My new daily routine

Recently, I fell in love with getting up in the early morning, around 4:45 am. Don’t get me wrong: if I wrote the last sentence about a year ago, I would have been shocked. Beforehand, I wouldn’t say I liked waking up early, and I strived to stay in bed as late as possible. I recently made a few changes in my daily routine to spend some time alone, which led to my love of waking up very early in the morning. Those changes made me more productive and happier. This blog post is about the key learning points that I got along the way.

Regular bedtime

Going to bed at the same time helps train the body to fall asleep in a matter of minutes. Bedtime on iOS helped me kick off this habit, and at around 9:30 pm, I now feel pretty sleepy. This habit helps to protect against the possibility of sleep deprivation.

The same time on the weekend

Beforehand, I loved to stay in bed later at weekends. At times, I lacked sleep, so I was looking forward to the weekend to stay in bed longer and later. However, I noticed that I didn’t feel great on Monday mornings. It seemed to me like two different body regimes, which created some discomfort. I decided to try waking up at the same time during the whole week and plan a few naps during the day on the weekend. That worked like a charm! The body quickly gets used to the same schedule despite the day of the week. Sleep deprivation is reduced by naps, which can last even three hours.

No news, social media or emails

Beforehand, I woke myself up by grabbing my iPhone and reading emails, news, and social media. Even though it helped me wake up, I often felt terrible. News is mostly negative; social media posts are often full of anger; work emails are organically filled with trouble. Because of this, I was getting a shot of adrenaline by looking through mostly negative stuff. To get rid of this habit, I removed the phone charger from the bedroom and switched to the alarm on my Apple Watch. This change helps me stay in a good mood after getting up. Most of the time, I start the day with 10 mins of meditation; Daily Calm works pretty well for this.

Time alone

I love to stay around my family and colleagues, but also need some time to decompress and reflect. I learned about it when I purchased my first motorcycle. Nobody else could fit in my tight helmet and start chatting. I stopped riding about a year ago and began to look for a way to spend about one hour alone every day. It was a bit hard logistically because the apartment is not big enough to do it when somebody else is at home. My solution was to use my family habit to sleep longer for my benefit. Neither my wife nor kids like to get up before 7 am, which gives me plenty of time alone.

Journaling

One more thing. I have not found a way to do it daily yet, but it helps me during particularly hard times. Quite often, it’s hard to fall asleep when something is troubling me. At such times, you can stay half asleep the whole night. I find a 750-word exercise helpful. It might take a while if you are not used to writing, but it can give you at least a few hours of a deep sleep instead of a whole night of torture by repeating troubling thoughts.