How I finally tricked myself into waking up at 5:30am

To the serial alarm clock snoozer that longs for a better morning

If I only had more hours in the day I would… How would you finish that sentence? I would very likely answer that question by responding: read, write, and code.

In 2017 I listened to the book Deep Work by Cal Newport for the first time (thanks Audible). I remember feeling particularly challenged to set aside time to do things on my bucket list. Things like: read good books, write a book, and make my own iPhone app.

So the question quickly became: How can I get more focused time without sacrificing time with the family? After considering the alternatives, which were to stay up later at night, or to work during lunch, I realized that the only reasonable answer was to wake up earlier—before everyone else in my house. If I did this I could “guarantee” I would have the energy and quiet I needed to get some work in. And if I could get to the place where I woke up around 5:30-5:45am I’d gain effectively 5 hours of focused time per week before the kids woke up. That’s a lot.

Why not just wake up earlier? Well the problem is that I’ve historically been a night owl. Spending many hours deep into the night playing video games (when I was younger of course), studying or writing a paper, finishing a project, watching a good movie, playing music, etc. Though this can be a time for inspiration to strike, with young children in the house I don’t really have the same stamina to push into the later hours. So how does someone who has been a night owl for their entire life change their habits and move into the early riser category?

A number of years ago I stumbled upon an alarm app called Step Out (I’ve since switched to Alarmy Pro because I was having an issue with Step Out, but they are both very similar). What’s special about these apps is that they let you setup small required tasks (or “missions”) that must be completed before you can turn off the alarm. Because these tasks are required you can’t simply snooze a hundred times. This is because the app requires more mental effort and/or physical exertion than a traditional alarm clock does. This gives you a higher chance of not going back to sleep after completing the required tasks. Some example tasks include solving a math problem, walking a number of steps, or shaking the phone violently. I tried all of these and they did not work for me. I have to admit I was discouraged at this point.

The feature that really sealed the deal for me and took me out of my app-buying-regret-despair-cycle was the “take a picture” mission. When you setup the alarm for the first time, you take a photo of a place in your house within the app. Then when the alarm goes off in the morning, you have to walk over to that same place and take essentially the same photo to turn it off (don’t worry they allow room for error!).

So every morning when I wake up early I take a picture of my fridge. This is strategic because it’s in the kitchen. This puts me close to the espresso machine which then greatly increases my chances of staying awake and getting to work. And this was the piece of the puzzle I was missing.

Finding an app that had the potential to help was one thing, but I still needed to actually start waking up earlier.

I began to use the app and paired it with making incremental adjustments to my sleeping habits. For one thing, I didn’t start waking up at 5:30am. I think I first set my alarm to 6:45am. I would try to go to bed a little earlier the next few nights, and then move my wakeup time to 6:30am. After a few weeks of inching both my bedtime and my wakeup time earlier, wham! I hit 5:30am. Eureka!

I can’t say it was easy inching along, systematically trying to program my mind and trick my body to wake up early. It wasn’t. But I can say the feeling of waking up earlier and reaping the benefits was amazing. I was finally doing it.

And now it’s largely a matter of discipline. When I’m getting ready for bed I will decide if I want to turn on my alarm for the morning. I also have to make the conscious effort to go to bed early enough the night before or I’ll just fall asleep on the couch. I’ve found that I need about 7 hours of sleep. And I’m pretty good at convincing myself that I need more sleep when it’s dark outside.

And that’s how I tricked myself into regularly waking up before 6am. There are of course exceptions to waking up early, sick kiddos is a good one, but I still use this method to wake up early and I’d recommend trying it if you’ve struggled with the ever tempting snooze button.

Do you already wake up early? What motivates you to resist every inch of your body screaming “stay in bed”?! Do you wish you could wake up earlier? Have you also found a way to change from a night owl to a morning person out of necessity like me?

-Jesse

*Side note: when you’re traveling or on vacation you’ll want to turn off the required picture setting (if you use it) since that area of your house won’t be available to take a picture of while you’re away! I learned this the hard way. 🤦🏻‍♂️