anybody have any tips on how to start your day off with a smile on your face???

tumbles,

we will probably still be up at 5:30 am having sex

I've never been a morning person and have always felt the best between about 7pm and 1am. A number of years ago I was under a set of circumstances where I had to wake up at 6:30 every morning, even on weekends. After two years of this, when I no longer had to wake up at 6:30, I woke up at 11:00. The next day I woke up at 1pm... I don't think I can fundamentaly change the fact that I'm a night owl...my best chance of seeing a sunrise is to stay up all night.

i wake up a 6 every morning. every morning, whether i want to or not.

but the morning is my personal time, so it's ok. on weekdays i have until i leave at 8 all to myself. on weekends i have until the two year old wakes up (usually about 8:30).

every now and then i try to stay in bed until 7, but i finally get up when my back starts to hurt. might as well get up at 6...

Get to sleep earlier?

I don't sleep very much at all - primarily insomnia - and would relish getting more sleep. Enjoy it. Embrace your sleep. Life's short, but if you try to cram everything into the shortest amount of time possible, you'll burn out sooner or later.

Slow and steady wins the race, and gets to smell the roses along the way.

I'm up at 5:30 for the gym, M-F. Which really hinders my natural night owl behavior.

i think it just takes time. i am an early bird (try to get to the office by 7 am) and haven't had a drop of caffeine in years.

train your body, sleep soundly, go to bed early, and have a good attitude about it. don't complain if you're up early if it's your choice.

i am a natural night owl as well. i easily stay up to 3am on most nights. my best hours are usually between 5pm and 2am. for now i am going to try to go to bed by midnight on a regular basis. i haven't used caffeine in ten years and don't plan on starting now. but it is a standard suggestion from the people to whom i mention that i attempting to start a new regimen. my plan is to go to bed when i get tired, and wake up at the same time everyday. seems simple enough. today has already had its tough moments. blurry eyes, the glare on the computer monitor seems exaggerated. my hope is that goes away after a week and i get used to my new schedule.

n_ i'm not as sharp today as i normally am but i don't think i have been complaining at all. i'm just looking for suggestions to help ease into morning person mode.

oh no, i didn't think you were complaining. i think you were legitamely asking for advice. i was just saying that comment about having a good attitude to everyone, not specifically to you.

I'm at the gym right when it opens at 5am. To work before 7am. If I abide by a 40 hour week I'm out of work by 4pm. Handling CA on sever eastern time zone projects and me being behind an hour in central time means 7am isn't early enough most mornings. Haven't been allowed to be a night owl since college where classes didn't start until 10am.

I function soooo much better when I get up early and get to work. Unfortunately this also requires that I get to bed before midnight, which is rare. I have heard that if you want to get up early one aid to doing so is to keep a glass of orange juice right next to the bed - the minute your alarm goes off, drink some OJ. Something about the tartness and the sugar rush helps you to not snooze off again.

Steven, how would you like to become my personal telephone alarm clock? The pay is crap, but you might get to hear me try to explain some of my dreams?

i get up earleier on the weekends than the weekdays. prolly cause i know on the weekends i can nap.

i have clinical insomnia - I range about 4 to 5 of restless sleep a night.

Whilst its nice to wake up early and get a head start on the day, the limited sleep that you give yourself will have life long and damaging effects that you won't see now, but when they hit (like your head against bare concrete) you'd wish you'd moved out a little slower

I HAAAAAAAAAATE alarm clocks, so I get up when the sun reaches some undefined level of brightness. Right about now, with a west facing bedroom window, I get up about 6.35 Mountain Time. Of course, really cloudy days mess with me, and the Daylight Savings change throws me for a loop, but it's worth it for the sense of natural connectedness.

I lived with my girlfriend last winter, and it involved an alarm clock AND a 30 mile commute. I almost died (on the inside).

my alarm clock purrs in the morning...

i'll be waking up early to make tumbles breakfast in bed

all i have to say is that it SUCKS to go to sleep when it's dark, then wake up the next morning and it's still dark.... can't be good for obtaining a good mood for the day

I think that's the thing, is to trick your body into believing it's daytime, no matter what the sky outside says. Turn on lights, turn on some noise (radio, morning news, whatever really). Go for a run if you're so inclined, or if not take things at a leisurely pace to allow yourself to enjoy the fact that you have time and aren't rushing through everything.

spend a week in a casino...should do the trick

if anyone has tips on getting to sleep let me know! I can never fall asleep fast and when I finally do fall asleep I wake up 4 or 5 times during the night...so frustrating! And exhausting!

Exercise in the evening and don't eat before bed?

exercise really does help. i've read don't set a bed time, go to bed when you are sleepy. if you really have trouble sleeping use the bed only for sleeping (i know... i know.... tumbleweed and mdler will have something to say about this) what i'm saying is don't watch tv in bed, don't read in bed. train your body to understand that the bed is for sleeping.

get a better job, so you can sleep better at night

i use some of the tricks (or just have the same tendencies) as listed above.. no alarm clock, eat breakfast, exercise, but i'd recommend napping- the hormones that control sleep run in weird cycles. yo umay notice that you get very tired at the same time once or twice a day (3-4 pm for me) i often just take a 15 minute nap then and it really helps for the overall sleep thing.

Give it up - go POLYPHASIC!

i've read that the acclimation period for polyphasic sleeping is quite difficult. plan on at least a week of being really tired and spacing out. i also think it would be very difficult to pull off if you work at a firm. you can push naps back but you can't put them off. and it seems like the key to making it work is keeping the naps on schedule. it would be tough to talk the bosses into letting you take two maybe three naps at work let alone get to all the meetings and deadlines you have at different times during the day.

I was just joking. I think polyphasic sleeping could completely screw you up. I heard about one guy who managed to keep it going for a while, until he missed one of his twenty minute naps and slep for 24hrs straight or something.

I made two semi-resolutions today. The first, inspired by this thread, was to go to bed early tonight. The second was to start flossing my teeth every single day.

I've kept one of these promises. But it's just past 2am and I think I might have screwed up a bit on that one.

On the other hand, I'm up late because I was being productive and drawing, so that's good. And I don't ever have to work before noon, either.

I'll try again tomorrow, but it's a friend's birthday party and I don't know how that'll go. Life just always seems to get in the way of my grand plans!

wake up an hour or so before you need to get up, chug coffee and go back to bed, wake up all psychotic and frantic

some of you know that I did the master cleanse fast a few weeks back. Anyways, while on the cleanse, I slept like a log. Usually, I would wake up many times throughout the night. As my body got rid of all the toxins and other shit in it, this allowed me to sleep well.

A few days after coming off of the fast, I had a cup of coffee. I was up the whole night (4 am posting on Archinect). It was amazing the effect that coffee had on me...

Now Tumbles keeps me up all night

i wake up at 5am every morning. i have the Marine Corps to thank for that. i love the morning, it's a great time. the early morning light and the crispness in the air gets me every time. the best time is waking up very early to go fishing. that early morning time on the river is absolutely staggering. . . the light grazing the river and the mist rising, the dew on the grass and the quick chill of the water.

in my opinion, the snooze button on alarms is the worst thing ever invented. when the alarm goes off either have the discipline to get up or the intelligence to set it when you are really going to get up. the hour and half that a person keeps pushing that button is not healthy, productive sleep.

i go to bed anywhere from 10pm-11pm and typically read in bed.

in the last 2 years school, i would get up really early depending on the work that needed to get done. I'd get to bed between 10-Midnight and wake up as early as 2-3 consistently on studio days. I'd be in the office (worked part time) 4-5 with my laptop. being in the office forced me to work on either school or office work depending on the more immenent deadline. and walking through the loop at 4 am is so soothing.

but weekends were a different story...

now, i've given up the habit as full-time work is particularly lame as of late, and i do not like to take on more than i can in 40-50 hours a week with a figured in 5% archinect surf time

but yeah, that commercial where there's that douche who's the morning guy...and says.."i think i'm gonna take the stairs"... that's me, except i should be taking the stairs a little more often...

anyway, for me, the morning is the most productive time of day