Tips for Waking Up Early

Let’s try this again, shall we?

I’ve tried a few times on this blog to “be a morning person” or even simply, to wake up early, and it’s never really been successful. This time though, I’m confident and I’ll lay out some tips on how to actually start waking up early. (These can also apply to any habit you’re trying to start)

1.You need to believe you can do it.

If you don’t think you’re capable of getting up early, then you’re not. If you don’t expect to actually accomplish this, or any other goal, (not just want but expect) then you will not succeed.

The two other times I’ve tried this I didn’t think I actually could do it. I was a self-proclaimed night owl who “wanted” to try being a morning person but didn’t actually expect myself to be capable of doing that. Therefore, it never happened.

I mentioned in my last post when I tried this that your mindset plays a big part, and now I would go as far as to say it’s every part of it.

My mindset this time is completely different, I’m a different person from when I tried this three years ago, at a different place in my life with a different routine. Ultimately, this is a reason I was able to succeed this time.

2. Baby Steps

If you’re like me and set lead up-alarms to the time you actually need to get up, then start by just waking up on time.

If you set an alarm for 6:45 because you actually need to get up at 7:00 then first try to get up at 6:45. Maybe you set an alarm for 6:40 to prompt you to do that, so you still get one snooze in.

Of course, I didn’t expect to get up at 6:00 AM when I normally get up fifty minutes after that, so I made it my goal to get up at my first alarm instead of my third.

Even just getting out of bed five minutes earlier than normal is a step. Just keep doing that until that’s your new normal then wake up five minutes earlier than that and so on. Slowly you’ll build yourself up to waking up an hour earlier than normal.

3. Like any habit, don’t expect a 100% success rate

There will be day you go to sleep at 3am and wake up just in time to rush out the door, or maybe you’re just extra tired and don’t want to get up early. That’s okay. Always allow for the ebbs and flows of life and don’t bring yourself down if you are unable to make your goal a few times.

I’m trying this for a week for the sake of the blog post and so far I’ve been able to make it every day. But if I continue this moving forward, I know I’ll sleep in and miss the mark at some point. And that’s okay.

A setback isn’t the final destination.

4. Set your boundaries

Figure out what you actually want to do, don’t just wake up early because you think you should or it’s prescribed as healthy. Your reasoning for establishing any habit plays into your mindset going into it, and as I previously established, your mindset is everything.

For example, I’m not going to hold myself to waking up early on the weekends. I don’t really want to do that because I do enjoy staying up late and sleeping in, but if I force myself to do it, not only will I fail but I’ll just be upset at myself for being unable to do it.

My log:

Monday: woke up at 6:40 (my first alarm) and was able to meditate as an additional morning activity on top of my normal morning routine.

Tuesday: woke up at 6:30 giving me time to shower as well

Wednesday: woke up at 7:40 (my first alarm) and just journaled for a bit

Thursday: woke up at 7:40 and didn’t really do anything extra, just scrolled through my phone

Friday: woke up at 6:30 and two albums that I had been looking forward to had dropped so I watched an MV and did some online shopping to buy one of them.

 

As you can see from my log, I didn’t try to wake up at the crack of dawn, just managed to wake up on my first alarm instead of my third and sometimes even earlier than that. The extra ten minutes I got in the morning from doing this was enough to add a small activity to my morning routine which was ultimately my goal.

As I mentioned from the boundaries section, I did not hold myself to this during the weekend and let myself sleep in.

Maybe sometime in the future I’ll try to wake up even earlier, but for the next while my goal will be to get up to my first alarm or slightly earlier and nothing more. These baby steps can become the foundation for greater change in the future but that’s not my concern right now.

A lot of this applies when trying to set any habit, I just thought I’d share how I achieved this one, but it can be applied anywhere.

I hope you guys liked it and thanks for reading!