The rewards I have drawn from being an early riser are a list in itself:
The Benefits of Being an Early Riser:
- I am more enthusiastic.
Like nothing else, both walking early and the subsequent hours of personal quiet time in the morning have improved my focus.
You’ll feel rejuvenated to take on the world by the time you get to get on with your day, whether you sit silently and meditate, do some simple tasks while practicing mindfulness, sit and read or go outside for a walk.
- I’m more efficient
The additional time in the morning is a huge boost to my productivity, especially with the obligation of demanding so much of my time from my two kids.
A direct influence on my productivity is the peace of the early morning. It is not only about getting more time but about the quality of the time I have.
- I’m more innovative
When I sit in the utter silence and uninterrupted peace of a quiet morning, much of my best happens maybe because it is easy to practice mindfulness and place the job at hand into my full and utter being.
Aside from that, I am more inventive all day long because of how well prepared my mind is once the day gets underway.
I may simmer what I have been working on that morning, and ideas seem to come to the surface throughout the day.
- I’m happier, calmer, and better at managing the difficulties of each day.
I remember when I first felt my heart thump like it was shouting out of my chest as it pounded. After it happened a couple more times, I realized later that anxiety was building up inside of me.
This was the first time in my life that I had felt anything like it, so it was a little frightening. I have been in a constant rush to get things done.
This was the first time in my life that I had felt anything like that, so it was a little terrifying. I had been in a constant rush to get things done.
Waking up early, getting time to focus on me, and catching up on things that I had been behind on having been a total turn around. I do not feel the pressure and tension anymore, nor do I try to get it all done during the day.
No matter what happens during the day, I always have my morning session to fall back on. This is incredibly comforting and really allows me to embrace the day as it comes and be happy.
I still have my morning sessions to fall back on, no matter what happens during the day. This is extremely soothing and really encourages me to welcome the day and be content as it comes.
These are just some of the advantages I have derived from being an early riser. I have learned so much from adjusting my timetable that the list is too long to write here.
Now on to how to develop the habit. These 12 points are what I have used to build the habit of getting up at 4 AM daily:
How to be an Early Riser
- Take it slow; make 30-minute increments.
The process of being an early riser is gradual.
My priority was to switch from 8:30 to 7:30 AM. It was a bit of a leap, but given that it wasn’t all that early, it was easy to adapt to it after a couple of weeks. After that, I did increments of 30-minute for the next year.
Take it slowly, learn to value every additional 30 minutes you have in the morning. Start by using the time to do the most rewarding things you might do in the morning to build up your motivation.
Meditation or a brief walk outside to breathe in the fresh air and try to watch the sunrise are both amazing activities that will make you feel better all day and inspire you to continue waking up early.
- Set a bedtime schedule and take it seriously
This means that if you happen to be out at a friend’s birthday party one night and you are planning to stay a little longer, your favorite show just altered schedules and airs at 10 PM instead of 9 PM now, or you feel like staying up- you definitely should not.
Take your bedtime seriously; do not take it as a loose undertaking.
“I need to make sure that I get to bed sometime around 10” ought to be. “I need to go to bed at 10 PM every night- no matter what.”
These are some of the circumstances I have had to experience while establishing the habit of rising early. You will be tempted to loosen up your engagements on those nights, and sometimes it’s OK. But whatever you do, try to be as consistent as you can be.
If you don’t get to go bed at the time you set up, you will not get enough sleep, and few things will ruin your chances of waking up early as a lack of sleep can do.
- Get ready to go to bed early
This is particularly valid if you have children, but still, it applies to everyone.
It would help if you got ready for bed early because we sometimes overestimate what we have to do before we can finally lay our heads down for the night.
I don’t even recall my bedtime schedules for what they were with my daughter and two sons, but rather I remember occasions when we had to start winding down to get them to go to bed because it was such a task.
Going potty, changing their diapers, last-minute snacks (which just started lately…my eldest child usually asks for almonds or pine nuts), brushing their teeth, getting into their PJs, reading bedtime stories, and then the act of finally falling asleep, that can really take over 30 minutes for the oldest.
If you are single or have a family, everybody has a lot to do before they finally lay their heads down to sleep at night.
Get a precise gauge of how much time you need before you go to lay down on your bed to ensure that you get enough sleep at night.
- Get to bed early
You really have to get sufficient rest.
Believe me; you’re going to attempt to cheat. You need to make sure you get to bed early enough to ensure that you feel refreshed once it’s time to rise.
I have an average bedtime nap of 6-7 hours a day like I have for most of my life. It’s exactly what sounds plausible to me. Pay careful attention to how your body feels when you wake up if you do not already know your optimal amount of bedtime hours.
Do not skimp on your sleep. It’s not just about putting yourself in the ideal position to wake up; you will hurt yourself because of sleep deprivation if you try to push it regularly.
- Position the alarm a few steps away from your bed
Please ensure that your alarm is far enough away that you have to get up out of bed and take a few steps to turn it off.
It is important to ensure that it is off of your bed and that, no matter how hard you try, you cannot reach your alarm without taking 2-3 steps.
Pushing yourself to get up and taking a few steps out of bed really helps you wake up.
And as much as you can, if you use your phone as your alarm clock as I do, DO NOT GRAB YOUR PHONE AND TAKE IT TO BED. That is a done deal, trust me.
I charge my phone overnight, and when the alarm automatically goes off, I tend to take it off the charger. After a while, I found that if I were really tired, I would take my phone off the charger and carry it back to bed with me.
If you want to have a little extra sleep, that’s all right; set your alarm to go off in 30 minutes and hold it in place. If you take your phone with you to bed, you will hit the snooze button as soon as it goes off without even noticing – and this is total suicide.
- Have a justifiable reason, or reasons, to wake up early
You need to have a legitimate reason to want to get up early, but you will never push yourself to get up if you don’t.
At one point, the drive I had to do martial arts training (which really motivated me at first) started to fade, and with it, my ability to get up early.
If you do not have a compelling reason to get up, the chances of you waking up early consistently will be minimal.
Ensure that your morning block is an important part of your day, a block of time that feels like you cannot function without it.
- Have a timetable.
One of the many facts you get to learn as you become an early riser is that you will always be more effective and efficient in the morning than at any other point in the day.
There are three reasons why you need a timetable;
You are not going to drift once you are up.
You are going to be fully effective at what you do.
The schedule will help you get up, and since you are conscious of the activities you want to carry out, you will do so as soon as you wake up and through the rest of the morning, and then you will be even fully awake.
I can’t stress these last two factors anymore; you have to make your reasons for getting up in the morning convincing and have a plan; otherwise, you are going drift off, be minimally efficient and lose the motivation to get up early.
And without a routine, soon after you wake up, you will wander around and start doing things that do not benefit you, such as checking Facebook, watching YouTube, or even working as you bounce around aimlessly.
Build a routine, even if it’s just a flexible one that prevents you from losing out on time.
- Nightly Routine #1: Remember why it’s important for you to wake up early. It’s one of the strategies that have helped me the most.
You may have a good reason to get up early, but you are not human when you get up in the morning; you are a zombie with an incredibly reduced mental capacity.
You recognize just what I’m talking about, and that’s one of the primary reasons why it’s so hard to wake up early. You are really not a completely functioning human being, and you cannot bring together a rational thought for your life.
So do this right before you go to bed; take a few minutes and recall why it’s important to wake up early the next morning.
Evaluate your compelling factors, whatever they might be, as well as your plan or the particular tasks you intend to accomplish that morning. This makes a kind of effect or imprint on your mind that remains with you while you sleep.
After doing this for a while, you will feel less like a zombie and finally understand exactly why you decided to wake up.
- Nightly Routine #2: Envision yourself getting up early and going to work.
Proceeding from the last point, having convinced yourself of the value of waking up early, picture yourself as clearly as possible, get up, and carry out the activities you had planned to do.
In your visualization, be transparent and precise. It should only take a minute or two, so let’s see, you get up, turn off your alarm, get ready, and do your thing as you should.
These two nightly routines have greatly helped me develop the habit of waking up early.
- Take a few minutes to breathe (don’t go to bed feeling mentally or emotionally exhausted)
Let’s hope this isn’t something you will do every day, but it is quite useful under the right circumstances.
Interestingly, I’ve figured out over the years that if you go to bed emotionally drained after a hard day’s work, you should don’t get up, and if you do, you will wake up feeling drained.
Just take a few minutes to resolve this by following through with your breathing.
Please pay close attention to your breathing and consider slowing it down after a while. This is going to help you calm down and have a more restful night of sleep.
- The Water Trick
As soon as you turn off your alarm, go to the washroom, turn the tap on, and throw some water on your face.
This will be a little surprising at first, but you will feel almost 100% awake.
I cannot explain how effective this is. As soon as you are finished, you’ll feel ready and willing to jump into any task. This is what you do when you wake up feeling exhausted and half asleep, but you want to have a productive morning.
Without doing this, particularly when I was tired, I fell back asleep after 30 minutes.
- Don’t Be So Hard On Yourself
Nowadays, I constantly wake up between 4-4:30 AM.
But sometimes, especially when I feel extremely tired from a long day, I let myself sleep in and completely recharge.
This varies around once a week and generally on the weekends. Don’t be so tough on yourself. To build up the habit of rising early, you do not have to do it every day.
And that’s healthier and great for your creative thinking. If you push yourself long enough, especially on days when you feel exhausted, basically not allowing yourself to be completely recharged, you will eventually experience the effects of sleep deprivation, which can have a lot of negative effects on your body and mind.
Developing a pattern of early awakening is a long term commitment. If you lose your commitment, pick up and finish from where you left off.