
Ask HN: What gets you out of bed? - akumpf
If half the work is showing up, half of showing up is getting out of bed. :)<p>What do HN readers do to get motivated and start the day awesomely when working on a startup?<p>Full disclosure: I'm asking because we want to make our startup's alarm clock app better. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.chaoscollective.warmly
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mbrock
I don't use an alarm clock, I just go to bed early and wake up in time...

But in periods when I've really had trouble with getting up, the core problem
hasn't been physically awakening my brain, it's been that as soon as I woke up
I knew there was just boring miserable shit all day to look forward to, so I
was likely to just snooze.

In those periods, I discovered that the only effective way to get my brain
going enough to understand the rational course of action (getting up &
showered), was to have something fun within reach -- my computer, usually.

So I'd wake up at the first ring of my phone alarm, then flip up my laptop and
read some Reddit or whatever.

If I really needed an exceptionally effective alarm clock, I'd want something
that maybe starts talking for five minutes about something interesting, or
prompts me with some captivating question, or shows me a gallery of cool
pictures, or something.

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saintx
The neighborhood squirrel serenades the sunrise each morning as a sort of
mammalian metronome for about an hour, filling me with questions about
rhythmic chanting and the mammal brain. It's like a 60 decibel woodblock, only
three octaves higher. That wakes me up. I don't recommend it for your alarm
clock app.

Money, glory, and fun actually get me out of bed.

~~~
photorized
That squirrel sounds incredibly motivated. Would love to hear what that sounds
like.

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eddieroger
Getting to the office before everyone else, for two reasons:

\- It is quiet. Most of my coworkers get in between 9:30 and 10:00, so if I'm
here at 8:30, I get a solid hour to handle the administrivia part of my job -
emails, daily task sorting, etc.

\- I get to leave earlier. I like to have my afternoons, so if I'm in early, I
get to take off early. This is not set in stone solid, and I can always take
off if I absolutely have to (or work from home), but for the day to day, if
I'm in at 8:30, I'm out at 4:30, and that lets me have time to handle my
personal stuff, beat traffic, run errands, anything.

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kellros
My secret to getting out of bed: I sleep with socks on!

I find it's also much easier to get out of bed when you know what you need to
accomplish and what's on your agenda for the day. A sense of urgency is a
great motivator.

~~~
lucb1e
Having something on my agenda rather makes me not go to bed :P. But yes, that
is indeed a good one that I hadn't thought of. In hindsight I notice I've
often woken up more easily because of something cool on my agenda rather than
the daily routine, so it might be something to practice.

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gyardley
Usually my wife.

She uses some sort of fitness wrist-thing to wake up - maybe a Jawbone? I love
it, because there's no more harsh alarm noise - no noise at all, usually,
although sometimes I can hear it buzz a wee bit.

~~~
Adirael
The Fitbit Flex does that too. I just got mine today and I'm counting the
hours till tomorrow morning to test it. I want to try being more of a morning
person but I don't want to disturb the wife getting up too early.

------
belcherj
Early Morning Meetings. If I know I HAVE to get out of bed I will get up. If
not I will snooze for longer than I would like.

Additional motivators:

1\. Light - Before bed I open all the curtains

2\. Tasks - I lay out all my tasks the night before. Less stress thinking
about all the things I have to do. Wunderlist everything and then stop
stressing.

3\. Fun First - I try to put a fun task at the top of the list each morning.
Makes it fun to get up.

4\. Alarm not near bed - Having the alarm away from the bed I have to get up
to turn it off. Once I'm up and moving I rarely feel the need to get back into
bed.

~~~
akumpf
great tactics. thanks!

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bnegreve
I park my car on a parking spot that isn't free. If I don't get up before 9 I
usually get fined.

~~~
akumpf
I think it's interesting that so many comments on here are about setting up a
scenario where you'll be embarrassed or fined if you don't get up.

I guess it comes down to trying to plan logically the day before vs. being too
tired to care when the alarm goes off. Reminds me of the extreme where your
alarm starts sending money to a political party you don't like if you hit
snooze. :)

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andreer
My son (nearly three), usually around 6am. If I don't bounce out of need the
instant he opens our bedroom door, he'll wake the baby and her mother, and
both will be grumpy for the rest of the day! I love it because then we get to
build something with Lego's for an hour before we have to get ready for
kindergarten.

~~~
davidjgraph
My eldest (4) woke me at about 6am this morning poking one of my iPads in my
face, he'd started YouTube and was asking how he could watch Spiderman on it.

What got me out of bed was the thought of what he'd watch after the first
video.

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dsirijus
Nicotine and caffeine craving gets me up.

~~~
lucb1e
Well that's the first good thing I heard about nicotine besides stress relief
I guess. Never thought about it this way.

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adventured
I've been doing web businesses since I was about 16, circa 1996. I didn't
particularly like computers growing up, but when I got introduced to the web,
it struck me like a bolt of lightning. I saw the web as an unlimited global
canvas that I could build anything on. Webchat Broadcasting! AltaVista and
HotBot! Netscape! Yahoo! Geocities! Quake online! Porn! It was all so exciting
to a teenager. If I had an idea, I could immediately go to work on it. That's
what I still love about the web today, and that's what gets me out of bed in
the morning (so to speak). I usually have a lot of things I want to work on
when I go to sleep, and so inevitably I wake up with my brain on fire, eager
to build.

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general_failure
Body clock. I am up at 6 everyday and go to bed at around 10pm or so. I then
proceed to my favorite activity - bug the wife till she wakes up :p.

It's interesting now that I think about it because I used to be totally a
night person not too long ago.

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behrendtio
The more I have to do, the more motivated I am. If I know I have a few tasks
to do, but no actual appointments or deadlines, it's pretty hard to get out of
the bed. I need stress to be productive.

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rickdale
I love the mornings and embracing the day. I try to imagine Rafael Nadal's
bull run from the net to the baseline at the beginning of his matches, and try
to match that energy and excitement for the day. Usually springing out of bed.

I like challenges, like workouts, in the morning as well. If I overcome stuff
in the morning, before I start my day, chances are I will have a productive
day.

------
zalew
my cat pats my face meowing for food.

~~~
akumpf
haha. I used to wake up to that a couple years back. Kind of awesome, actually
:)

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johnsocs
A few things that get me out of bed in the morning:

* Looking forward to spending time with my children ( post work, or all day on weekends )

* Known exactly what I have to accomplish that day ( task breakdown )

* Exercise, I really enjoy known that I'll have time to workout, this goes with having a schedule.

* Interesting problems to solve at work ( related to task breakdown I suppose )

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mimbee
I'm using Sleep Cycle on my iPhone and it works like a charm actually.
Downside is that you should keep it in bed so it can measure your sleep, but
the vibration of my phone and alarm sounds are always on the right time. It's
my only alarm, in stead of the 7 alarms I used before (at the same time!)

------
dsschnau
Girlfriend and child - wakes me right up.

~~~
akumpf
Just curious, does that motivate you and put you in a good mood?

If not, are there other ways you wake up that put you in a productive mindset?

~~~
hamburglar
My answer is "a toddler", which, before having one, would have sounded like a
nightmare to me (not a morning person). It turns out having a little person
who is so ridiculously happy to see me puts me in a pretty good mood.

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wojt_eu
Throughout winter, a light+radio alarm clock, something like: Philips-Hf3470

Since recently, a recorded motivational message:
[http://blog.wojt.eu/post/51792538207/get-your-custom-
motivat...](http://blog.wojt.eu/post/51792538207/get-your-custom-motivational-
alarm-clock-on)

~~~
akumpf
reminds me of this guy who uses two alarms; one set to go off quietly a few
minutes before the loud alarm.

[http://veenix.blogspot.com/2005/10/alarm-clocks-are-bad-
how-...](http://veenix.blogspot.com/2005/10/alarm-clocks-are-bad-how-to-wake-
up.html)

~~~
wojt_eu
Yeah I'm planning to create one long alarm mp3. It'd start with ambient sounds
of slowly increasing volume, then some motivational recording reminding me of
my resolutions. Finally plain old annoying alarm.

------
geekam
That I will return from work eventually back to my personal projects, reading
and writing.

------
akumpf
For the past couple months I've made it a point to read the news when I get up
to get the gears turning.

On one level it's great, but at the same time it's often distracting relative
to sitting down and being productive.

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orangethirty
I wish my project management system (currently getblimp.com) had a way for you
to sync the alarm clock with it. So I would get daily alarms on important
things. Why don't you give your app an api?

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groundCode
Wake up Glass of luke warm water with a splash of lemon juice in it. 20 slow
pushups Shower. Coffee. Wake up daughter and chat to her about the dreams she
had last night :)

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raldi
If you go to bed before midnight, you're actually _ready_ to get up in the
morning.

I haven't used an alarm in five years, ever since I stopped staying up late on
weeknights.

~~~
dllthomas
Your experience doesn't necessarily generalize.

------
tbrock
Working on a product for developers that they love to use.

~~~
akumpf
Does that literally wake you up? Or is that more of a motivator once you're up
and moving?

~~~
glassx
Not the OP, but once I was promoted to lead developer for the flagship app of
the company I worked for and that was quite efficient in making me wanting to
get to the office before everyone.

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ivanaj
I have to work 9 hours/day. So if I get out of the bed late I will have to
come from office late in the night which I definitely not want.

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loqi
100mg of caffeine (half a nodoz) taken 30 minutes before I need to get up. I
set alarms for both events, but rarely need the second one.

------
eitland
sleep as android + qr code in kitchen ( Not affiliated, I am just a happy
user, now having two hours more in the morning to do something I want to/need
to.)

[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.urbandroid...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.urbandroid.sleep&hl=no)

------
aaronsnow
1 kids. 2 dog. If you can make your alarm clock jump up and down on my bed
and/or lick my face, it's a winner.

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cdvonstinkpot
I lay in bed thinking about the day's tasks until I feel motivated to get up &
start on one of them.

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rooshdi
Usually a stretch and a phone check followed by another stretch does the job.

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magpie707
Alarm --> email and google reader check. GR soon to be Feedly =/

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like-that
Coffee & cigarettes

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pshin45
(Mistakenly) thinking that I've overslept.

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krapp
The fire alarm in my dorm, today...

------
haliphax
BLACK METAL

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db-dzine
My stomach ...

------
toutouastro
a quote of jim rohn

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youngerdryas
I had serious trouble getting up in college. Someone had given me a bizarre
stereo that had an alarm clock that would set off the turntable. I would put
Back in Black on vinyl set very loud as the alarm. Once I heard the crackle
and high hat count in I knew if I did not get up before the first bar chord I
would aggravate quite a few people. Needless to say it never got to the bar
chord. :)

~~~
akumpf
That's awesome. Playing a card from the psychology deck and making it
embarrassing if you don't get up in time. :)

+1 for having Back in Black on vinyl.

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wilfra
5-hour energy.

I'm not joking. Slam one of those right after you wake up and you'll have a
really productive first few hours of your day and over time will start to look
forward to getting out of bed because of the near-instant high it gives you.

~~~
akumpf
Do you slam it while still in bed? or after you're up an moving.

I find that the small gap between in-bed and out-of-bed is the crux of getting
up.

~~~
mkjonesuk
I'm with you on that - the inbed/outofbed crossover can be a real challenge.

Once I'm up and about I'm generally OK, but those moments of pain when I open
my eyes to see it's time to get up and do stuff are the killer.

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kmasters
If I have too much money in the bank, I will not get out of bed. So being poor
would help.

Once I hit a certain savings threshold, I quit my job because I know the whole
(my bank account) is greater than the sum of its parts (putting up with
horrible software shops)

Then...I do it all over again.

~~~
raldi
_> I know the whole (my bank account) is greater than the sum of its parts
(putting up with horrible software shops)_

I think the saying you're looking for is actually "the ends don't justify the
means".

