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I am living proof that it's possible to change from a night owl to an early riser. I used to stay up till midnight or 1am as often as not. By nature? and lifelo

I am living proof that it's possible to change from a night owl to an early riser. I used to stay up till midnight or 1am as often as not. By nature? and lifelong habit, for over 40 years I was in the "stay up late, sleep in to compensate" camp. But a couple years ago someone I respect and admire challenged me to reset the pattern. I started setting a daily alarm and jumping into a brief ice-cold shower at 5am. It only took a few days to acclimate, and nearly everything about my days changed for the better. I need 7h of sleep so if I'm not lights-out by 10p, I "sleep in" to 530 or 6. I recommend it highly. The time I spend between 5-7a is, almost without exception, much better spent than 10p-12a would ever have been. YMMV but my point is, being a "morning person" can be a choice.

balfirevic 6y ago
> I used to stay up till midnight or 1am as often as not. That's not a night-owl (midnight I mean, 1am might barely be).
- chrisweekly 6y ago
  Fair enough. But FTR the 12-1a habit was itself a form of restraint against my prior tendency to stay up much later than that -- as a parent of school-aged kids, w/ no plausible option to sleep past 7a or so. Staying up till 3 or 4 and getting less than 4h sleep would've been a non-starter.
  - balfirevic 6y ago
    Yeah, I feel the pain. I usually go to sleep between 3-5 and need 8-9 hours of sleep. If my work didn't allow for very flexible schedule I fear I'd also need to resort to extreme measures (cold showers - brrr).
pc86 6y ago
Same - part of it may have been natural shifts in circadian rhythms - in college I'd often be up until 3am during the week, not even particularly busy. Just not tired, so I stayed up. Any class up to and including 10am was an active struggle to get to. Now I am regularly up before 5am to work out and typically start work around 6:30. People absolutely have natural tendencies one way or the other, but if you want to change you can. Too many people approach it as if they're stuck in one or the other.

balfirevic 6y ago

> I used to stay up till midnight or 1am as often as not. That's not a night-owl (midnight I mean, 1am might barely be).

chrisweekly 6y ago
Fair enough. But FTR the 12-1a habit was itself a form of restraint against my prior tendency to stay up much later than that -- as a parent of school-aged kids, w/ no plausible option to sleep past 7a or so. Staying up till 3 or 4 and getting less than 4h sleep would've been a non-starter.
- balfirevic 6y ago
  Yeah, I feel the pain. I usually go to sleep between 3-5 and need 8-9 hours of sleep. If my work didn't allow for very flexible schedule I fear I'd also need to resort to extreme measures (cold showers - brrr).

pc86 6y ago

Same - part of it may have been natural shifts in circadian rhythms - in college I'd often be up until 3am during the week, not even particularly busy. Just not tired, so I stayed up. Any class up to and including 10am was an active struggle to get to. Now I am regularly up before 5am to work out and typically start work around 6:30. People absolutely have natural tendencies one way or the other, but if you want to change you can. Too many people approach it as if they're stuck in one or the other.