How I Finally Became a Morning Man
I always tried to get up before lunch, but I wanted to be a real early riser. A man stands before the sun . Do 3 hours of work before lunch for the average person.
This post was originally published on Belle Beth Cooper’s blog .
For several months, I got up at 6 am every day . But something changed in late 2015 when I moved in with my partner and co-founder Josh . Josh gets up late by nature and works after I went to bed many nights. I don’t know if it was my own body rhythms trying to align with his, or residual feelings of stress and shock from the move, but it took me at least six months to get used to the routine of getting up before 8am. again.
It was a real fight. So complicated that at times I wondered if it might be easier to switch to Night Owl Mode to fit Josh’s patterns. However, every time I tried it, it only had one day at most. I don’t tend to sleep late and stay up late, and it’s not easy to work to stay awake longer than your body wants, so I always give up quickly.
So getting up early was the best solution. I just needed to figure out how to do it. When it came time to write my Productive Habits e-mail course, I knew what I needed for this early ascent to be debunked.
Here are some of the things that ended up working for me. But remember: it took at least 6 months of experimentation and failure . If you really want to do this for yourself, you need to figure out what works for you, and it may take a long time.
Get up much earlier
There are many tips that recommend getting up a little earlier each day. For example, gradually set the alarm for 15 minutes until you reach your desired wake-up time.
In theory, this makes sense, but for some reason it didn’t work for me. I honestly don’t know why.
When I started this process, I did not have a specific, regular awakening time. I work from home when I feel like it, so I get out of bed when I want to. But I constantly got up after 8 am, which I found was the last thing I could get up and still feel good during the day. When I got up later, I felt irritated and lethargic for the rest of the day. It always seemed to me that I have time to do more, getting out of bed before eight.
So, initially I set the alarm at 8 am and tried to get out of bed every day by that time.
I was terrible at this . I’ve been defeated so often. And almost every time I didn’t fail , I woke up at 8 and lay in bed or sat on the edge of it for up to half an hour before doing something. Supposedly I reached my daily goal, but it didn’t seem like a success.
After months of this nonsense, on a whim, I tried something illogical: I set my alarm for 6 a.m. the next day. A full two hours earlier than I still struggled to get up every day. I can’t think of a single reason why I would think this might work, but I’m so glad I gave it a try.
It worked.
It was easier for me to get up at 6 in the morning than two hours later. In part, this could simply be due to the novelty and bragging rights associated with getting up right early versus 8 a.m. which hardly counts as early. Or maybe it’s just a more natural time to wake up for me. I usually doze off and wake up more often during my morning sleep, so maybe I was making my life more difficult by staying in bed until 8 and getting lower sleep in the last couple of hours.
I don’t know exactly why it worked. It definitely didn’t work alone. Over time, I did a few more things that helped me make it a habit.
And these days I don’t always get up at 6. It’s usually between 6 and 7 in the morning, unless I have a particularly late night. I would like to get up even earlier, but for me this is the most natural time to wake up. I want to work with my body, not against it.
Go to bed at the same time every night.
I’m lucky I didn’t have to plan it too much because I try to do it anyway. After dinner, I usually watch TV with Josh, and sometimes I go for a walk. Then around 8 or 9 pm and I definitely don’t feel like working, so I usually jump onto the bed. I’ll grab a hot drink, my planning pad for tomorrow, and my Kindle, and spend an hour or two to sleep.
Regular bedtime is important for your body to fall asleep faster and for a good rest when your early waking time approaches.
Don’t forget, I already went to bed no later than 23:00. I usually go to bed at 9 or 10. My body naturally gets tired around 10 pm and I don’t like to work after dinner because I’m not very smart, so it’s easy for me to go to bed so early. If you don’t get tired so early, you may naturally go to bed (and get up) later. You can fight it, but it will be much better for your body if you work with your natural inclinations.
Create the morning routine you look forward to
This is undoubtedly the most important change I have made in developing this habit. Behavioral economist Dan Ariely says we are made to think about the present. While it is good for us to act with the future in mind, it is contrary to our nature. To get around this limitation of the human brain and ensure that we do what is good for us, even if we don’t want to, Arieli suggests using what he calls reward substitution .
Basically, reward swapping is when you force yourself to do the right thing for the wrong reason . For example, if you want to exercise more by only allowing yourself to watch your favorite TV show while exercising, that means you will start exercising to watch that show, not to be in better shape and health. … But you will do something good for your body. Doing the right thing for the wrong reason .
When I wake up in the morning, I get out of bed for a cup of coffee . Not because I know I will have a better day and be more productive if I get up now. My future is a completely different person, even when she is only a few hours away. I can’t motivate myself (at least not every day) to get up early so that some stranger can reap the rewards in the future. I need awards now .
Building a routine that I do every morning when I get up helped me find a way to (finally) make early waking habitual. It all starts with coffee, which I look forward to getting out of bed and starting my routine. The rest of the routine keeps me from getting out of bed. It looks like this:
- Drink coffee and practice French
- Do five push-ups
- Take a shower and get dressed
- Have breakfast
I look forward to coffee, French workouts, and breakfast, so when I wake up I focus on those parts of my routine. Each one acts like a rope, pulling me forward through the routine until I’m done.
Another reason this is helpful is that while I get up early to be more productive, I don’t have to think about work as soon as I get up. By the time my routine is over, I’ve been awake for an hour or more, and I usually can’t wait to get to work.
The more I do this process, the more familiar it becomes, and getting up early is only part of the routine.
How I Became a Morning Man | Belle Beth Cooper