how to be a morning person

welcome to introspection ft. harsehaj! ⭐️ i’m harsehaj, a 19 y/o always up to something in social good x tech.

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btw, feel free to reply with topic ideas you want me to write about for future posts.

onto today’s topic: how to be a morning person 🛏️

i firmly believe that being a morning person vs. night owl is mostly, if not entirely, dependent on your environment and circumstance.

you might be the most nocturnal night owl anyone has ever seen, but i’m certain you’ll be completely energized boarding a 5am flight to japan for a trip. i know that’s an unrealistic expectation to set for every day, however my point is that you can shape yourself to be a morning person if you control a few factors.

you don’t have to resign to “that’s just how i am.”

1) pls get enough sleep 🙏 

the obvious factor is getting enough sleep. you’re not going to wake up early loving life on only 4 hours of sleep. 6 hours needs some work, 7 hours is acceptable and 8 hours is stellar. being a morning person requires you to also sleep earlier, which might be a hard trade-off. it was definitely a rough compromise when i was in sf and exciting events were happening all the time, so i gave myself a few cheat days.

still, the biggest barrier for a lot of people to becoming a morning person is fatigue, and a significant root cause to this is something known as “revenge bedtime procrastination."

2) let go of “revenge bedtime procrastination” 🔪 

i used to be a major victim to this, staying up on my ipad (💀) to enjoy the me-time i didn’t have during the day. revenge bedtime procrastination is basically when you sacrifice sleep for personal time, because you didn’t have enough throughout the day. inject that personal time throughout the day — maybe it’s working out in the middle of the day, or taking a break to read, or moving that personal time up to the morning instead. ☀️ 

now that you’ve overcome the hurdle of sleeping late, you need to actually be motivated enough to stay awake when you’re up early.

3) stick to a routine 📆 

sticking to a routine before bed helps you consistently get quality sleep so you wake up feeling refreshed. similarly, having a morning routine will keep you disciplined to get out of bed. having a set of repeated things to do in the morning is extremely helpful in getting rid of that disoriented feeling even if you do wake up groggy. you’re sure of your next step and keep it moving.

however, the reason why you probably still weren’t a morning person during high school despite having such a consistent routine of getting to class at the same time is because there wasn’t anything energizing your mornings.

4) set up an energizer for your mornings ⚡️ 

i’m not a huge coffee drinker, but if making a fun little drink in the morning gives you a little joy, have that be your motivation to start your day early. the main difference between waking up early and being a morning person is that the latter actually enjoys being awake early. if it’s a chore and you feel miserable, then you aren’t really a morning person yet. 💔 

make sure your morning has something you can look forward to daily. it could be catching the sunrise while reading a book, calling a friend that’s also up early, going on a walk, blasting music (this was huge while on kilimanjaro), literally anything that gives you energy and brings a smile to your face.

excite yourself in the morning, that’s the key!

everyone has a little bit of a morning person in them. if that’s something you want to unlock, controlling these factors has helped a lot for me. (:

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