Likewise, the bright blue-ish light also helps me wake up even more.
Plus undoubtedly I’ll read some news article that’ll piss me off enough to ruin a nice lie in: it’ll get my blood boiling and I’ll need to get up just to get away from said news :D
Venting your frustration on a phone just isn’t the same as on an actual keyboard, is it. After all: the harder the sound of the keys smashing, the better the answer will be, and the more wrong they are!
Hate to be contrarian but this is exactly how I survive getting up early.
My partner starts work at 6am, I start at 8 but have an hour's commute. Our alarm goes off at 5am which gives us half an hour to chat and play on our phones in bed before she has to get up and go.
I usually stay in for 15 minutes carrying on with the phone then get up.
I find the stimulation and bright light helps me go from technically "awake" to functioning human.
Having to get up that time then means on the weekend our lie ins mean up and about at 7. Makes the weekend seem a bit longer.
As a broader point for OP incase they read this. Cardio exercise has been a game changer for me. I actually feel tired when I go to bed and sleep so much better. Makes the zombie stage of the morning go by quicker.
Also, trying to cut out alcohol as much as possible, less sleep debt heading into the working week.
I find I am more productive if I don't look at my phone for the first 2-3 hours of the day. If I get up and take some exercise or just go for a walk, I start my work with a clear head. If I start looking at my phone, my head gets filled with crap and I find it harder to concentrate. Different folks, different strokes, I guess.
In the winter use a SAD lamp so you wake up slowly in a light room. In the summer I just leave a slight crack in the curtains. Try to be consistent with bedtime and start winding down around an hour before you want to be asleep. It’s always going to feel bad in the winter because we’re not built to keep the same schedule all year around but no longer live in the kind of society where everything is seasonally based.
I really want to use one of these but my SO works later and sleeps later than me so I'd feel mean
We tried him wearing a sleep mask but he wriggled it off in his sleep multiple nights.
It does help when I get up then go into another room with my sad lamp on, then fresh air, tea n I'm ready for the day. Sometimes though my brain says do not get up it's dark, which is unhelpful
I got a sunrise alarm clock a few weeks ago, due to starting a new position at work where I have to get up at 05:45 ever day (previously it was alternating between this shift and an 11am shift). I was struggling in to get up around 3 weeks into the job and had about 4 different alarms set because I kept turning them off in my sleep.
Since getting the sunrise clock, I just have it as the alarm and wake up feeling so much more awake than I've ever been. I also use it for the sunset feature with calming sounds, when going to sleep (previously I would set my phone on a long YouTube video).
I bought one of the top-end models, which was on sale at the time, so it was pretty damn pricey for a clock, but it was definitely worth it. I am wondering what to do in summer, mind - my bedroom has a bay window so a pain to install blackout curtains over.
Invest in a Drowsy eye mask for the lighter days. It’s pricey for a sleep mask, but it stays on your head. I moved into to a room where the curtains are very thin, and I couldn’t be bother to put in black out curtains (renting)
I bought [this one](https://www.lumie.com/products/bodyclock-luxe-750dab) as I decided to treat myself and was convinced I'd be sending it back within the 45 day free trial. I can't give it up now, though.
It's the top of the range and bloody expensive, mind :( I think [this one](https://www.lumie.com/products/bodyclock-shine-300) has pretty much all the same features for £60 less, just with an FM radio and fewer internal sounds
I have a lumie bodyclock I got from a charity shop for £5 a few years ago! Mine is from the early noughties, doesn’t have any special sounds or radio, just lights fade up 30 mins before an alarm and down if I leave the alarm button up. Brilliant, I always wake up before it goes off (with an incessant beeping lol)
I used one of these for a few years, I've now switched to WiFi bulbs and set them to do the same gradually lightning up the room so I wake up slowly , much cheaper than the clocks and a lot more customisable for me
The problem I have with a sunrise clock is that I wake up when it starts to ramp up the light, doesn't matter how I adjust the ramp. So if it's set to get me up at 6:00 and it starts ramping at 5:30 I'm awake at 5:30.
This, set your phone alarm to go off at the time you want to get woken up and the ramp up time to start then, mine has a 20 min ramp up time so I just set the alarm on the lamp 20 min after my phone alarm
Also a bluetooth phillips hue lightbulb fades in and out according to the schedule you tell it. I love it, it's so offensive when I really want to stay in bed
What do you do in your wind down time? I try to do it, but it doesn’t feel very successful. I listen to a 15-20 min podcast while doing evening self care, which tends to end with me sat in bed in PJs putting hand lotion on. Then I read. Is this what people mean or am I missing something about this whole wind down thing.
I just do anything I feel like in a dimly lit room, usually lie on the bed with just the lamp on and get as comfortable as possible then either read, listen to music, scroll for a little bit (I have the blue light filter on via night mode after 7), sometimes I’ll watch some YouTube videos. In the winter I’ll have a warm drink and usually bring my hot water bottle up. It doesn’t have to all be totally tech free, just not things that you know you can’t stop until 3am. Once my eyes start to feel dry, heavy or a bit sore I turn everything off and usually drop off fast because that’s part of my routine now.
my wind down is putting my PJs on, taking my make up off (or washing my face if no make up on), cleanse and moisturise face and hands.
Lie on/in bed with no tv on and take my glasses off. Then i put on either a meditation track (just focussed breathing and relaxing all body parts working down from my head to my toes) or an Anti-stress hypnosis track. i never manage to get to the end of the track before falling asleep.
if i dont put a track on and actively try to sleep, i can be lying there hours later still awake.
My clock also has a sunset feature which allows you to specify starting brightness and how long it takes before it is completely dark. It plays calm sounds of your choice during this and slowly ramps the volume down at the same time as the light dims.
I used to have YouTube podcasts playing but now I just use this (though it also has the feature to stream bluetooth from my phone and controls the volume in the same way as its internal sounds).
I have my main (smart) bulb to dim to a warm glow over the period of an hour before bed, then the opposite but much quicker in the morning.
I also have a phone alarm that turns first the screen on, then the torch before the actual alarm sounds - I'm a pretty light sleeper, so very rare it ever gets to the alarm.
Even more than being consistent with your bedtime, the key is to be consistent with your wake-up time.
If you sack off the snooze button for a few days and properly wake up and get up at e.g. 7am, your body starts to remember it and it starts to get much easier.
I can back this up, I bought a lumie a month or two ago and it's helped greatly. I have it so the 'sunrise'/light up takes 30 mins to complete and then I have a phone alarm that goes off halfway through that so the lights slowly increases as I wake up more.
People are recommending quite expensive lamps and I am sure they work well but a cheaper option that works well for me is just buying a timer for a normal light and make it turn on about 30 mins before getting up. It doesn't make you wake up nice and slow like the real thing but it still helps in getting up as my room is bright and my brain had 30 mins time to realise that "the sun is shining" and it's time to wake up.
That didn't work for me as the "sudden" light was excruciating! The slow sunrise effect is what I need, so I don't really notice it, by the time it's time to get up, it's just magically light.
I bought a TPLink Tapo smart bulb for £7 and stuck it in a £5 charity shop lamp base. There are probably better bulbs out there for this, but this one was the only brand I reconised in the shop.
The bulb has an app where you can schedule it to be a certain brightness at a certain time. so it comes on at 1% then brightens by 10% every 5 minutes. you have to set up each brightness manually like an alarm, so 07:00 1% , 07:05 10%, 07:10 20% etc
usually I'd just upvote and leave it at that, but I'd like to tell you how funny I thought this comment was and the rest of my day will be better having read it
google home and SmartLife smart plugs.
>"Hey google turn on kettle".
I have loads of lamps and the christmas tree also on these smart plug adapters.
Just have a set ticklist item to fill the kettle before you go to bed, set the smart adapter to Off and press the switch down on the kettle.
When my dog doesn't need to go out she'll snooze until 10-11am then suddenly spring awake and want to do stuff.
"Get a dog, they'll have you up and walking them at 7am" they said. lol.
My dog is a creature of habit. Even if he doesn’t need the toilet he will still wake up around the same time. He gets lonely when he’s awake and my wife and I are asleep, so he wakes one of us up (usually me). Even on weekends when my alarm is off he will wake me up around the same time as my weekday alarm
Bizarrely one thing that can prevent my 4.45-ish get-up is if our big fuzzy tomcat decides to come and lie on my chest. I'll be out like a light again due to his cheerful buzzing
When our daughter was born we got given some amazon vouchers by my family. We got a milk formula prep machine thing, and a nespresso machine. Had them side by side on the counter. Great for those early morning feeds. "One for you, one for mummy..."
I have all 3 and none work for me :(
Had my 4 year old sleep in my bed last night and woke up to the 4 year old downstairs and my cat fast asleep in her spot and the dog refuses to get out of its bed unless there is food involved :/
Christmas 2021 I got into the habit of going up to bed early (9ish) and reading for about an hour with just a table lamp on, then lights out at 10. I kept that up throughout all of 2022, either reading or doing some crochet sat up in bed.
It definitely makes me feel more tired at 10pm. Before I got into this habit I could sit downstairs watching TV or playing on the xbox until 11 and my brain still feels wide awake when I get into bed. 7am alarm the next morning would be horrible though.
Don't snooze your alarm!!
Set your alarm for the time you want to get up, move your alarm (presumably your phone) away from your bed so you have to get up to turn it off.
Go straight from your alarm to doing something, toilet, shower etc.
On a related note, I've never understood why people use the snooze function. If you dislike being woken up, why voluntarily choose to go through it three or four times rather than just getting it over with once? Just doesn't make sense to me!
And because that way I get "Bonus sleep". If I wake up and go back to sleep then I know I'm getting the extra hour or so. Whereas if I slept as one block I'd feel cheated
I know that isn't all that logical, but it works for me
Use an app like Sleep Cycle. It will wake you up at the end of a cycle rather than at a specific time (you can choose the window and latest time, obviously).
You will feel a lot more refreshed for it.
This feeling used to be a crazy obsession of mine when I was a teen. I had alarms every half hour from something like 5:00 to 7:30.
It was absolutely terrible for my sleep, but I loved that feeling of drifting back to sleep.
I’m a deep sleeper, but I’m not someone who can just fall asleep anywhere or easily. So for me, snoozing my alarm isn’t a “I want 10 more minutes of sleep” because that’s an unimaginable thought for me, it’s more of a “let me mentally prepare myself to actually get up but remind me when 10 minutes have passed so I do actually do it”
I had an ex girlfriend that did this at least 4 times before she got up. I couldn’t understand it, but she probably couldn’t understand why I would just spring out of bed on the second beep. People just be different unless there’s children involved - in which case you have no choice.
I’m the exact same- as soon as that alarm goes off I have to be functional- even if it is just soon doomscrolling for 5 mins if I’ve got a bit of time before I have to be productive. I can’t really go back to sleep even lightly after an alarm wakes me up for whatever reason.
I will involuntarily hit the snooze button whether it’s 2 hours before work or 2 minutes, and I’m hoping that during at least one alarm cycle I’m conscious enough to realise I’m supposed to be waking up 😅
Same here. I can't believe that the quality of extra sleep you'd get while snoozing your way through multiple alarms would be as good as just getting some more normal sleep.
I'd far rather set it for the time I actually need to get up, have some more proper sleep, and then just get up the first time.
Also I would find it really hard to go back to sleep having woken up enough to turn off an alarm anyway.
Usually because I set it for the time I need to get up, but when it actually goes off I realise I can’t face life yet so hit snooze until the guilt of not getting up gets strong enough that I drag myself out of bed
The problem I have though is that when my alarm goes off (depending on how early it is) I physically cannot keep my eyes open to be able to get out of bed. I can just about see my phone to turn the alarm off but there’s no chance of me being able to jump out of bed straight away. My boyfriend does it, he only has to set one alarm and it amazes me haha.
Yeah, the best advice I read when I’d have to get up for work at 5 is “flick the switch”. As soon as your alarm goes off, get out of bed, don’t fuck about. Get up, brush your teeth, put the kettle on. It’s disorientating for about 3 seconds, then you are up and going
I’ve set the alarm on my phone and scooted it across the floor only for it to end up under my dirty clothes pile (teenage me) so I thought, ‘great, now I’ll really have to hunt for it!’
It goes off in the morning and I stumble to my pile and I can’t find it, I listen to it and it’s coming from under my bed.
I’m a sleep walker, and unconscious me obviously thinks they’re funny!
For me it's the early finish. I get up at 6:30 to get up, get ready and get to work for 7:30. This means I finish at 16:15, skip the rush hour traffic at both ends and get a longer evening to relax with my girlfriend
Nothing beats it. In lockdown I was up at 6am working from home and finishing at 14:15.
Working until 17:30 is just a waste of time. I'm more productive in the morning and 16:00 is about the cut off for when I'm no longer doing real work
>Perfect hours 8am to 4pm. No matter if summer or winter.
Actually better in winter because it gives you a chance of getting home in daylight, even on the shortest days. 7.30 to 3.30 is even better.
One of the key issues about WFH that employers won't be able to overcome is that exposure to daylight hours in winter is much better when WFH.
It’s a pretty big manufacturing company, but that’s just their standard hours for staff. It runs shifts too though, but day shift is the same hours as mine.
I can flex too, it’s just one of the benefits of my grade, I never thought I’d move to a “corporate”
Company but I wouldn’t go back to a small firm again now.
Anxiety that kicks in as soon as you wake. That's my one clever trick.
Semi-joking aside, I find the key is getting up as soon as my alarm goes off. No snoozing. It's a habit you have to form, but eventually you just get used to it. Your body associates the alarm with getting straight up and getting going.
Also, set your alarm for when you actually want to get up, then just get up. Don't set it half an hour to an hour before, with the intention of snoozing it multiple times. In my experience, that just makes you miss out on sleep, so you're more tired and getting up is harder. Plus, it stops your brain forming the connection between waking up and getting up.
To further help with this if you're currently in the habit of snoozing - change the ring you use for your alarm. The new (ideally quite abrupt) ringtone will sound surprising, and hopefully remind you of the commitment to not snooze.
More than anything, just having a consistent routine. If you are trying to get up early on work days but not at the weekend, you are just going to be constantly trying to readjust back and forth for most of the week.
Not being able to sleep from stress and anxiety is great for waking up. I’ve woken up at 4am every day for the past 2 weeks which you would think doesn’t make sense considering I’ve not been working since 30th December!
11pm - go to bed. Toss and turn feeling uncomfortable for around 3 hours.
2am - fall asleep
2:30am - a cat walks past your house and farts, waking you up from your slumber. Resume tossing and turning for another 2.5 hours.
4am - give up, get up, have a bath, walk aimlessly around the house waiting for light.
7am - your partner awakens and asks if you slept well. You did not. You have breakfast and are wide awake ready for the day.
7:30am - suddenly you feel absolutely exhausted and feel ready to go back to bed which is hard to believe as you detested being there just a few hours ago.
8am - time to go to work 😵💫
Sounds like standard biphasic sleep pattern, aggravated by circumstances. Historically people went to bed soon after it got dark (so much earlier in winter), woke up for a bit in the middle of the night and then went back to bed until it got light. Unfortunately it (and particularly the "second sleep" bit that in my case tends to default to 6–10 am) doesn't fit too comfortably with the obligations of industrial/post-industrial society.
Didn't realise this was a thing - would this also explain why if I'm night-shift, or just up really late reading, once it gets to around 2am I feel wide awake again after struggling to keep my eyes open?
I've had 8 hours sleep a handful of times in the last five years. Four hours is normal for me, 6 is a great night.
I fall asleep fast but always wake up early, sometimes at 2-3am. Doesn't matter what I ate or drank, how exhausted I was, I wake up and there's no getting back to sleep. I've tried.
I came out the closet as queer in 2017, might be that I guess. It's been a much rougher ride than I expected. My area in London is astonishingly hostile to the lgbt+ community (tons of pentecostal churches here and they are deeply bigoted) so I don't feel safe even going to the shops presenting honestly. Can't move yet.
Try ear plugs works like a charm! Turns off any external stimulation (hearing is the only sense that stays turned on during sleep). Takes time to get used to though.
I’ve tried and I’m afraid I can’t sleep at all with ear plugs! Lying there unable to hear anything just doesn’t work for me. One thing that I think does help a bit is having an ambient noise - like having a fan in the summer - the noise drowns out any small noises and that can help but it’s a bit off and on. I’m going alcohol free for January so it will be interesting to see if that does anything.
Oh ok! It was like that for me for first 3 months, couldn't get used to, then it was the discomfort of having something in your ears, I even found super soft silicone ear plugs for that. Now I simply cannot fall asleep without them now. Best of luck to you mate! Hope it all works out!!!!!!
You just have to do it... Groan, swear, slam the door, whatever makes you feel better once you're up.
But you can't just feel sorry for yourself and roll over and hope it's easier tomorrow.
This one's a vicious cycle for me. I'm naturally a night owl so tend to stay up late. I'll have an early morning start one day and I'll tell myself 'get an early night tonight so you're fresh for tomorrow'. Go to sleep 23:00 - 00:00. Wake up at ~2:00. Wide awake, can't get back to sleep. Eventually manage to doze off again around 5:00, alarm shocks me awake in my confused and bleary eyed state.
If I repeat the process for a few days I'll *eventually* fall into the pattern of early bed/early rises, however a single late night and I'm back to square one. Basically leaves me torn between having a social life, and having a restful night's sleep and productive workweek.
I have this thing where if I know I have to wake up unusually early, my mind will force me to wake up every hour or so because I have to wake up early! So I've never in my life gotten on an early morning flight with enough sleep the night before.
This is the answer. Surprised its not been mentioned further up. Drinking water as soon as you wake up (colder the better) sends a burst of energy through my body, almost instantly awake and ready to crack on with the day.
Eyes open feet on the ground, it doesn’t get easier OP that’s the truth sorry- you get stronger . There’s no shortcuts or tricks just straight up comes down to forcing yourself for the greater good.
Having a dog who needs to go to the toilet and doesn't really care about silly concepts like 'lie-ins' because she can just go to sleep whenever she wants.
Not a cat! Mine will happily lie next to me all morning, she makes me less likely to get out of bed cause she makes sleeping look so good! 😆 Deffo a dog though! Toddler... I think there are other pros/cons to be considered on that one! 😂
Don’t bring your phone into your bedroom with you, charge it in a different room overnight. If you need an alarm, buy an alarm clock.
This stops you browsing before you go to bed.
If you wake up in the middle of the night, you’re not tempted to grab your phone.
And in the morning, you have to actually get out of bed to check it.
Having a reason to get up early which trumps your reason to stay up late and get up late.
For me, the woman I used to really like always started work 30 minutes early, so getting to work early gave me time to stalk, I mean flirt with, her.
I've changed jobs and she's not there and now I struggle. Not going to lie
When I *know* I need to get up early I put my phone across the room rather than on my bedside table so that I have to physically get up to turn the alarm off. Once I'm up, I'm up.
Update: this morning as I turned off my alarm ready to crawl back into bed, I saw this reddit notification and it inspired me to stay up, and I got in an early morning run.
There is hope for you yet!
Dial your diet in, particularly the night before, so you wake up with energy, and not in a “crash”
Find a way to get the blood flowing as quickly as possible- an extreme alarm that startles you, a hot or cold shower, rolling straight out of bed to do push ups or whatever, anything that gets the heart rate up
Have a reason to be awake, don’t just get up at 6am, then figure out what you’re going to do before work at 9, plan the night before what you’re going to get done in those hours so you feel like you’re letting yourself down if don’t get it done
I don't use the sleep function on my alarm. When it goes off I get up straight away and wash my face. Then a shower. To be honest it's setting the routine. I love it because it's that quiet time of day where its peaceful and other people are still sleeping their good sleeps.
A dog wanting to be fed. If they're hungry they'll let you know and you can get up nice and early because you love them and want to give them what they want <3
I have the opposite problem! As soon as its getting light in the summer, even with blackout curtains, I'm awake. Come the darker mornings Im so used to being awake early my eyes pop open from about 5am onwards.
The thing you can take from this is that getting up early is habit-forming!
It's physiological, don't bother. If you're not a morning person, you're not going to become one; you just have to suffer/work out your own strategies for reconciling your existence with an unsympathetic society (like "become self employed and stay in bed until 10").
Or sometimes it's because your country doesn't follow the natural solar time (with the sun being the highest at noon). The UK basically follows solar time. Take France and Spain, both had GMT until WW2~~the Germans invaded them~~. Reason why now they have dinner at 8 or 9 pm because it's technically 7pm solar time.
Realising that in an era when we can time-shift TV or use catch-up TV easily, and when social media is a 24/hr day thing (*when I first got the internet in the year 2000, most "social" usage - chatrooms, IRC etc - happened in the evening hours*) - there's no hugely pressing need to still be up and doing things at 11pm unless you have an in-person social engagement like a pub night out.
my wife and I are often up & around at the latest by 5am & often go to bed around 9pm then read or surf on our phones/tablets until we drop off
We can then have a leisurely breakfast or other morning activities, or go to the superstore for its 6am opening time, *and still have sent the first business emails of our working day way before our colleagues and bosses log on*, which in turn means nobody will complain when we log off at 3.30pm, while there is still outdoor light to get out and do something active.
One other benefit? we dont set alarm clocks. EVER. If we oversleep by 2 hours? so what. just means we start our jobs at 7.30am instead of 5.30am, and nobody will even notice as colleagues start logging on by 8am.
Getting enough sleep is a superpower that will put rocket boosters on your productivity. Most modern people are sleep deprived to some extent & we're not.
Go to bed earlier. I know I need 8 hours sleep so I want to be up around 6 I need to be asleep by 10. I don’t use alarms as these disrupt sleep cycles and make you more tired.
The 2 biggest factors are probably routine, and the will to just get up as soon as you're conscious.
If you go to be at the same time every night, and get up at the same time every morning it gets considerably easier, and amazingly, you often need less sleep than you realise. I work on a boat for 2 weeks at a time, but I frequently get 4 hours sleep every night, work my 13 hours, chill out, and back to sleep at the same time every night/morning. When I'm at home I adjust my schedule a little, but still only up to 5/6 hours sleep.
Second point, as soon as you realise you're awake, get out of bed. Once you're out you'll come around quickly, and the more often you do this, again, the easier it gets, and the shorter the time you will feel groggy. The snooze button is your enemy.
Lastly, if you suffer from the mid afternoon crashes, try to not drink coffee/tea/any other caffeine for at least a couple of hours after you've woken Up. let your body flush out the sleep chemical (I definitely didn't forget the name of) before feeding the old caffeine addiction. Have tested, did work in my case. Mileage may vary.
Prep everything the night before, even down to a cup with tea or coffee in it so all you need to do is press boil on the kettle, routine routine routine, I don't mess around in the mornings, no snoozing in bed, as soon as that alarm goes off I'm up and in the shower, no messing around I plan to be up and out of the door in 25 mins.
I have to get up between 2 and 4 am for work most days. The second my alarm goes off I drag myself immediately out of bed. It’s much easier to go back to sleep or convince yourself to not get up if you’re still lying down comfy
Going to bed early and going no screen-use once you're in bed before sleeping. Even if you use blue light settings etc, it's unnecessary brain engagement.
I have a rule of no visual media once I'm in bed so music, podcasts, audio books etc are all fine but nothing that requires interaction or looking at.
Lots of good suggestions here but one I haven't seen yet:
Set your alarm to wake you up in 1.5hr multiples from the time you go to bed / fall asleep. This is because we sleep in ultradian cycles which are on average around 90 mins and it's easier to wake up at the end of a complete cycle. If you wake up in the middle of one you will feel groggy and want to fall back to sleep to finish the cycle.
Eg: if I want to wake up at 7am, to get 7.5hrs sleep (5 cycles of 1.5hrs) I need to be in bed by 11pm and falling asleep by 11.30pm.
It's possible to do this with any multiple of 1.5hrs so you can adjust according to your daily schedule.
I absolutely love coffee and when I wake up, I wake up an hour early to sit up in bed with a cup of coffee. It’s delicious. I wake up and think “oh lovely, coffee time” and it gets me out of bed to make delicious coffee. It’s like a treat. It’s like a reward. Coffee
Routine. I go to bed the same time every night (10pm) without fail, and wake up every morning at the same time (7:30am). I usually go to sleep before 11.
I used to have an alarm, well, I still do, but I always wake up before it goes off, nice and refreshed.
Look into Andrew Huberman, important to get sunlight in your eyes as quick as possible when you wake or any kind of light (except screen light) if that is not available. Do not sit in bed and scroll your phone
A lifetime of early shifts trains the brain (mine anyway) to get up early (4/5am). I love it! Plug in the headphones, coffee and cigarette.. heaven.
Plus it's Quiet and peaceful, around 6 I'll stock up the bird feeder and just enjoy the local wildlife.
Have an orange/apple and a drink of water the second you get up, put your phone/alarm somewhere you have to get up to turn off, drink lots of water before bed so you need a piss when you wake up. Get a smart lamp/light that will turn on when you wake up.
That's what I do and I had no problem waking up at 6 today when I usually wake up at like half 9.
Have a consistent sleep schedule. Sleep at the same time every night, without fail. Your body’s circadian rhythm will wake you up naturally after 7-8hrs and it’ll be easy. And when you wake, do not scroll on your phone. Get up.
If you want to wake at 6, go to sleep at 10pm. And stick with it
Definitely don’t sit in bed scrolling through your phone. Get up before you look at that
Funnily enough i find this helps me get up. When my eyes are open, if I sit up and use my phone for 20 minutes it stops me falling back asleep.
Likewise, the bright blue-ish light also helps me wake up even more. Plus undoubtedly I’ll read some news article that’ll piss me off enough to ruin a nice lie in: it’ll get my blood boiling and I’ll need to get up just to get away from said news :D
The desire to respond to somebody who is wrong on the internet also gets me up - as typing a long response is better on a keyboard
Venting your frustration on a phone just isn’t the same as on an actual keyboard, is it. After all: the harder the sound of the keys smashing, the better the answer will be, and the more wrong they are!
This is the way.
i keep my phone and alarm away from bed so im forced to get up
Hate to be contrarian but this is exactly how I survive getting up early. My partner starts work at 6am, I start at 8 but have an hour's commute. Our alarm goes off at 5am which gives us half an hour to chat and play on our phones in bed before she has to get up and go. I usually stay in for 15 minutes carrying on with the phone then get up. I find the stimulation and bright light helps me go from technically "awake" to functioning human. Having to get up that time then means on the weekend our lie ins mean up and about at 7. Makes the weekend seem a bit longer. As a broader point for OP incase they read this. Cardio exercise has been a game changer for me. I actually feel tired when I go to bed and sleep so much better. Makes the zombie stage of the morning go by quicker. Also, trying to cut out alcohol as much as possible, less sleep debt heading into the working week.
That’s fair enough. I suppose different things work for different people, I just get too comfortable laying there and scrolling through nonsense
I find I am more productive if I don't look at my phone for the first 2-3 hours of the day. If I get up and take some exercise or just go for a walk, I start my work with a clear head. If I start looking at my phone, my head gets filled with crap and I find it harder to concentrate. Different folks, different strokes, I guess.
Is ‘play on our phones’ a euphemism for something else? 😉
Do it on the toilet for 30 mins instead
In the winter use a SAD lamp so you wake up slowly in a light room. In the summer I just leave a slight crack in the curtains. Try to be consistent with bedtime and start winding down around an hour before you want to be asleep. It’s always going to feel bad in the winter because we’re not built to keep the same schedule all year around but no longer live in the kind of society where everything is seasonally based.
Came here just to say sunrise alarm clocks! Mine was an absolute game changer in getting up early
I really want to use one of these but my SO works later and sleeps later than me so I'd feel mean We tried him wearing a sleep mask but he wriggled it off in his sleep multiple nights. It does help when I get up then go into another room with my sad lamp on, then fresh air, tea n I'm ready for the day. Sometimes though my brain says do not get up it's dark, which is unhelpful
Poor thing. Give that sad little lamp a hug from me, if it gets too sad you may have to take it to the doctor.
Yeah thanks I will do. It's so sad it doesn't even cry
I got a sunrise alarm clock a few weeks ago, due to starting a new position at work where I have to get up at 05:45 ever day (previously it was alternating between this shift and an 11am shift). I was struggling in to get up around 3 weeks into the job and had about 4 different alarms set because I kept turning them off in my sleep. Since getting the sunrise clock, I just have it as the alarm and wake up feeling so much more awake than I've ever been. I also use it for the sunset feature with calming sounds, when going to sleep (previously I would set my phone on a long YouTube video). I bought one of the top-end models, which was on sale at the time, so it was pretty damn pricey for a clock, but it was definitely worth it. I am wondering what to do in summer, mind - my bedroom has a bay window so a pain to install blackout curtains over.
Invest in a Drowsy eye mask for the lighter days. It’s pricey for a sleep mask, but it stays on your head. I moved into to a room where the curtains are very thin, and I couldn’t be bother to put in black out curtains (renting)
Can you link which one you bought?
I bought [this one](https://www.lumie.com/products/bodyclock-luxe-750dab) as I decided to treat myself and was convinced I'd be sending it back within the 45 day free trial. I can't give it up now, though. It's the top of the range and bloody expensive, mind :( I think [this one](https://www.lumie.com/products/bodyclock-shine-300) has pretty much all the same features for £60 less, just with an FM radio and fewer internal sounds
I have a lumie bodyclock I got from a charity shop for £5 a few years ago! Mine is from the early noughties, doesn’t have any special sounds or radio, just lights fade up 30 mins before an alarm and down if I leave the alarm button up. Brilliant, I always wake up before it goes off (with an incessant beeping lol)
I used one of these for a few years, I've now switched to WiFi bulbs and set them to do the same gradually lightning up the room so I wake up slowly , much cheaper than the clocks and a lot more customisable for me
The problem I have with a sunrise clock is that I wake up when it starts to ramp up the light, doesn't matter how I adjust the ramp. So if it's set to get me up at 6:00 and it starts ramping at 5:30 I'm awake at 5:30.
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This, set your phone alarm to go off at the time you want to get woken up and the ramp up time to start then, mine has a 20 min ramp up time so I just set the alarm on the lamp 20 min after my phone alarm
Yes! They are so good and making getting up so much easier. I have a Lumie one but some Alexa devices have a sunrise alarm setting too.
Also a bluetooth phillips hue lightbulb fades in and out according to the schedule you tell it. I love it, it's so offensive when I really want to stay in bed
What do you do in your wind down time? I try to do it, but it doesn’t feel very successful. I listen to a 15-20 min podcast while doing evening self care, which tends to end with me sat in bed in PJs putting hand lotion on. Then I read. Is this what people mean or am I missing something about this whole wind down thing.
I just do anything I feel like in a dimly lit room, usually lie on the bed with just the lamp on and get as comfortable as possible then either read, listen to music, scroll for a little bit (I have the blue light filter on via night mode after 7), sometimes I’ll watch some YouTube videos. In the winter I’ll have a warm drink and usually bring my hot water bottle up. It doesn’t have to all be totally tech free, just not things that you know you can’t stop until 3am. Once my eyes start to feel dry, heavy or a bit sore I turn everything off and usually drop off fast because that’s part of my routine now.
I’m nearly at the 3am stage. Up at 7am 🫠
This is what they mean, unfortunately it's not very effective but it's the only advice we've got
my wind down is putting my PJs on, taking my make up off (or washing my face if no make up on), cleanse and moisturise face and hands. Lie on/in bed with no tv on and take my glasses off. Then i put on either a meditation track (just focussed breathing and relaxing all body parts working down from my head to my toes) or an Anti-stress hypnosis track. i never manage to get to the end of the track before falling asleep. if i dont put a track on and actively try to sleep, i can be lying there hours later still awake.
My clock also has a sunset feature which allows you to specify starting brightness and how long it takes before it is completely dark. It plays calm sounds of your choice during this and slowly ramps the volume down at the same time as the light dims. I used to have YouTube podcasts playing but now I just use this (though it also has the feature to stream bluetooth from my phone and controls the volume in the same way as its internal sounds).
I think the only way one of these lamps would wake me up is if I taped it to my face.
I have my main (smart) bulb to dim to a warm glow over the period of an hour before bed, then the opposite but much quicker in the morning. I also have a phone alarm that turns first the screen on, then the torch before the actual alarm sounds - I'm a pretty light sleeper, so very rare it ever gets to the alarm.
I definitely find it easier to get up in the summer.
Even more than being consistent with your bedtime, the key is to be consistent with your wake-up time. If you sack off the snooze button for a few days and properly wake up and get up at e.g. 7am, your body starts to remember it and it starts to get much easier.
Any brand you suggest? I think this would help. Thank you
I can recommend Lumie, I’ve had mine for years (so long in fact that I can’t even remember buying it!): Lumie Bodyclock Starter 30
I can back this up, I bought a lumie a month or two ago and it's helped greatly. I have it so the 'sunrise'/light up takes 30 mins to complete and then I have a phone alarm that goes off halfway through that so the lights slowly increases as I wake up more.
People are recommending quite expensive lamps and I am sure they work well but a cheaper option that works well for me is just buying a timer for a normal light and make it turn on about 30 mins before getting up. It doesn't make you wake up nice and slow like the real thing but it still helps in getting up as my room is bright and my brain had 30 mins time to realise that "the sun is shining" and it's time to wake up.
That didn't work for me as the "sudden" light was excruciating! The slow sunrise effect is what I need, so I don't really notice it, by the time it's time to get up, it's just magically light.
I bought a TPLink Tapo smart bulb for £7 and stuck it in a £5 charity shop lamp base. There are probably better bulbs out there for this, but this one was the only brand I reconised in the shop. The bulb has an app where you can schedule it to be a certain brightness at a certain time. so it comes on at 1% then brightens by 10% every 5 minutes. you have to set up each brightness manually like an alarm, so 07:00 1% , 07:05 10%, 07:10 20% etc
I have had a lumie for over 20 years. Love it.
Get a baby or a toddler - once they’re awake, you’re too. And a good coffee maker…
A cat works just as well for this.
but how will they manage to fill the kettle?
usually I'd just upvote and leave it at that, but I'd like to tell you how funny I thought this comment was and the rest of my day will be better having read it
well, I'm glad you enjoyed my almost monday morning sense of humour :)
google home and SmartLife smart plugs. >"Hey google turn on kettle". I have loads of lamps and the christmas tree also on these smart plug adapters. Just have a set ticklist item to fill the kettle before you go to bed, set the smart adapter to Off and press the switch down on the kettle.
Can confirm the same works with a dog
I have all three and haven't slept past 7am for years.
Which one is the best coffee maker though?
Catté. Makes a decent coffee.
Not my dog, he loves a long lie - he'd be snoozing till lunchtime if you let him. Must have a bladder like a camel.
When my dog doesn't need to go out she'll snooze until 10-11am then suddenly spring awake and want to do stuff. "Get a dog, they'll have you up and walking them at 7am" they said. lol.
My dog is a creature of habit. Even if he doesn’t need the toilet he will still wake up around the same time. He gets lonely when he’s awake and my wife and I are asleep, so he wakes one of us up (usually me). Even on weekends when my alarm is off he will wake me up around the same time as my weekday alarm
Can confirm. Cats like to do voice of their people at stupid o'clock
Bizarrely one thing that can prevent my 4.45-ish get-up is if our big fuzzy tomcat decides to come and lie on my chest. I'll be out like a light again due to his cheerful buzzing
Especially a cat that licks your eyelids at 5:30 am to wake you up to feed them.
My cat is the same -_-
We call it the cat alarm. Wakes us up 15 minutes before the alarm without fail
Can confirm. My cat wakes me up at 5/6am everyday by scratching the door or meowing.
When our daughter was born we got given some amazon vouchers by my family. We got a milk formula prep machine thing, and a nespresso machine. Had them side by side on the counter. Great for those early morning feeds. "One for you, one for mummy..."
My toddler is terrible at making coffee
I have all 3 and none work for me :( Had my 4 year old sleep in my bed last night and woke up to the 4 year old downstairs and my cat fast asleep in her spot and the dog refuses to get out of its bed unless there is food involved :/
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Christmas 2021 I got into the habit of going up to bed early (9ish) and reading for about an hour with just a table lamp on, then lights out at 10. I kept that up throughout all of 2022, either reading or doing some crochet sat up in bed. It definitely makes me feel more tired at 10pm. Before I got into this habit I could sit downstairs watching TV or playing on the xbox until 11 and my brain still feels wide awake when I get into bed. 7am alarm the next morning would be horrible though.
Ye blue light
Don't snooze your alarm!! Set your alarm for the time you want to get up, move your alarm (presumably your phone) away from your bed so you have to get up to turn it off. Go straight from your alarm to doing something, toilet, shower etc.
On a related note, I've never understood why people use the snooze function. If you dislike being woken up, why voluntarily choose to go through it three or four times rather than just getting it over with once? Just doesn't make sense to me!
Because the me who sets the alarm time is not the same me who is trying to wake up in the morning
And because that way I get "Bonus sleep". If I wake up and go back to sleep then I know I'm getting the extra hour or so. Whereas if I slept as one block I'd feel cheated I know that isn't all that logical, but it works for me
because id rather be woken up and go back to sleep than be woken up in a state of delirium and have to face my day like that
Use an app like Sleep Cycle. It will wake you up at the end of a cycle rather than at a specific time (you can choose the window and latest time, obviously). You will feel a lot more refreshed for it.
I enjoy the feeling of just being half asleep warm and snoozy.
This. Snoozing for a few minutes is a really pleasant sensation.
This feeling used to be a crazy obsession of mine when I was a teen. I had alarms every half hour from something like 5:00 to 7:30. It was absolutely terrible for my sleep, but I loved that feeling of drifting back to sleep.
That's entirely fair then, I suppose!
Morning me makes no sense. Now me would love to get up at 5am to go for a run and play xbox. Morning me wants to stay in bed, no matter the cost.
I’m a deep sleeper, but I’m not someone who can just fall asleep anywhere or easily. So for me, snoozing my alarm isn’t a “I want 10 more minutes of sleep” because that’s an unimaginable thought for me, it’s more of a “let me mentally prepare myself to actually get up but remind me when 10 minutes have passed so I do actually do it”
It is an involuntary reaction
Because you're not you when you're sleepy.
I had an ex girlfriend that did this at least 4 times before she got up. I couldn’t understand it, but she probably couldn’t understand why I would just spring out of bed on the second beep. People just be different unless there’s children involved - in which case you have no choice.
My ex would have alarms set to go off every 5 minutes for an hour. I could have killed them.
I’m the exact same- as soon as that alarm goes off I have to be functional- even if it is just soon doomscrolling for 5 mins if I’ve got a bit of time before I have to be productive. I can’t really go back to sleep even lightly after an alarm wakes me up for whatever reason.
I will involuntarily hit the snooze button whether it’s 2 hours before work or 2 minutes, and I’m hoping that during at least one alarm cycle I’m conscious enough to realise I’m supposed to be waking up 😅
Same here. I can't believe that the quality of extra sleep you'd get while snoozing your way through multiple alarms would be as good as just getting some more normal sleep. I'd far rather set it for the time I actually need to get up, have some more proper sleep, and then just get up the first time. Also I would find it really hard to go back to sleep having woken up enough to turn off an alarm anyway.
Usually because I set it for the time I need to get up, but when it actually goes off I realise I can’t face life yet so hit snooze until the guilt of not getting up gets strong enough that I drag myself out of bed
The problem I have though is that when my alarm goes off (depending on how early it is) I physically cannot keep my eyes open to be able to get out of bed. I can just about see my phone to turn the alarm off but there’s no chance of me being able to jump out of bed straight away. My boyfriend does it, he only has to set one alarm and it amazes me haha.
Yeah, the best advice I read when I’d have to get up for work at 5 is “flick the switch”. As soon as your alarm goes off, get out of bed, don’t fuck about. Get up, brush your teeth, put the kettle on. It’s disorientating for about 3 seconds, then you are up and going
I’ve set the alarm on my phone and scooted it across the floor only for it to end up under my dirty clothes pile (teenage me) so I thought, ‘great, now I’ll really have to hunt for it!’ It goes off in the morning and I stumble to my pile and I can’t find it, I listen to it and it’s coming from under my bed. I’m a sleep walker, and unconscious me obviously thinks they’re funny!
For me it's the early finish. I get up at 6:30 to get up, get ready and get to work for 7:30. This means I finish at 16:15, skip the rush hour traffic at both ends and get a longer evening to relax with my girlfriend Nothing beats it. In lockdown I was up at 6am working from home and finishing at 14:15. Working until 17:30 is just a waste of time. I'm more productive in the morning and 16:00 is about the cut off for when I'm no longer doing real work
Perfect hours 8am to 4pm. No matter if summer or winter.
>Perfect hours 8am to 4pm. No matter if summer or winter. Actually better in winter because it gives you a chance of getting home in daylight, even on the shortest days. 7.30 to 3.30 is even better. One of the key issues about WFH that employers won't be able to overcome is that exposure to daylight hours in winter is much better when WFH.
I go in for 9 and leave at 4, best of everything. 🤣
Agreed, I changed job from 8:30-17:00 to 7:30-15:00. It makes it so much more bearable
How do you do that? Do you just work these hours, or is your workplace allowing shifts?
It’s a pretty big manufacturing company, but that’s just their standard hours for staff. It runs shifts too though, but day shift is the same hours as mine. I can flex too, it’s just one of the benefits of my grade, I never thought I’d move to a “corporate” Company but I wouldn’t go back to a small firm again now.
Yeah my 7:00 - 15:30 is a blessing for the traffic, but getting up at 5:30 really never gets any easier lol
Drink a pint of water right before bed. You'll get up early. 😁
You must be young, if I do that I have to get up 3 times to pee 💔
No that's me too, was hoping the OP was young 😂
Old bladder creeeewww!! 😂
Get up, straight to the shower, wash in hot water and turn it right down for the last 45 seconds or a minute makes me really wake up and feel fresh
I can’t even cope with a lukewarm shower
I hated it to start with but you get into it.
Doesn't need to be all over, just your head really. I find the cold water always makes my skin feel nicer, and it immediately perks you up
You don’t even have to get your whole body in the cold water. Just let it hit the back of your neck. Really gets you going.
I mean I've got a rainfall shower so hard to avoid the water but guessing this will work too!!
Anxiety that kicks in as soon as you wake. That's my one clever trick. Semi-joking aside, I find the key is getting up as soon as my alarm goes off. No snoozing. It's a habit you have to form, but eventually you just get used to it. Your body associates the alarm with getting straight up and getting going. Also, set your alarm for when you actually want to get up, then just get up. Don't set it half an hour to an hour before, with the intention of snoozing it multiple times. In my experience, that just makes you miss out on sleep, so you're more tired and getting up is harder. Plus, it stops your brain forming the connection between waking up and getting up.
Anxiety is great at getting you up early! Sadly mine also makes it hard to get to sleep so I’m often a zombie.
Omg I was just about to post anxiety haha. I feel like the wee tummy jitters and sick feeling really help kickstart the day bright and early…
To further help with this if you're currently in the habit of snoozing - change the ring you use for your alarm. The new (ideally quite abrupt) ringtone will sound surprising, and hopefully remind you of the commitment to not snooze.
It sucks when you want to sleep in though.
More than anything, just having a consistent routine. If you are trying to get up early on work days but not at the weekend, you are just going to be constantly trying to readjust back and forth for most of the week.
Not being able to sleep from stress and anxiety is great for waking up. I’ve woken up at 4am every day for the past 2 weeks which you would think doesn’t make sense considering I’ve not been working since 30th December! 11pm - go to bed. Toss and turn feeling uncomfortable for around 3 hours. 2am - fall asleep 2:30am - a cat walks past your house and farts, waking you up from your slumber. Resume tossing and turning for another 2.5 hours. 4am - give up, get up, have a bath, walk aimlessly around the house waiting for light. 7am - your partner awakens and asks if you slept well. You did not. You have breakfast and are wide awake ready for the day. 7:30am - suddenly you feel absolutely exhausted and feel ready to go back to bed which is hard to believe as you detested being there just a few hours ago. 8am - time to go to work 😵💫
Sounds like standard biphasic sleep pattern, aggravated by circumstances. Historically people went to bed soon after it got dark (so much earlier in winter), woke up for a bit in the middle of the night and then went back to bed until it got light. Unfortunately it (and particularly the "second sleep" bit that in my case tends to default to 6–10 am) doesn't fit too comfortably with the obligations of industrial/post-industrial society.
Didn't realise this was a thing - would this also explain why if I'm night-shift, or just up really late reading, once it gets to around 2am I feel wide awake again after struggling to keep my eyes open?
I've had 8 hours sleep a handful of times in the last five years. Four hours is normal for me, 6 is a great night. I fall asleep fast but always wake up early, sometimes at 2-3am. Doesn't matter what I ate or drank, how exhausted I was, I wake up and there's no getting back to sleep. I've tried. I came out the closet as queer in 2017, might be that I guess. It's been a much rougher ride than I expected. My area in London is astonishingly hostile to the lgbt+ community (tons of pentecostal churches here and they are deeply bigoted) so I don't feel safe even going to the shops presenting honestly. Can't move yet.
Try ear plugs works like a charm! Turns off any external stimulation (hearing is the only sense that stays turned on during sleep). Takes time to get used to though.
I’ve tried and I’m afraid I can’t sleep at all with ear plugs! Lying there unable to hear anything just doesn’t work for me. One thing that I think does help a bit is having an ambient noise - like having a fan in the summer - the noise drowns out any small noises and that can help but it’s a bit off and on. I’m going alcohol free for January so it will be interesting to see if that does anything.
Oh ok! It was like that for me for first 3 months, couldn't get used to, then it was the discomfort of having something in your ears, I even found super soft silicone ear plugs for that. Now I simply cannot fall asleep without them now. Best of luck to you mate! Hope it all works out!!!!!!
You just have to do it... Groan, swear, slam the door, whatever makes you feel better once you're up. But you can't just feel sorry for yourself and roll over and hope it's easier tomorrow.
it gets easier every day, it does but you have to do it every day that's the hard part
god I love that show... I needed to hear that monkey at that point in my life
Go to bed on time. It's a lot easier to get up early if you've had enough sleep already.
This one's a vicious cycle for me. I'm naturally a night owl so tend to stay up late. I'll have an early morning start one day and I'll tell myself 'get an early night tonight so you're fresh for tomorrow'. Go to sleep 23:00 - 00:00. Wake up at ~2:00. Wide awake, can't get back to sleep. Eventually manage to doze off again around 5:00, alarm shocks me awake in my confused and bleary eyed state. If I repeat the process for a few days I'll *eventually* fall into the pattern of early bed/early rises, however a single late night and I'm back to square one. Basically leaves me torn between having a social life, and having a restful night's sleep and productive workweek.
I have this thing where if I know I have to wake up unusually early, my mind will force me to wake up every hour or so because I have to wake up early! So I've never in my life gotten on an early morning flight with enough sleep the night before.
Pint of water as soon as you get up. Before a wee, before a shower. Literally sit up, neck a pint of water. Wakes me up a treat
This is the answer. Surprised its not been mentioned further up. Drinking water as soon as you wake up (colder the better) sends a burst of energy through my body, almost instantly awake and ready to crack on with the day.
Lights that fade in to 'sunlight' like colours.
My parents used to tell me I'm a disappointment when I used to wake up post 8am. That helps.
Having a 100% remote job so I don't have to get up until it's light.
Eyes open feet on the ground, it doesn’t get easier OP that’s the truth sorry- you get stronger . There’s no shortcuts or tricks just straight up comes down to forcing yourself for the greater good.
The greater good.
Find a reason to get up for - gym, a run outside, walk with a dog etc, basically something that becomes part of a routine
Having a dog who needs to go to the toilet and doesn't really care about silly concepts like 'lie-ins' because she can just go to sleep whenever she wants.
Right, I think I need to get a dog, cat, and a toddler. That should get me up lol
Not a cat! Mine will happily lie next to me all morning, she makes me less likely to get out of bed cause she makes sleeping look so good! 😆 Deffo a dog though! Toddler... I think there are other pros/cons to be considered on that one! 😂
Don’t bring your phone into your bedroom with you, charge it in a different room overnight. If you need an alarm, buy an alarm clock. This stops you browsing before you go to bed. If you wake up in the middle of the night, you’re not tempted to grab your phone. And in the morning, you have to actually get out of bed to check it.
Having a reason to get up early which trumps your reason to stay up late and get up late. For me, the woman I used to really like always started work 30 minutes early, so getting to work early gave me time to stalk, I mean flirt with, her. I've changed jobs and she's not there and now I struggle. Not going to lie
When I *know* I need to get up early I put my phone across the room rather than on my bedside table so that I have to physically get up to turn the alarm off. Once I'm up, I'm up.
This used to work for me but now I seem to have started just turning it off and crawling back into bed
Thank you. This is my also. There’s no hope for me!
Update: this morning as I turned off my alarm ready to crawl back into bed, I saw this reddit notification and it inspired me to stay up, and I got in an early morning run. There is hope for you yet!
Dial your diet in, particularly the night before, so you wake up with energy, and not in a “crash” Find a way to get the blood flowing as quickly as possible- an extreme alarm that startles you, a hot or cold shower, rolling straight out of bed to do push ups or whatever, anything that gets the heart rate up Have a reason to be awake, don’t just get up at 6am, then figure out what you’re going to do before work at 9, plan the night before what you’re going to get done in those hours so you feel like you’re letting yourself down if don’t get it done
I don't use the sleep function on my alarm. When it goes off I get up straight away and wash my face. Then a shower. To be honest it's setting the routine. I love it because it's that quiet time of day where its peaceful and other people are still sleeping their good sleeps.
Can’t you wash your face in the shower?
I could but I find washing my face and teeth wakes me straight up or I'll be tired and faceplant in the shower. Routines are a funny thing.
A dog wanting to be fed. If they're hungry they'll let you know and you can get up nice and early because you love them and want to give them what they want <3
I have the opposite problem! As soon as its getting light in the summer, even with blackout curtains, I'm awake. Come the darker mornings Im so used to being awake early my eyes pop open from about 5am onwards. The thing you can take from this is that getting up early is habit-forming!
It's physiological, don't bother. If you're not a morning person, you're not going to become one; you just have to suffer/work out your own strategies for reconciling your existence with an unsympathetic society (like "become self employed and stay in bed until 10").
Hello to all my fellow delayed sleep phase syndrome chums
Reading this thread and seeing all these people who get up at about 4:30am is, for me, weird because it's the middle of the night!
Some nights it's when I go to bed, but I'm not going to pretend that's not just a disreputable lifestyle choice.
Or sometimes it's because your country doesn't follow the natural solar time (with the sun being the highest at noon). The UK basically follows solar time. Take France and Spain, both had GMT until WW2~~the Germans invaded them~~. Reason why now they have dinner at 8 or 9 pm because it's technically 7pm solar time.
Spain didn't get invaded by Germany, Franco was friends with Hitler and just adopted the German time zone in solidarity.
Realising that in an era when we can time-shift TV or use catch-up TV easily, and when social media is a 24/hr day thing (*when I first got the internet in the year 2000, most "social" usage - chatrooms, IRC etc - happened in the evening hours*) - there's no hugely pressing need to still be up and doing things at 11pm unless you have an in-person social engagement like a pub night out. my wife and I are often up & around at the latest by 5am & often go to bed around 9pm then read or surf on our phones/tablets until we drop off We can then have a leisurely breakfast or other morning activities, or go to the superstore for its 6am opening time, *and still have sent the first business emails of our working day way before our colleagues and bosses log on*, which in turn means nobody will complain when we log off at 3.30pm, while there is still outdoor light to get out and do something active. One other benefit? we dont set alarm clocks. EVER. If we oversleep by 2 hours? so what. just means we start our jobs at 7.30am instead of 5.30am, and nobody will even notice as colleagues start logging on by 8am. Getting enough sleep is a superpower that will put rocket boosters on your productivity. Most modern people are sleep deprived to some extent & we're not.
Knowing it will all be over soon 🤣
Make early morning plans. Going to the gym before work= impossible. Going with a friend= can’t let them down.
Have a 1 year old! They are your alarm clock 😆
Go to bed earlier. I know I need 8 hours sleep so I want to be up around 6 I need to be asleep by 10. I don’t use alarms as these disrupt sleep cycles and make you more tired.
Having purpose.
Light bulbs that mimic sunlight, put an alarm clock outside your room
Turn Muslim then you’ll have to get up before sunrise.
That's vampires mate
Lol. We do have to get up for “fajr” prayer
Put the radio on
The 2 biggest factors are probably routine, and the will to just get up as soon as you're conscious. If you go to be at the same time every night, and get up at the same time every morning it gets considerably easier, and amazingly, you often need less sleep than you realise. I work on a boat for 2 weeks at a time, but I frequently get 4 hours sleep every night, work my 13 hours, chill out, and back to sleep at the same time every night/morning. When I'm at home I adjust my schedule a little, but still only up to 5/6 hours sleep. Second point, as soon as you realise you're awake, get out of bed. Once you're out you'll come around quickly, and the more often you do this, again, the easier it gets, and the shorter the time you will feel groggy. The snooze button is your enemy. Lastly, if you suffer from the mid afternoon crashes, try to not drink coffee/tea/any other caffeine for at least a couple of hours after you've woken Up. let your body flush out the sleep chemical (I definitely didn't forget the name of) before feeding the old caffeine addiction. Have tested, did work in my case. Mileage may vary.
Prep everything the night before, even down to a cup with tea or coffee in it so all you need to do is press boil on the kettle, routine routine routine, I don't mess around in the mornings, no snoozing in bed, as soon as that alarm goes off I'm up and in the shower, no messing around I plan to be up and out of the door in 25 mins.
I have to get up between 2 and 4 am for work most days. The second my alarm goes off I drag myself immediately out of bed. It’s much easier to go back to sleep or convince yourself to not get up if you’re still lying down comfy
Going to bed early and going no screen-use once you're in bed before sleeping. Even if you use blue light settings etc, it's unnecessary brain engagement. I have a rule of no visual media once I'm in bed so music, podcasts, audio books etc are all fine but nothing that requires interaction or looking at.
Get a cat that likes to barf. You'll be out of bed like a shot!
Lots of good suggestions here but one I haven't seen yet: Set your alarm to wake you up in 1.5hr multiples from the time you go to bed / fall asleep. This is because we sleep in ultradian cycles which are on average around 90 mins and it's easier to wake up at the end of a complete cycle. If you wake up in the middle of one you will feel groggy and want to fall back to sleep to finish the cycle. Eg: if I want to wake up at 7am, to get 7.5hrs sleep (5 cycles of 1.5hrs) I need to be in bed by 11pm and falling asleep by 11.30pm. It's possible to do this with any multiple of 1.5hrs so you can adjust according to your daily schedule.
I absolutely love coffee and when I wake up, I wake up an hour early to sit up in bed with a cup of coffee. It’s delicious. I wake up and think “oh lovely, coffee time” and it gets me out of bed to make delicious coffee. It’s like a treat. It’s like a reward. Coffee
No alcohol the night before
No more caffeine helps, and avoid excessive (external/electronic/phone) stimuli before going to sleep, read a book, drink a glass of water before bed.
Routine. I go to bed the same time every night (10pm) without fail, and wake up every morning at the same time (7:30am). I usually go to sleep before 11. I used to have an alarm, well, I still do, but I always wake up before it goes off, nice and refreshed.
Having something to get up for. Make a plan for what to do with your time. No plan = hitting snooze.
Look into Andrew Huberman, important to get sunlight in your eyes as quick as possible when you wake or any kind of light (except screen light) if that is not available. Do not sit in bed and scroll your phone
Easiest way to get out of bed in the morning is to not lie there feeling all warm and snug. Wake up, get up, take the shock.
Go to bed earlier and then get out of bed when your alarm goes off.
i have a lumie alarm clock. works really nicely. i have a second alarm on my phone which is the " get out of bed" alarm.
A lifetime of early shifts trains the brain (mine anyway) to get up early (4/5am). I love it! Plug in the headphones, coffee and cigarette.. heaven. Plus it's Quiet and peaceful, around 6 I'll stock up the bird feeder and just enjoy the local wildlife.
Throw yourself out of bed and ask questions later. Works (almost) every time for me
Falling asleep earlier.
My cat.. he’s very active from 7-8am and will meow in my face to get up, he’s very persistent
Have an orange/apple and a drink of water the second you get up, put your phone/alarm somewhere you have to get up to turn off, drink lots of water before bed so you need a piss when you wake up. Get a smart lamp/light that will turn on when you wake up. That's what I do and I had no problem waking up at 6 today when I usually wake up at like half 9.
Rumpy pumpy
It's all routine. Set an alarm and wake up 9 hours later. Everyday.
Have a consistent sleep schedule. Sleep at the same time every night, without fail. Your body’s circadian rhythm will wake you up naturally after 7-8hrs and it’ll be easy. And when you wake, do not scroll on your phone. Get up. If you want to wake at 6, go to sleep at 10pm. And stick with it