Everyday Systems

Hi all,

I read something on here from a while back about how to establish a good waking habits, and thought I'd share how I went from being a lazy student who regularly selpt until the afternoon to become something approximating a responsible grown up (getting a 9-5 job was a start!).

This may have been discussed in other posts, so apologies if it's repetitious.

I decided on a time that would be sensible to get up every day, both workdays and weekends, for me that is 7.30am.

I set my alarm and put on on the other side of the room. This means I have to physically get out of bed to turn it off (or risk waking spouse).

I then resolved to get up at that time every single day, regardless of how late I went to bed, and to make things easier I had the safety net of allowing a nap later in the day if needed or if I went to bed late. I often found though that even if I did go to bed late, I didn't fancy a nap later unless it was a relaxing Sunday or something. (This is analagous to helping yourself on the No S diet by saying that you won't have a snack now but you'll allow yourself extra at the next meal).

I also resolved to do this consistenlty for 21 days to establish the habit and then relax the rules if desired - this is also a good safety net, as it makes you feel that this isn't necessarily a permanent thing.

Anway, not surprisingly the above did the trick and established the habit, I generally wake at the same time every day even if I'm on holiday or haven't set my alarm.

I've occasionally slipped into bad habits again (sleeping late at weekends) but then done the 21 day thing to get the habit back again. Also, more recently I've decided that on Sunday I can get up whenever I feel like, as doing No S made me realise that it's good to give yourself a break regularly.

Anyway, just thought some might find that helpful, I don't think this idea is at all new and is definitely not something I came up with myself (I read various articles on the web which suggested some of the above, and I just took what I felt would be good for me).

Lastly, you could also do what Reinhard says and have kids - then I guess getting up early happens whether you want it or not! (I've often been amazed at how kids can get up before dawn and be bursting with energy!)

Thanks for sharing this.

Not currently a problem for me (2 kids did the trick and then some), but it certainly was, and is for many other people. Not only is irregular sleep a widespread problem, but I think it's one with very harmful effects that tend to be underestimated. Regular sleeping is right up there with eating regular meals as your basic internal metronome -- if you can't establish regular habits here, how are you going to manage anything else? Your rhythm will be off, at the deepest level. It's like trying to sing over an erratic baseline.

It also seems to me that people get so screwed up in terms of sleep habits that they imagine there is some deeper issue. They resort to dangerous pills and nutty ideas instead of trying the obvious cure of simple enforced, external regularity. Do the externals, lying down and getting up at the same time, and the internals, getting tired, the sleep itself, will follow. It's just like, on the No S Diet, leading your appetite by insisting on regular meals instead of letting your appetite lead you into anarchic permasnacking.

Obviously, this isn't always the case, but I suspect it's usually the case.

Reinhard

Thanks for posting this - once I've got my No-S habit firmly embedded I want to start dealing with this one myself.

I have a real problem with getting up early (and although everyone says that having kids will help, it hasn't made a massive difference in my case - I think we've just passed on our bad sleeping habits to our daughter instead )

My problem is not so much getting up early - I have to, in order to get to work on time, but of getting to bed too late. I need to get up at five each morning to leave the house by seven. I get home at six in the evening and by time dinner is cooked and eaten and cleared up and various chores like laundry and tidying are done it's time to have a bath and get ready for bed if I am to be asleep by ten and get seven hours of sleep.
Now this is conflicting with my to do list on my index cards In practice it's usually eleven thirty by the time I turn off the light and I could swear lack of sleep makes me fat. I "catch up" on sleep at weekends but I see I need to do some streamlining, somehow.

It's hard, isn't it? I actually made "bed by 10:30" a to-do on my list, and tracked it for a while!

We drive our son to school, carpooling with another family, because we'd have to have him ready 30 minutes earlier to ride the bus. And while we could get him UP earlier, I don't see any way to get him to BED earlier. Evenings are so crammed!!

All I can suggest is to remember that sleep is a priority too. Streamlining does help, but sometimes you just have to draw the line and say "I'm done."

Best wishes!

Lack of sleep makes me fat, too. Not a real fat, but a bloated, squidgy kind of fat. I suppose if I went long enough being sleep deprived I would learn whether the fat "stuck".

I think it has something to do with cortisol.

There was definitely a study done that indicated that people who lost sleep gained weight. What the connection was I'm not sure.

It's definitely a problem for me because I work from 2 pm to 10 pm and it's such a temptation to go online when I come home and stay up way too late. I have put a computer off time into my Habit Cal to see if that will help.

I generally get enough sleep but it's hard working everything else in, especially as I can't eat dinner at home but have to get it at work (during the week) so that's not normal either. Maybe it's also that the computer becomes a way of unwinding in the evening...I need some Late Night Luddite perhaps!

Well, I was only 1/2 hour off my goal for this morning: wanted to get up at 0630, got up at 7. Does that mean my square should be pink?

I have a sucky schedule too. I get home at 2000. That leaves two hours to do all my stuff (I'm a photographer wannabe) and watch TV and veg out and read. That means I get to bed at midnight and up at around 0700 which is not enough sleep by any means no matter what.

f

Hey f I like that quote about knowing one's limitations
I've heard about the cortisol thing and sleep deprivation, but I think it's also that feeling sleepy by midafternoon has a tendency to make a person want something sweet to give an energy boost (which probably wouldn't occur with enough sleep). Now with the No S regime that option is out, so I'm just going to have to add one S: sleep

Hi, just a bit of a late response to this revived thread

I often have the problem of getting to bed too late too, partly to do with me and DH being on totally different sleep schedules, e.g. he's a night owl who goes to bed late and gets up late. A good thing to ask yourself though if you are likely to have a late night is whether whatever you will accomplish in that time is worth the scarifice of feeling tired the next day, as well as how productive you can be late at night. For me it's usually a no brainer, as I'm a morning person, I can't do much that involves thinking or complexity past 11pm.

Hi Bonnie,

We have a "mixed marriage" too (I'm a morning person, hubby is a night owl). It does take effort to coordinate - but the more I stick to my OWN routine, the more productive I am.

Sleep needs to be a priority, just like exercise and good food. (I say ruefully, having missed bedtime last night...) I insist on it for my child, and am learning to do the same for myself.

My husband and I are BOTH night owls! Before our kids started school we were ALL night owls! LOL!

Hubby doesn't even try to maintain a normal schedule (we both work from home) but I do try. It makes it hard b/c he's up and I'd usually like to be too. The only thing that saves me is that my kids have to be at school in the mornings.

I may start a HabitCal this summer to keep me and the kids on a decent sleep schedule.

I'm self-employed.

I get up at five every morning. While I am a morning person, I find that one of the reasons I do this is that if I get up early and hit the ground running, I'm more likely to get everything done.

In my experience, the connection between lack of sleep and gaining weight is the desperate attempt to get some energy by snacks and caffeine. It works for oh, about 30 minutes, and then you have to have more. May be the connection for all the permasnacking that goes on in this country. Definite problems with sleep deprivation. (That's my sleep deprived, glazed look!) So I'm heading to bed. Good night, everyone.

There's a saying from one of the Inuit -- "Food is sleep".

In the Navy, they feed you a lot when you're on Four and Four watches.

I try to get up around five most mornings 'cause then I'll get my workout in without whining or screwing around with it.

I'm trying to get my sleep schedule realigned, too. My class schedule this semester is very irregular - sometimes class starts at 10:30am and sometimes at 1pm - and I have a volunteer thing to do at 6:30am on Saturdays. As a result, my internal clock is all over the place, and I've decided that if I get up at 7 or 8 every day except Saturday, it won't be such a wrench to get up at 6am on Saturdays. (I can't stomach the idea of getting up at 6 every day...) We'll see how that works. Today, it didn't.

I made a decision to exercise regularly this year (decision made prior to finding NoS, which dovetails perfectly). I am a single, parent, working outside the home so spending quality time with my daughter in the evenings is a priority.
I know from the past if I were to exercise after she goes to bed I would be so jacked-up that it would be well past midnight before I went to bed and our work/school schedule doesn't allow for this unless I wanted to just drag through the day.
I made the commitment to get up at 4:30 in order to get my workout in before we officially start our day. The first week was rough, my internal clock seemed to think I should be camped out on the sofa watching TV when it was time for bed.
Now I just go to sleep when I put my daughter in bed so getting up is easier. I really now see the problem as not so much the difficulty of getting up as it is the difficulty of going to bed. I may not get to watch every episode or Frontline or Top Chef that I would like but my days are so much more productive.
Better rest Blessings to All

I am naturally a night owl, but I have to be up by 05h00 if I want to be ready to leave the house by 07h00 to get my boys to school and me to work on time.

DH & I would happily stay up till well past mid-night and only get up mid-morning, so I really battle to get up so early.

I try during the week to be in bed by 22h00, but it is something that is so easily defered.

For me it is all about getting to bed on time and that way I am able to wake up when the alarm goes off and I don't have the mid afternoon snoozy feeling.

Thanks for reminding me to get back on track.