6 ms·
Ask HN: What gets you out of bed?
If half the work is showing up, half of showing up is getting out of bed. :)
What do HN readers do to get motivated and start the day awesomely when working on a startup?
Full disclosure: I'm asking because we want to make our startup's alarm clock app better. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.chaoscollective.warmly
- akumpf 13y agoFor the past couple months I've made it a point to read the news when I get up to get the gears turning. On one level it's great, but at the same time it's often distracting relative to sitting down and being productive.
- kellros 13y agoMy secret to getting out of bed: I sleep with socks on! I find it's also much easier to get out of bed when you know what you need to accomplish and what's on your agenda for the day. A sense of urgency is a great motivator.
- akumpf 13y agoI've found a similar effect when needing to wake up super early to catch a flight. By laying out what I'm going to wear the night before it's much easier to get started when I'm still half-asleep. I'll have to try socks next time :)
- lucb1e 13y agoHaving something on my agenda rather makes me not go to bed :P. But yes, that is indeed a good one that I hadn't thought of. In hindsight I notice I've often woken up more easily because of something cool on my agenda rather than the daily routine, so it might be something to practice.
- makerops 13y agoFwiw, sleeping with socks on also helps you get a better nights sleep.
- ivanaj 13y agoI have to work 9 hours/day. So if I get out of the bed late I will have to come from office late in the night which I definitely not want.
- dsschnau 13y agoGirlfriend and child - wakes me right up.
- akumpf 13y agoJust curious, does that motivate you and put you in a good mood? If not, are there other ways you wake up that put you in a productive mindset?
- hamburglar 13y agoMy answer is "a toddler", which, before having one, would have sounded like a nightmare to me (not a morning person). It turns out having a little person who is so ridiculously happy to see me puts me in a pretty good mood.
- wilfra 13y ago5-hour energy. I'm not joking. Slam one of those right after you wake up and you'll have a really productive first few hours of your day and over time will start to look forward to getting out of bed because of the near-instant high it gives you.
- akumpf 13y agoDo you slam it while still in bed? or after you're up an moving. I find that the small gap between in-bed and out-of-bed is the crux of getting up.
- wilfra 13y agoAfter getting out of bed, I keep it on top of the fridge.
- mkjonesuk 13y agoI'm with you on that - the inbed/outofbed crossover can be a real challenge. Once I'm up and about I'm generally OK, but those moments of pain when I open my eyes to see it's time to get up and do stuff are the killer.
- michael_h 13y agoEasy now, even the manufacturer doesn't recommend a full bottle for regular use. It contains the same caffeine as a cup of coffee, but costs $3USD instead of $0.10.
- wilfra 13y agoCoffee or another stimulant would have a similar result. No argument there. 5-hour energy just has the advantage of being so concentrated and so fast acting. It's very different from drinking a cup of coffee (unless you can mainline your coffee somehow, which I've never tried).
- tbrock 13y agoWorking on a product for developers that they love to use.
- akumpf 13y agoDoes that literally wake you up? Or is that more of a motivator once you're up and moving?
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- glassx 13y agoNot the OP, but once I was promoted to lead developer for the flagship app of the company I worked for and that was quite efficient in making me wanting to get to the office before everyone.
- zalew 13y agomy cat pats my face meowing for food.
- akumpf 13y agohaha. I used to wake up to that a couple years back. Kind of awesome, actually :)
- kmasters 13y agoIf I have too much money in the bank, I will not get out of bed. So being poor would help. Once I hit a certain savings threshold, I quit my job because I know the whole (my bank account) is greater than the sum of its parts (putting up with horrible software shops) Then...I do it all over again.
- raldi 13y ago> I know the whole (my bank account) is greater than the sum of its parts (putting up with horrible software shops) I think the saying you're looking for is actually "the ends don't justify the means".
- dsirijus 13y agoNicotine and caffeine craving gets me up.
- lucb1e 13y agoWell that's the first good thing I heard about nicotine besides stress relief I guess. Never thought about it this way.
- geekam 13y agoThat I will return from work eventually back to my personal projects, reading and writing.
- eddieroger 13y agoGetting to the office before everyone else, for two reasons: - It is quiet. Most of my coworkers get in between 9:30 and 10:00, so if I'm here at 8:30, I get a solid hour to handle the administrivia part of my job - emails, daily task sorting, etc. - I get to leave earlier. I like to have my afternoons, so if I'm in early, I get to take off early. This is not set in stone solid, and I can always take off if I absolutely have to (or work from home), but for the day to day, if I'm in at 8:30, I'm out at 4:30, and that lets me have time to handle my personal stuff, beat traffic, run errands, anything.
- johnsocs 13y agoA few things that get me out of bed in the morning: * Looking forward to spending time with my children ( post work, or all day on weekends ) * Known exactly what I have to accomplish that day ( task breakdown ) * Exercise, I really enjoy known that I'll have time to workout, this goes with having a schedule. * Interesting problems to solve at work ( related to task breakdown I suppose )
- belcherj 13y agoEarly Morning Meetings. If I know I HAVE to get out of bed I will get up. If not I will snooze for longer than I would like. Additional motivators: 1. Light - Before bed I open all the curtains 2. Tasks - I lay out all my tasks the night before. Less stress thinking about all the things I have to do. Wunderlist everything and then stop stressing. 3. Fun First - I try to put a fun task at the top of the list each morning. Makes it fun to get up. 4. Alarm not near bed - Having the alarm away from the bed I have to get up to turn it off. Once I'm up and moving I rarely feel the need to get back into bed.
- akumpf 13y agogreat tactics. thanks!
- toutouastro 13y agoa quote of jim rohn
- orangethirty 13y agoI wish my project management system (currently getblimp.com) had a way for you to sync the alarm clock with it. So I would get daily alarms on important things. Why don't you give your app an api?
- bnegreve 13y agoI park my car on a parking spot that isn't free. If I don't get up before 9 I usually get fined.
- akumpf 13y agoI think it's interesting that so many comments on here are about setting up a scenario where you'll be embarrassed or fined if you don't get up. I guess it comes down to trying to plan logically the day before vs. being too tired to care when the alarm goes off. Reminds me of the extreme where your alarm starts sending money to a political party you don't like if you hit snooze. :)
- behrendtio 13y agoThe more I have to do, the more motivated I am. If I know I have a few tasks to do, but no actual appointments or deadlines, it's pretty hard to get out of the bed. I need stress to be productive.
- rickdale 13y agoI love the mornings and embracing the day. I try to imagine Rafael Nadal's bull run from the net to the baseline at the beginning of his matches, and try to match that energy and excitement for the day. Usually springing out of bed. I like challenges, like workouts, in the morning as well. If I overcome stuff in the morning, before I start my day, chances are I will have a productive day.
- like-that 13y agoCoffee & cigarettes
- gyardley 13y agoUsually my wife. She uses some sort of fitness wrist-thing to wake up - maybe a Jawbone? I love it, because there's no more harsh alarm noise - no noise at all, usually, although sometimes I can hear it buzz a wee bit.
- Adirael 13y agoThe Fitbit Flex does that too. I just got mine today and I'm counting the hours till tomorrow morning to test it. I want to try being more of a morning person but I don't want to disturb the wife getting up too early.
- krapp 13y agoThe fire alarm in my dorm, today...
- adventured 13y agoI've been doing web businesses since I was about 16, circa 1996. I didn't particularly like computers growing up, but when I got introduced to the web, it struck me like a bolt of lightning. I saw the web as an unlimited global canvas that I could build anything on. Webchat Broadcasting! AltaVista and HotBot! Netscape! Yahoo! Geocities! Quake online! Porn! It was all so exciting to a teenager. If I had an idea, I could immediately go to work on it. That's what I still love about the web today, and that's what gets me out of bed in the morning (so to speak). I usually have a lot of things I want to work on when I go to sleep, and so inevitably I wake up with my brain on fire, eager to build.
- rooshdi 13y agoUsually a stretch and a phone check followed by another stretch does the job.
- pshin45 13y ago(Mistakenly) thinking that I've overslept.
- magpie707 13y agoAlarm --> email and google reader check. GR soon to be Feedly =/
- saintx 13y agoThe neighborhood squirrel serenades the sunrise each morning as a sort of mammalian metronome for about an hour, filling me with questions about rhythmic chanting and the mammal brain. It's like a 60 decibel woodblock, only three octaves higher. That wakes me up. I don't recommend it for your alarm clock app. Money, glory, and fun actually get me out of bed.
- photorized 13y agoThat squirrel sounds incredibly motivated. Would love to hear what that sounds like.
- akumpf 13y agothen maybe the app should pay you, complement you, then tell you a joke? :)
- youngerdryas 13y agoI had serious trouble getting up in college. Someone had given me a bizarre stereo that had an alarm clock that would set off the turntable. I would put Back in Black on vinyl set very loud as the alarm. Once I heard the crackle and high hat count in I knew if I did not get up before the first bar chord I would aggravate quite a few people. Needless to say it never got to the bar chord. :)
- akumpf 13y agoThat's awesome. Playing a card from the psychology deck and making it embarrassing if you don't get up in time. :) +1 for having Back in Black on vinyl.
- andreer 13y agoMy son (nearly three), usually around 6am. If I don't bounce out of need the instant he opens our bedroom door, he'll wake the baby and her mother, and both will be grumpy for the rest of the day! I love it because then we get to build something with Lego's for an hour before we have to get ready for kindergarten.
- davidjgraph 13y agoMy eldest (4) woke me at about 6am this morning poking one of my iPads in my face, he'd started YouTube and was asking how he could watch Spiderman on it. What got me out of bed was the thought of what he'd watch after the first video.
- raldi 13y agoIf you go to bed before midnight, you're actually ready to get up in the morning. I haven't used an alarm in five years, ever since I stopped staying up late on weeknights.
- dllthomas 13y agoYour experience doesn't necessarily generalize.
- aaronsnow 13y ago1 kids. 2 dog. If you can make your alarm clock jump up and down on my bed and/or lick my face, it's a winner.
- cdvonstinkpot 13y agoI lay in bed thinking about the day's tasks until I feel motivated to get up & start on one of them.
- wojt_eu 13y agoThroughout winter, a light+radio alarm clock, something like: Philips-Hf3470 Since recently, a recorded motivational message: http://blog.wojt.eu/post/51792538207/get-your-custom-motivational-alarm-clock-on http://blog.wojt.eu/post/51792538207/get-your-custom-motivat...
- akumpf 13y agoreminds me of this guy who uses two alarms; one set to go off quietly a few minutes before the loud alarm. http://veenix.blogspot.com/2005/10/alarm-clocks-are-bad-how-to-wake-up.html http://veenix.blogspot.com/2005/10/alarm-clocks-are-bad-how-...
- wojt_eu 13y agoYeah I'm planning to create one long alarm mp3. It'd start with ambient sounds of slowly increasing volume, then some motivational recording reminding me of my resolutions. Finally plain old annoying alarm.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- general_failure 13y agoBody clock. I am up at 6 everyday and go to bed at around 10pm or so. I then proceed to my favorite activity - bug the wife till she wakes up :p. It's interesting now that I think about it because I used to be totally a night person not too long ago.
- mbrock 13y agoI don't use an alarm clock, I just go to bed early and wake up in time... But in periods when I've really had trouble with getting up, the core problem hasn't been physically awakening my brain, it's been that as soon as I woke up I knew there was just boring miserable shit all day to look forward to, so I was likely to just snooze. In those periods, I discovered that the only effective way to get my brain going enough to understand the rational course of action (getting up & showered), was to have something fun within reach -- my computer, usually. So I'd wake up at the first ring of my phone alarm, then flip up my laptop and read some Reddit or whatever. If I really needed an exceptionally effective alarm clock, I'd want something that maybe starts talking for five minutes about something interesting, or prompts me with some captivating question, or shows me a gallery of cool pictures, or something.
- db-dzine 13y agoMy stomach ...
- eitland 13y agosleep as android + qr code in kitchen ( Not affiliated, I am just a happy user, now having two hours more in the morning to do something I want to/need to.) https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.urbandroid.sleep&hl=no https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.urbandroid...
- groundCode 13y agoWake up Glass of luke warm water with a splash of lemon juice in it. 20 slow pushups Shower. Coffee. Wake up daughter and chat to her about the dreams she had last night :)
- mimbee 13y agoI'm using Sleep Cycle on my iPhone and it works like a charm actually. Downside is that you should keep it in bed so it can measure your sleep, but the vibration of my phone and alarm sounds are always on the right time. It's my only alarm, in stead of the 7 alarms I used before (at the same time!)
- loqi 13y ago100mg of caffeine (half a nodoz) taken 30 minutes before I need to get up. I set alarms for both events, but rarely need the second one.
- haliphax 13y agoBLACK METAL