wake up at 6am every day

I decided to try for 5am, so I set my lamp on a timer for 5am, and had my ipod radio alarm play a chirping birds track at 5am as well. I woke up at 5:29am and realized that my lamp and music never turned on. Once the clock hit 5:30, my light came on. I layed in bed for 15 minutes, then decided to get out of bed, use the bathroom, and brush my teeth. I started studying for the CPA exam in bed until about 7am… I felt like I had to read everything twice because I just wasn’t grasping the information. At 7:15am I went back to bed (lol). I couldn’t study anymore, I didn’t have anything to do, and didn’t want to wake anyone up. Woke up again at 10am :(

Oh well… It’s a start at least!

Okay, well to kick-start the first goal I have set the alarm on my phone to 5:55am. I am going to place my phone on my bookshelf on the opposite side of the room to my bed. So when it goes off, I will be forced to get out of bed to turn it off. :)

Do Morning Pages and listening to music

I read this article a while ago and I’m going to try it out. Basically you go to sleep whenever you’re tired but get up at the same time every morning. You only go to bed when you’re really tired – when it doesn’t take you longer than 5 minutes to fall asleep, so you’re not wasting time lying there trying to fall asleep (a big problem for me).

I tried this last night – it was great being able to fall asleep right away but the experiment was kind of ruined by my very loud, drunk housemates, who woke me up 3 times (they’d better not make that a habit). So I lost a good two hours of sleep and found it really tough getting up early this morning.

It’s almost 10.30 now and I’m not remotely tired, so I don’t think getting up early tomorrow will be any easier, especially since I’ll have no early class to motivate me to get up!

Monday 5th: 12am
Tuesday 6th: 11pm
Wednesday 7th: 12am
Thursday 8th: 1am
Friday 9th: 12.45am
Saturday 10th: 2am
Sunday 11th: 12am

For most of last week I was very good about this and turned of the computer at 10, and I slept so much better. But a couple of times (nights when I knew I wouldn’t have to get up early the next morning) I didn’t do it and I really, really felt the difference. So I’m turning it off at 10 every night now – I shouldn’t be on it any later anyway, even if I don’t have to get up early the next morning.

I have gotten into the routine of staying online until midnight and then when I do go to bed I’m still wide awake and end up tossing and turning and just sleeping very badly. So of course in the morning I have to drag (and I really mean drag) myself out of bed. It’s not a good way to start the day and I want to change. I can count on my fingers the number of mornings I’ve woken up early looking forward to the day and wanting to get up.

So my first new rule: no computer after 10pm on weekdays. Then I’ll take it from there.