January 13, 2009
Photo Credits: Neato Coolville
I’ve completed my first trial of waking up early and I have to say that this one habit will change your life. I’ve gone from someone who would snooze from 6:30 till 7AM then rush to get ready and out the door to someone who can easily wake-up at 5AM start working on their blog, journal, and get a workout in all before I shower and get ready to go to work at 7:30AM.
It’s amazing what waking up early will do to change your life. What’s your biggest goal? Why have you failed to achieve it so far? One excuse you may have for yourself is that you don’t have enough time. Well I’m here to tell you that you have more than enough time and that time is right when you wake-up.
What I’ve discovered about waking up early everyday is that by doing it you create a window of time to accomplish anything you want. Most of us wake up early because we have to. We do it because someone else requires us to do it. But what if you did it because you wanted to. Now you can finally write that book you’ve always wanted to finish. What if you wrote one page a day for a year. You can finally start that business you’ve always dreamed of doing. Whatever major goal you have for yourself you can do in as little as one to two hours every morning and here’s how to do it.
Here are 8 things that you can use to master waking up early.
- Have A Reason To Wake-up Early. This reason is going to make or break this habit. This reason has to so good that it litterally pushes you out of bed. It’s so exciting that you can’t wait to fall asleep so you can wake up the next day and get started. Think about when you were five years old on Christmas Eve or the night before you went on a really fun vacation where you have to wake-up early.
- Get Busy Right When Your Wake Up. Getting out of bed is the hardest part. You’re going to have thoughts like “Why am I doing this to myself?” “It’s going to feel so great to go back to bed”. The biggest challenge is to overcome these thoughts and fight through them. Set a routine of getting up and turning all the lights on in your house. Go to the bathroom. Make your bed. Do whatever you have to do to keep busy and not thinking about going back to sleep.
- Drink 8 oz of Water Upon Rising. Water is the great way to wake-up your insides after getting out of bed, so make it a habit of drinking a full 8oz glass right after you get up. The water will rehydryate your body after 8 hours of no liquids and you’ll feel even more awake.
- Don’t Worry About Failing, Just Keep Doing It. I failed to wake-up early everyday of this trial. In fact, I slept in 6 of the 30 days and they were mostly on the weekend after I had been out till 2 or 3 in the morning. But that’s OK, because I never lost the desire to keep going. Who cares if you slip up on some days and sleep an extra hour or two. One thing you’ll notice is you’ll feel a little off that whole day and it will motivate you even more to keep going. In fact if you do stay out late, I’d suggest getting the right amount of sleep, then go to your normal wake-up time the next day. You want to be sure getting enough sleep. No point in waking up early if you can’t keep your eyes open.
- Avoid or Limit Alcohol Intake Late At Night. This is a hard one for me, because I like to go out with my buddies on the weekend, but I found that the nights I drank really late, it was almost impossible for me to wake-up early the next day and when I did wake-up, I had a hang over during the morning. The best suggestion for this is to alternate a glass of water with every alcoholic drink. And drink a glass of water prior to going to bed. The main thing you want to avoid is dehydrating yourself before you go to sleep.
- Exercise Right After Your Wake Up. This is one I started doing recently and its really given me a lot of engery right after getting up. Even if its just a few jumping jacks or push-ups, just do something to get your body moving and your blood pumping. It doesn’t have to be a full on cardio workout. You’ll find that once your body is moving, everything else, including your mind will start moving, too.
- Go To Bed When You’re Tired. You’ll naturally start falling asleep when you get tired, but I found that sometimes I tried to stay up later than I should have to watch TV and it effected me the next day. Try to do something relaxing like take a shower or read a book right before you go to bed. Avoid any kind of computer work. Your brain reacts to light so being a dark room will make you sleepier than staring at a computer screen or TV.
- Watch The Sun Rise. There’s something magical about being up before the sun. If you wake-up early, find 10 minutes to watch the sun rise or if you can work next to a window where you can see the sun. There’s no way to describe it. It’s just truly a cool thing to watch the planet wake-up and realize that you choose to be up at this time, not someone else.
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