It’s been about three months now and I have made waking up at 5am part of my daily schedule. Plenty of studies talk about the benefits of being early riser, books have been written on it, folks say that the most successful people wake up before dawn. How in the world do they do it? And how do you make this behavior stick?
So how did I do it?
1. Go to bed earlier/ Nightly routine
It should go without saying but early to rise, early to bed … makes a man (woman) healthy and wealthy and wise. This is true … especially when aiming for ‘good, uninterrupted sleep’. Ariana Huffington (of the Huffington Post) wrote one of my fave reads on sleep and its importance in our lives. Haven’t read it? Click here. I started going to bed earlier. I am a night owl. All my life my parents have worried that I never got enough sleep. That was their number one or two concern all through high school and college. So being the night owl that I am I devised the following trick to get myself to bed before 10pm.
- Create a nightly routine – shower, brush my teeth, beauty routine and read a book
- Place all devices on silent
- Have Alexa play rain sounds
- Light a scented candle an hour before you have to sleep (usually lavender or something calming)
- Socks on before bed
2. Do not snooze
I am not one to snooze. When it’s time to get up, I’m up. But I know that there are plenty of folks that live on that snooze button so I’m telling y’all right now, for this to succeed, you need to kill the snooze button. I legit have only one alarm set – for 5am … and that’s it! I understand that it might be tough in the beginning but for this habit to stick, you legit need to eliminate the snooze button.
3. Wake up earlier
I know you’re thinking – this is exactly what I CANNOT do! Allow me to explain. I didn’t initially set my alarm for 5am. I started waking up 5minutes before my usually 7:30am wake up time. Every week for four weeks I woke up 5-15minutes before my previous wake up time until I set my alarm for 5am … and woke up.
4. Reward good behavior aka treat yo’ self
I always treat myself to a good book or binge watching a show when I hit a streak. I listened to Gretchen Rubin, Podcast host of Happier and she talks about treats or rewards. In this case, spending money or sleeping later than usual are not effective ways to reward yourself as you get better at waking up earlier. Your reward needs to benefit your behavior positively.
