Imagine yourself waking up in the morning feeling full of energy, looking in the mirror to see a reflection of someone with bright eyes full of excitement, and making yourself a delicious cup of coffee knowing that you have the time to sit back and enjoy it. Doesn’t this sound amazing? Well, it can be a reality for you too!
In order to wake up early, you need to go to bed early. But how? I decided to share my experience with different methods for improving the quality of my sleep with the readers of Bright Side. You may be surprised at some of the results!
Why did I need it?
My name is Lyuda. And as far as I remember, I always kept asking myself, “Why do I have to wake up early? Why are there no kindergartens, institutes, and offices that start working in the afternoon?”
Due to my dislike of mornings, I started to work as a freelancer once I got the opportunity. I was very satisfied with life because I could sleep in the mornings as much as possible.
But as it always happens in movies, if the main character has a period of careless happiness, it means something bad is going to happen. My trouble appeared in the form of a new neighbor that looked 45 years old, however, her passport was showed that she was actually 60 years old. She never injected Botox and among all the varieties of available cosmetics items, she used only a facial mask made of cucumbers. But she always went to bed at 10 PM.
Of course, it could be due to good genetics and not because of her sleeping habits at all. But having read much information about the benefits of melatonin for a woman’s youth and beauty, I decided to change my sleeping habits.
So my goal was to fall asleep no later than 11 PM and wake up by 6 AM.
At first, I was simply trying to go to bed by 10 PM and to fall asleep. But I had no wish to sleep and my boredom kept reminding me that the internet has many interesting things that will help me fall asleep faster. Eventually, I ended up wasting my time surfing the web till about 2 AM. Then I decided to try other methods that could help me fall asleep faster. Those were:
I tested each method for a week, trying to evaluate not only how fast I fell asleep but also my feelings the next morning.
Aromatherapy
At first, I read the information about essential oils recommended for improving sleep. I opted for lavender oil because its positive effect was checked on students and women with postpartum depression.
Sleeping pills
In order to choose the right sleeping pills, I visited a doctor. At first, he asked me to drop this idea because sleeping pills are usually prescribed to people with serious sleeping disorders and my imaginary problems were not the case. But after listening to me more carefully, he recommended the extract of Passiflora.
I found a study that confirmed the positive effect of the pills which works by increasing deep sleeping phases and decreasing fast sleeping phases.
Refusing gadgets 2 hours before sleeping
The camera cover may make me seem paranoid, but I feel better when it is there.
The radiation that comes from smartphones and notebooks (also called blue radiation) is perceived by our eyes as “daylight” and it makes our brain think it’s daytime, which decreases the melatonin production. That’s why sometimes when you feel extremely tired, your body still can’t fall asleep.
Alcohol
I chose Cabernet Sauvignon Merlot to check this method.
Red wine (or rather the grapes from which it is made) contains a substance that helps you fall asleep quickly. You can find most of it in such varieties as Nebbiolo, Croatina, Cabernet-Sauvignon, and Merlot.
The “Smart Alarm” application
The application checks your sleeping phases, it notices all the movements while you are asleep. Here is my daily report: I set an alarm in the evening at 5:54 PM. The period between 10:30 PM and 05:07 AM is the time of my sleeping. The blue and green colors show deep and light sleep phases.
In the morning, half an hour before waking up, the program chooses the moment where body motions and sounds get their peak (those are the signs of a light sleep phase) and the alarm starts to wake you up. In order to fall asleep easier in the evening, I chose a relaxing melody called “white noise.”
What happened next:
Having finished testing all of these methods, I decided to stop my choice at the Smart Alarm application and lavender oil. Red wine was left as an additional method in case I had a bad day. Within a month, I was falling asleep listening to “white noise” and smelling the lavender aroma and was waking up listening to birds singing at 5-5:30 AM. I have broken the rule several times though because of visiting some club, cafe, or other Friday evening places with my friends.
A month later, these are the changes:
The left photo is of me before I started to fight my problematic sleep. The right photo is of me at the end of the experiment.
What’s next?
I have decided not to get back to my previous regime even before getting the results of the experiment. All because I fell in love with mornings! It is such a nice feeling to go to the balcony early in the morning, listen to birds singing, and to watch the city wake up. So I decided to become an early bird. Moreover, it turned out that such people live longer.
But despite all the obvious advantages of such a regime, I wouldn’t recommend it to everyone. I think it’s a similar situation to loving olives — people start loving them at a different age (or not loving at all.) But if you also decide to do it, now you know what to do to switch off your laptop without any hesitations and how to go to bed at 10:30 PM!
Are you a night owl or an early bird? Have you ever made drastic changes to your health regime? Share your stories with us in the comments section below!
