Rise and shine: How to become a morning person

Becoming a morning person might sound like an impossible challenge, but by waking up early in the morning, you earn a practical superpower: the ability to beat the crowds. Morning people are the first on the trail and the first to run errands. They even beat rush-hour traffic.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with being a night owl, a morning person, or anything in between. Each has an advantage in different scenarios, and we all have a tendency toward one or the other. These tendencies are scientifically referred to as your “chronotype.” Although our chronotypes are deeply rooted, strategies can help you adjust your circadian rhythm toward morning-oriented patterns. 

Turning yourself into a morning person won’t feel easy, but the benefits are undeniable. By shifting your morning routine and starting your day a few hours earlier, you can join other morning people and get things done.

What is circadian tendency?

To understand what you’re trying to change, you need to understand chronotypes. These are people’s natural inclinations to wake up early or stay up late. In our primitive past, a mix of night owls and larks may have been beneficial. Even in a modern household, it’s nice when one partner waters the garden before sunrise and the other lets the cat out in the evening. We all work together.

How to reset the circadian rhythm

Unless they put in the effort, night owls are likely to stay that way. Age and environment can influence sleep patterns, but their roots run deep. Kids, for example, are likely to stay up later than adults. And a 2014 study of 14,650 people found young women woke up earlier than young men on average, but the difference shrank until the mid-30s. Among older participants, women stayed up later and later than men.

There are even possible side effects to changing your internal clock. Some people – shift workers, for example – live with such a profound misalignment from natural sleep-wake cycles that their hours are considered a possible cancer risk.

But there are benefits to rising with the sun, leading researchers to study altering circadian rhythms through sounds, exercise, mealtimes, and caffeine. Since your chronotype is deeply ingrained into your system but affected by subtle changes, it’s precisely the kind of behavior that can be tackled with a habit loop.

5 benefits of being a morning person

The advantages of getting up earlier are easy to recognize:

• You can leave for work before the morning rush.

• Early birds can jog or read when it’s peaceful and quiet.

• Getting outside earlier might lead to lower body mass index (BMI).

• Going to sleep earlier has been linked to lower rates of depression.

• You can get a head start on emails before a new stream arrives.

6 tips for becoming a morning person

So, how do you reap those benefits? Here are some small but impactful changes you can start with:

• Exercise: Good sleep is one of the many benefits of regular exercise. It wears you out and helps you fall asleep naturally.

• Limit caffeine intake: Caffeine from coffee, tea, or energy drinks can stay in your system for several hours after consumption.

• Avoid light at night: Bright lights, such as those from TVs and phones, can suppress melatonin and keep you from feeling sleepy.

• Increase light in the morning: A sunlight alarm or unblocked window can help you wake up gradually and in a better mood than pounding snooze on a screeching clock.

• Find a routine that works: You’ll only stick with a habit if you like it. Build enjoyable routines into your bedtime habits to give yourself something to look forward to. Start with a nice hot breakfast in the morning.

• Go slow: Shifting your internal body clock too significantly can feel like jet lag. Try changing your sleep schedule 15 minutes at a time instead. 

First plan of attack: Habit loops

You won’t revolutionize your sleep habits overnight, but even small changes build up. If you want to stop staying up late and start waking up early, you might focus on late-night snacks. They can keep you up at night because they give you the energy to keep going, especially if they’re high in protein. So, tackle them with a habit loop.

Habit loops were popularized in The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg, a book about why habits exist and how they can be changed. A habit loop has three parts: cue, routine, and reward. When you want to change a habit, you can’t change the reward or trigger (cue), but you can change the routine in the middle.

Here’s how to build a habit loop:

1. Identify the trigger: For instance, if you notice yourself grabbing a snack every time you head past the pantry in the evening, the trigger might be “passing the pantry.”

2. Focus on the routine: Habits emerge from the path of least resistance. We do them because they’re easy. You need to create a new nighttime routine that’s enjoyable enough to get you past the beginning when it’s new and challenging. Rather than staying up all night working or watching TV, put on some music you enjoy and settle into a long book when you go to bed.

3. Change the habit (rather than break it): If you can’t avoid working at night and can’t avoid the pantry on the way to your desk, change the habit instead of breaking it. Organize your snacks instead of eating them. In time, you’ll lose interest.

4. Enjoy the reward: Small changes have ripple effects. Getting up earlier allows you to start the day quietly, giving you time to sort your thoughts before they’re roaring for attention. Enjoy the satisfaction of checking off weekend errands before noon. And enjoy the morning coffee.

5. Say goodbye: Once you identify as a morning person, you must bid your old identity goodbye. But you don’t have to miss being a night owl. You worked hard on this; appreciate it. All those chores you used to lose sleep over can wait patiently until the morning.

Conclusion

Becoming a morning person takes energy. You have to overcome your chronotype and reset your internal clock. But in return, you get a head start before the crowd and skip the worst of your daily commute.

Sleep habits aren’t the only thing you can change to optimize your working day. Tempo offers a suite of tools to streamline your project management processes. Strategic Roadmaps will help you visualize your strategy and dominate your next boardroom presentation. Portfolio Manager is an all-in-one project management platform that uses predictive scheduling to help you stay on top of complex portfolios.

Sleep soundly, knowing Tempo can handle all your project management needs.