fall asleep within 30 minutes or so.
Thats pretty much it - We've all read the various sleep 'hacks' and blogs out there but the only thing that worked for me was to go to bed earlier.
Like an old man, I now go to bed at 10pm and wake up at 6 ;) - But business/work/wife dictates that I get up earlier - when I first started this schedule it felt like I had been missing out on the wonderful early mornings. I just felt a bit more 'fresher'.
My previous schedule was 1:30-2am and waking up at 9-9:30; I sorta miss being a night owl, but both work and wife make sure I go to bed early.
1) get up earlier
2) You can only shift your schedule about 1 hour per day. You can try shifting it more, but you're going to have sweater-head, nausea and hot flashes. If you go from getting up at 11 to getting up at 5, expect five days of feeling like crap.
3) The pineal gland is activated by light incident on the retina. So calculate when you need to go to sleep based on when you get up, and stop using the computer one hour prior. AND use Flux, or do something to turn down the absolute amount of light coming from your screen(s).
4) The sleep-wake cycle is naturally about 25 hours. It takes discipline to go to sleep at the same time every night. Or exhaustion.
5) Recent findings suggest that starvation can suspend the diurnal cycle 12 hours or more. So eat a good dinner.
6) Additionally, fats, proteins, warmth, and bulk activate the parasympathetic nervous system (rest and digest). Simple carbs offer none of these things. So fatty snacks are better. Unsalted nuts are a great snack (salt stimulated the cephalic phase of eating. So, sorry, but bacon is not a good snack).
7) Caffeine. Metabolized in the liver at a second-order decay rate by CYP1A2. Effective half-life is 3-7 hours.
Coffee: 30-170 mg/8oz Espresso: 30-50 mg/oz Tea: 10-50 mg/8oz (more with black teas) Soda: 30-60 mg/12oz Dark chocolate: 20mg/oz
Minimum effective concentration is around 0.05 mg/dL. Total body water is 40L for a 5'10" male (5'10" male has about a 70kg lean body mass regardless of total body weight and 40L of that is water. The 70kg and 40L vary linearly with height for adults). So those two cups of French pressed Sumatra you stopped drinking at 8:30 after a 7pm pasta dinner could easily keep you wired until 1 or 2 in the morning. Go on, have that chocolate ice cream, too.
8) Calculate when you want to get up (remember, you need to phase in the change, one hour a day). Establish a routine that starts at dinner. Eat. No more caffeine. Work. Have a small, fatty snack. Work until an hour before you need to go to sleep. Brush your teeth, change; lay down. Read something good. I recommend the classics. Doesn't really engage the problem-solving areas of your brain, but you've been meaning to start reading those things. Start with Plato. Very readable.
9) If you just absolutely have to go to sleep with noise, I recommend white noise. A beat, rhythm, or lyric will capture your conscious mind.
As for getting up, the only thing I've found that definitely will get me up without relying on sunrise is a social commitment. If surgery starts at 7 am and I need to round on patients before then, it's relatively easy to get up at 4:15. If I'm on a "research month", um, yeah.
Also, this is the least useful comment by pg i've seen in a long while. It's not even funny if you happen to be a late sleeper.
The are both very useful and correct answers to the OP. I don't think it needs to be funny. Its simply correct. Most of us have far too much to do every day and end up working too late. If you want to wake up earlier, you have to stop doing that.
I'll leave with this one (also not meant to be funny):
"Early to bed, early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise."
Somewhat off topic, you realize it's a real disservice to pg to upvote and defend any comment he makes indiscriminately? Or even with less discretion then normal.
Pink noise is much more smooth.
Answering the question is one thing, fostering good discussion is another. To foster discussion, both parties should understand each other. To help understanding, a question should not only be answered, but explained. An explanation is more helpful than a straight answer.
Make sense?
I partially blame the computer, since it seems to energize me. If I'm tired and I start using the computer I am no longer tired.
To the extent that I've solved it, I solved it after I had kids, and sleeping until 1PM became untenable for the family.
The answer for me? Wait for it: waking up early every morning.
I've learned that there is absolutely no way to predict when I'm going to fall asleep at night (even if I eliminate caffeine, use-bed-only-for-sleep, avoid stimulating reading before bed, etc); the only habit I've deliberately changed is that I never code after 10PM (a surefire way to look up and have it be 4AM).
Nope, what works for me is, whether I got to bed at 12:30A or 4:45A, I'm out of bed with the kids at 7A. If I have a bad night, I'll fall asleep the next night before 12A. Won't have any choice.
A day, a couple days, a week in sleep dep, not worth the life stress of starting the day in the afternoon.
Steve Pavlina has written a couple good articles.
Overview.
1. Go to bed when tired
2. Get up at the same time every morning. So if you don't get enough sleep one night, you'll go to bed earlier the next.
3. Don't do anything very stimulating late at night. Don't drink caffeine, or exercise late at night. Stimulating activities will keep you up to late.
4. Don't turn getting up into a problem with self-discipline, turn getting up into a habit. It's kind of corny, but practice getting out of bed during the day. Match the conditions where you get up, turn out lights, take off your work clothes, and get into bed. When your alarm goes off, jump out of bed, thrown on clothes, and do a little bit of exercise or do something else to wake you up. It doesn't matter really what you do, it just has to be consistent. After practicing a few times, it should be a habit, and you will be able to get up with your alarm when it goes off.
Part 1:http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2005/05/how-to-become-an-ea...
Part 2:http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2005/05/how-to-become-an-ea...
Getting up with an alarm clock: http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2006/04/how-to-get-up-right...
I've struggled with getting up my entire life, and so has my entire family, immediate and extended. My 18-year-old brother regularly sleeps until 1pm, as do many of my cousins and their parents. I was homeschooled growing up and the day didn't typically start until 11am. In high school, I got suspended numerous times for missing my first few classes. I joined the Navy out of HS and I pretty rarely had issues with being late because I overslept, because the military is very effective at putting the fear of God in you regarding the consequences. I still always slept until the last possible minute before getting up. After the Navy, I went back to finish college and ended up taking about 30 hours worth of classes every semester, which helped some, but I still overslept and was always jumping out of bed and rushing to class at the last second. I very often would sit down in class about 5-10 mins after having been sound asleep before. My wife was very frustrated, and I was frustrated with myself. I was sure that I had some kind of sleep disorder, especially since my whole family is like this.
So what changed? Mostly what changed is that I realized what you've realized: life is too short to sleep it away. My central problem has always been the actual act of getting up; once I'm up and awake, I'm fine. So I started looking around and I found this article by Steve Pavlina:
http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2005/05/how-to-become-an-ea...
Basically, his method is to practice getting up, in the middle of the day. Bizarre (and embarrassing), but it works. I did this every day for a few weeks, and I immediately noticed a difference.
The other big thing I did was go to bed early. Not earlier, as I typically went to bed at 1am or 2am, but early. Like 8pm. I'd go to bed at 8pm for a week and get up at 5am. That was more sleep than I usually got, and since I was doing it consistently, it got easier over time. Then I started going to bed a little later and now I usually get to bed between 9pm and 10pm. Because I'm consistent, I get better quality sleep and I can get by on 7 hours consistently.
I know it's frustrating to have someone tell you to just go to bed early, but I found that it's a lot harder than it looks, especially because you've almost always got way more to do than you have time for and it feels like you should work on some of it rather than go to bed. The key for me was realizing (after some "split-testing") that I get probably 2-3x more accomplished in the four hours from 5am - 9am that I do from 10pm - 2am.
A few other things that I found vital: - no caffeine after noon - no computer or tv within an hour of bed - keep room as dark and quiet as possible while sleeping - try to keep the same schedule on weekends - alarm clock in different room - once you're up, immediately splash water in your face - exercise several times per week - track your progress!
Try this for a month. Most people I know who have become early risers would never go back. There's something incredibly rewarding about hitting 8am having already had breakfast, worked out, showered, knocked out a bunch of emails, read all your blogs, and built two new features. In San Francisco, that means you're about two hours from when most folks even start working :)
Good luck!
I was known as somebody who's completely alarms-any alarms-"resistant". I'd set my alarm so loud and so annoying that I used to wake up my whole family and then they had to wake me up... this just couldn't go forever.
I read Steve Pavlina's article and applied his suggestion. Wow, what a difference... I experienced great results even after a couple of days of practicing.
As for the rest of the advices Ryan gives, I should probably listen to a couple of them (I already ditched coffee completely, don't watch TV before bed, but I do work on computer...) for better quality sleep, but I never really had problems sleeping - just waking up ;)
Not sure what it is, might just be not winding down -- but the light of the screen probably doesn't help imho.
I’m simply more productive and creative in the AM, so I rise each day at 5:30. For me, knowing when I'm the most please with my own production is my motivation. But, by the time 2 or 3 rolls around in the afternoon I’m all out of juice. And truth be told if I wasn’t in a corporate environment I would likely take a nap at this time to recharge.
Not sure I agree with this - For me, sleeping is just a habit. I get into the habit of staying up late, or the habit of getting up early.
This makes it sound trivial - but it's not - habits take work to form and work to change.
Naturally everyone is different. I'm sure there is research that disagrees with me :-) But that's my experience anyway.
I guess my point was - don't necessarily pigeon-hole yourself as a "night owl" or "morning person".
Don't worry about anyone else (one of the luxuries of a lot of tech jobs), find the schedule that leaves you feeling alert and awake and able to get things done. If you need 8 hours of sleep to be able to code the next day and not walk through the day in a haze - that's you. If you do well keeping a fixed schedule and not deviating, that's great. But if not, don't fight it, listen to your body.
Similarly, some people can code for 10, 12 hour stretches. Some people stop doing useful things after 4 hours without a serious break. Experiment, find what works for you, and _do not_ expect other people to work like you do. Focus on end goals, not processes.
Even by the age of 10, when I had to get up at 5:00am to deliver a paper route, I was an absolute wreck in the morning. By the time I was a High School student I would essentially spend the entire first half of the day in a sleepy haze even falling asleep in the midst of taking tests (I would jump with a start and find pencil trails running down the sheet where I had passed out). Teachers would yell at me for sleeping in their class all the time.
No I don't have narcolepsy... I was tested. Most they came back with was I have mild sleep apnea but the stupid breathing machine they give you just prevents me from sleeping even more so I quit wearing it... so I could actually get SOME sleep. ARGH!!!
I'm a lifetime overachiever in the field of sleep. If I can convert to a 7-8 hour sleep schedule, anybody can. And I've found that consistency is about the only way I can do it without feeling like crap during the day...so no more all-nighters, no matter how awesome whatever I'm working on is.
To start wake up earlier, this was tested by myself. You need to reset your brain. So don't sleep for night or two. And after go sleep on proper time. For 6-6.5h. You will be fresh as new born.
Interesting about the sleeps starts when You have idea about, training polyphasic sleep :-). Well its different story.
Basically you need a reason to wake up in the morning. If we don't have reason, then even if alarm rings, we snooze it and procrastinate waking up at the decided time.
Do all brainstorming, planning, HN/news/blogs reading in the night. And decide a clear action plan for the morning.
2. Sleep early. One of my advisers sleeps at 10-10:30 in the night, and wakes up at 4am. I tried following same pattern, and it worked flawlessly. I used to get solid work done in 4am-8am before I go to my day job.
I wish I can have that smooth wake up all the time but now he has his own kids to worry about and he's so far away from me. It'll be good if there's something emulates that feeling.
My story won't mean you anything. But I enjoyed reminiscing those nice wake ups & if I ever have to wake some one up I'll definitely do it my uncles way.
Go to bed earlier at night. Leave your blinds open to let natural light come in in the morning. Have a deadline due the next day.
On the other hand, if I'm excited about something, and feeling really interested in what will happen that day it definitely helps. So, if I open a bug on a project that I need for my work...and I think about it some the night before, I'll wake up excitedly thinking, "I wonder if my bug has been answered?" Likewise if I email someone about some work I need done; requesting quotes, whatever, for projects that I'm enthusiastic about. Today I woke up thinking about the RFQs I sent out to three designers yesterday (nothing! this is why crowdsourced design is winning...), and a bug I opened about the Drupal Project module.
Need that pressure. Love that pressure. I'll probably have a heart attack when I'm 40.
When searching more on the subject, I found this interesting text:
"This sort of smugness is prevalent among morning people, who count among their ranks Nelson Mandela, Mahatma Gandhi, nearly every American president, and even Jesus. (See Mark 1:35: "And in the morning, rising up a great while before day, he went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed.") Night people are stuck with psychopaths like Adolf Hitler and Juan Arreola, the guy in Pennsylvania who nearly killed his girlfriend's 2-year-old last year, explaining to a judge, "I'm not a morning person."" http://friendfeed.com/e/cc0e9eb4-39ff-11dd-9d6f-003048343a40...
If I don't have a reason to get up in the morning, I'm much more likely to stay in bed before I go to sleep again.
The two things that worked best for me were:
Organise every meeting you possibly can to be in the morning, and don't allow yourself to cancel.
Go to bed with something unfinished, i.e. have something to do that really propels you out of bed. An example would be leaving a piece of code not quite done, but with a good idea of how to finish it (if you haven't got a clue, it's more likely to make you want to stay in bed and make it go away, no?). Thinking about the problem while dropping off and waking up makes me just want to leap up and fix it.
Other tips, potentially irrelevant to most commenters, but that worked for me:
Give up WoW. Or at least stop playing it late at night. Seriously. The difference in sleep quality, for me, is night and day.
Hack your nutrition. Eat low-GI. Cut out soda and junk food. Let caffeine be a treat, not a staple.
Have a flatmate or loved one poke you awake. Even if they're not geographically present, having someone you love call you or tuning yourself to wake up to the sound of an incoming IM can help you boot up faster in the morning.
Read in bed, but don't read anything too interesting. I still have this backfire when I open a new book at 11pm and don't sleep 'til it's finished. Others love to journal instead, which can be a great relaxer, but I end up making todo lists which has the opposite effect.
Keep going to be earlier until you wake up when you want. Stop using an alarm clock. Be consistent.
I haven't used an alarm clock in years, and when I need to get up at 3:30 to hit the gym, its not a problem. Of course, I'm going to bed 8 hours before that too.
You can't cheat the math. If you want to get up earlier, as pg and others said, go to bed earlier.
EDIT: By nature, I have the damnedest time going to bed. I'm always immersing myself in a programming problem or a TV show or some other time sink (worthwhile or not). To fix this, I started taking melatonin an hour or so before I plan to go to sleep. I know its helped me adjust my sleep/wake cycle.
My alarm clock has proven ineffective. I'll wake up an hour after it should have woken me up and realize I turned it off in my sleep
Story about it was even posted here almost a year ago. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=199394
* My pre-alarm goes off 15 minutes early. After this alarm, I start thinking and worrying about what I need to do. When the real alarm sounds I'm ready to jump out of bed.
* I don't use the bathroom in the morning when I'm sleepy. A full bladder helps me stay awake.
* I nap whenever I can't work.
* Also, drink some water before you go to bed and don't use the bathroom, this will help you wake up in the morning.
Now I will explain my reaction so I don't just get downvoted and if you disagree with me, reply.
Most people in the world have responsibilities. Kids to feed and to take to school, chores and errands to do plus a (sometimes long) commute to a job where they cannot afford to be late (responsibilities, a boss, or both). Yet, they all manage just fine.
It also helps that my girlfriend is on a different time zone and calls me early in the morning for her good-night kiss and chit chat.
I say stay up as long as required and try to get as much done as possible. But one important thing is to maintain atleast a 12 hour overlap with other people in your team if you are in a startup. An added advantage is, there is somebody to monitor the servers round the clock ;).
I've got several alarm clocks strategically placed in my room so that I can't simply turn them off without having to actually get out of bed and because there are several of them, the resulting dissonant noise is usually enough to wake me up.
Here is some stuff about it on WebMD (http://www.webmd.com/sleep-disorders/guide/important-sleep-h...). This one does not outright link it to death, but many things which help death come knocking.
I thought this was well known, so sorry about the lack of links in the first assertion. Is that why I'm gaining negative marks, or are you shooting the messenger for the news you don't like?
Modafinil
Edit: Of course, I'm not suggesting that this is a deal breaker, or that I've 'given up', just that it's not always as simple as "just get up when the alarm goes off." I also have been known to pass the turing test in my sleep. I once convinced my wife that I had the day off when she tried to wake me up... Yea, I was really late that day.
Stress factors a lot into it for me. If I'm having a good week hardly anything strange happens in my sleep.
Go on track, run a lap in under 1:45. Now imagine you can run at that speed for a long long time, without getting tired, in the trails, near lakes, on the tiny bridges -- running rules.
Once you actually can run (not jog like many do: took me a year or so) it is great.
A 1:45 400m is fucking pathetic. I only criticized the absurdity that is long distance running.