
The Secret to Becoming an Annoyingly Productive Early Morning Person - joeyespo
https://nickwignall.com/the-secret-to-productive-mornings/
======
Mizza
Fuck this. I'm a night time person and I feel like I'm constantly punished by
a society that places a moral value on waking up early.

In all seriousness, I'm thinking about starting a "night company" for night
time people. Come in at 2, work until 10. Is there anybody out there who'd be
interested in something like that?

~~~
ams6110
Yes, but they're all single or otherwise have no family obligations. Once you
have a family and have to deal with school and other activities it's pretty
hard to deviate much from the normal 9-5 workday.

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AndrewKemendo
No that's bogus. I have three kids and am very much a night person.

Usually in bed around 2.

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ramphastidae
Are you responsible for getting your kids to school? The average US school day
starts at 8 AM.

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TomMarius
In my country kids use their foot to get to the school, even small kids
(usually starting at 9 years when afterschool care is not available anymore).
Maybe you should start structuring your society in a way that allows people
without cars to get around if you don't like that, or move to Europe.

~~~
roasm
Wow, I don't know if the negativity is warranted here, but for me (and my kids
walk to school), getting the kids ready involves making sure the young kids
get properly dressed, breakfasted, lunch packed, etc... Transportation is not
always the issue.

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TomMarius
I didn't want to be negative, sorry. Kids generally are able to do all of what
you saod when they're 9 years old. I've seen that American families often
belittle their kids and are afraid to make them responsible.

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noir_lord
Not just the US, UK is the same, when I was 9 (1989) I had to cross two busy
roads to get to school and it was considered entirely normal to walk to school
alone.

Now in 2019 at the same age (9) letting my step-son do the same would be
considered by a lot of parents to be borderline child abuse.

I’m treating him the same way my parents treat me, if he wants to make his mum
a cup of tea (novelty hasn’t worn off) I’ll let him (with supervision at a
distance), I’m not coddling him at his age I had full access to my father and
grandfather sheds/garages and tools - by comparison a kettle isn’t a big deal.

~~~
indemnity
In New Zealand this is illegal while they’re under 14.

Whereas, when I grew up, pretty much from 7+ you were expected to be able to
go visit your friends, get to school, etc. without all the ceremony and
scheduling required today.

~~~
noir_lord
Yep, it's hard to avoid the "back in my day" feel but there is a qualitative
difference in how we are raising current generations here, Daniel is vastly
less self-sufficient than I was at the same age.

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anderspitman
I'm naturally a night owl. My best sleep seems to happen between 7-9AM.
However, I recently started getting up at 5AM. It was hard at first. It took a
solid month before I started sleeping well again. However, I feel the
tradeoffs have absolutely been worth it. Before, I worked on my side projects
after work. The amount of brain power I had left at the end of the day was
incredibly variable and completely dependent on how the day had gone. Now, I
do the things that are most important to me first thing in the morning. I feel
far more productive. It's been awesome. Also, I don't use caffeine at all.

~~~
p2detar
Ok, serious question. What happens if there're days when you go out with
people and get in bed at 2AM? Do you still get up at 5AM? Doesn't that mess up
your body for days after?

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anderspitman
This has only happened a couple times. I hardly function on less than 5 hours
of sleep, and not very well on less than 6-7. So in this case I would get up
at 5 to maintain the habit, do some reading for an hour, then go back to sleep
for a couple hours. As I said, there are tradeoffs. I'm pretty much fried by
9-10PM, which is having an impact on my social life.

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kough
The way I've switched from a 'wake-at-2-pm' kind of person to a 'wake-at-6-am'
kind of person is setting an alarm, popping 200mg caffeine + 200mg modafinil,
then going back to bed. In 10 minutes I'll be right back up and ready to go to
the gym and go about my day. I've started dialing back the modafinil since it
seems unnecessary to get up anymore and I have some ethical concerns (see
comment below.)

I'll also +1 the friction removal concept -- laying out my gym clothes the
night before really helps me get out the door as soon as I'm up in the
morning. Otherwise, I'll tend to want to go back to bed.

~~~
erentz
> 200mg modafinil

The wide use of drugs as performance enhancers in our industry really makes me
unhappy and uncomfortable. (I guess it probably exists in other industries
too?)

I can't work out how to properly put into words how or why it makes me
uncomfortable. But it seems like instead of drawing lines and saying people
shouldn't need to take ADHD medication to focus, or modafinil to work
unnatural hours, or ambien to sleep on planes, we're just going along with it.
Like the work should come first, and of course we should take drugs to allow
us to meet work expectations, or to get the upper hand in intra-employee
competition, etc.

~~~
geofft
Modafinil has basically as safe as caffeine, isn't it? The big difference with
caffeine is that many governments permit caffeine in food/drink but control
modafinil, but trusting governments to have good opinions on drug safety seems
a little unsubstantiated. I think modafinil is _less_ addictive than caffeine
and has fewer withdrawal problems. And it's not a drug like cocaine or alcohol
that has serious long-term side effects. So I think the only serious reason to
avoid it, if it doesn't cause you side effects, is a morality that says
certain drugs are bad. (Which isn't even consistent - there are plenty of
moralities in the world that say that caffeine and alcohol are bad too, and
that at least makes sense.)

It's not unusual to feel gut-uncomfortable with technology enhancing the lives
of humans beyond where nature left us, but at the end of the day, I have
trouble seeing how you can say using modafinil to get your job done is bad but
using eyeglasses to get your job done is good.

~~~
soufron
It's not "governments" that control drugs, but the FDA - in the US - and it's
comprised of M.D.

~~~
geofft
Do M.D.s generally recognize modafinil as less safe _than caffeine and
alcohol_? It seems unlikely to me that the political will exists in the US to
schedule either, regardless of what doctors actually think.

My claim is that no research exists that argues that modafinil is more
dangerous than caffeine. (I'm not 100% sure about this claim, and it's easily
debunkable. And for what it's worth I take caffeine and have never taken
modafinil.)

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cududa
This missed the fact that there’s a massive body of evidence showing people
have different genetic predispositions to being morning people versus night
owls

~~~
mykowebhn
Extremely small sample size (of two), but I used to be a night owl, and in my
old(er) age I've definitely become a morning person. Same with my wife. It's
not unusual for us to be in bed by 8pm. My point is that being a morning/night
person might be changeable.

~~~
rsuelzer
It is a fact that as we age we prefer to go to bed earlier. There is a good
evolutionary explanation for this. It makes sense that teenagers with better
eye sight would stay up late to watch over the tribe / livestock at night,
this predisposition for younger people to be night owls benefited the survival
of the species.

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yabatopia
The advice in the article is very universal and not specific to early morning
people. A night owl too can prepare his breakfast or lunch, make a plan or
meditate before sleep and benefit from that. It takes just a few changes and
the title becomes The Secret To Becoming an Annoyingly Productive Night Owl.
So what, you wake up early?

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mykowebhn
I think the key point here that was left unmentioned is that the writer seems
to be working from home. If I had to get ready to leave the home and commute
every day, I think a lot of my morning time would be spent just getting ready
and commuting. This is one of the chief reasons I prefer to work from home:
the productivity gains one gets from having free time in the morning to work.

EDIT: I just noticed that the author does commute. Still, I'm not sure I'd be
productive if I had to commute an hour each way every day.

~~~
allannienhuis
He explicitly says in the article that he arrives at his office by 6am.

That said, I suspect he doesn't have a 1.5 hr commute like many do (and I used
to have, at times). Working from home does indeed provide a tremendous
advantage, particularly with those quiet early morning hours.

~~~
wolco
Getting to work by 6am usually means he drove without many cars on the road.

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erinnh
This is specifically the reason why I changed from a person that got in barely
at 10am to somebody that comes in at 6am.

Way less traffic and that cuts my commute down by half. (1hour to 30 min)

And I found I actually like 2-3 hours of no distractions at the beginning of
the day.

When I came in at 10am, it was 0-100 almost immediately because somebody
always wanted something.

Took me a good month though to actually learn to go to sleep before 11pm.
Originally whenever I slept before 11pm, even if I was dead tired, I would
wake up at 2-3 am and not be able to sleep again.

~~~
slededit
If you had pushed it just a little bit farther to 11am you would have been
commuting in the daytime lull and had the same benefits.

~~~
erinnh
Not possible with my employer. 10am is the latest I am allowed to arrive. And
to be honest, I already hated being in office at 8pm some times, so being out
from work at 3/4pm is also a plus in my book.

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reneberlin
Instead of focussing of being externally useful / abused - please consider:
internal, subjective rules to obey. You are more than an experiment on short-
living, abandoned batteries for the society you feel to be living a standard
for.

~~~
gatherhunterer
Just because you are doing work does not mean that you are a cog. Many people
do work that is meaningful for them. There is no shame in being productive.

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rland
My 2 rules for being up and alert at 6am:

1\. Get in bed by 10pm every night, no exceptions.

2\. If I can't sleep after I'm in bed, it means I haven't exercised enough.
So, exercise, then GOTO 1.

Downside to this is that it works--after a few days of the cycle, if I try to
stay up past 10, I nosedive to half-dead around 10:30.

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brightball
I currently work with a largely European dev team and started getting up and
5am to have more work day overlap. The hardest thing for me was getting to
sleep at 9pm because I’ve always struggled to get to sleep. Usually I have too
much on my mind.

Turns out that necessity actually forced me to figure it out. I discovered
that I can get to sleep if I turn on a movie that I’ve seen many times before
because it basically keeps my mind from wandering.

Not kidding at all, for the last 4 months I’ve turned on Avengers Infinity War
every night + the sleep timer on the TV. I’m usually out cold before “Launch
17-A” and I never make it past the Guardians scene that comes right after.
Also have to sleep on my side.

I’m sure it sounds crazy but it’s the only thing I’ve found that consistently
works.

~~~
noir_lord
Hah I do the same thing with audio books of books I’ve read many times,
engaging enough to silence my thoughts but I don’t care if I fall asleep.

In my case terry pratchett audio books since some of those I can almost quote
entire chapters.

~~~
2sk21
Exactly the same - no matter how much I have on my mind, I can usually get to
sleep very quickly listening to audiobooks. It has to be a book that is a
somewhat interesting but not too absorbing. And as you say, it has to be an
audio book you have already heard before. I myself favor books on cognitive
science, I really like Daniel Dennet's books for this.

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inertiatic
I don't think it's too much to claim that if you can develop a routine that
makes you perform great mentally that early in the morning, you probably
aren't a "night person".

~~~
MRD85
I'll disagree here as I'm naturally a night person but my current schedule is
all early mornings due to my combination of work, study and parenting. It's
not fun but I maintain it with discipline and it works out really well for
productivity. If I don't need to be productive and relax a bit I'll slip into
night owl mode.

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soufron
One alternative solution is to schedule all of your emails so they are sent at
7 or 8am. That way you'll be annoyingly productive early in the morning, while
sleeping.

Best of two worlds.

~~~
listenallyall
The "Send Later" extension for Thunderbird is terrific for this exact use
case.

[https://addons.thunderbird.net/en-
US/thunderbird/addon/send-...](https://addons.thunderbird.net/en-
US/thunderbird/addon/send-later-3/)

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ttul
Does the author have kids? I’m up at 5:30am getting my kids ready for school.
If I’m lucky, that process is fully complete by 8:25am when the final kids are
on the school bus.

If I had the luxury of a zen wake up experience, I don’t know what I would do
with myself.

~~~
HereBeBeasties
Anyone who can find the time to write such a massively long article with so
little actual content in it clearly doesn't have children.

~~~
skiman10
He has a daughter.

~~~
detaro
Two daughters.

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eriktrautman
2 quick things to add. First, eat dinner much earlier if you're remotely
sensitive to blood sugar movements (read: a normal human) because the
difference between eating at 6 and at 8 is huge when trying to get to sleep.
Second, have something you really want to wake up to do. For me, it's almost
always breakfast. I can't wait to get out of bed to have the delicious thing I
have every day which my body really wants.

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camdenlock
He glosses over his consumption of coffee way too easily. "No drugs involved!
... except for a strong shot of caffeine, a powerful stimulant, just after
waking up, and again 6 hours later."

No thanks. I'll listen to my body and its rhythms, producing work when
opportunities arise. Restricting one's schedule artificially like this seems
like a recipe for burnout and misery.

~~~
brianberns
Amen. I stopped reading when I saw the casual caffeine addiction. Red flag. No
thanks.

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snarfy
> No drugs or goofy supplements other than my medium cup of Starbuck coffee
> every morning around 5:30am, plus a booster cup around midday.

You have no idea how much coffee affects your sleep and energy levels until
you quit drinking it. Before I quit drinking coffee, when I got home from work
I was done for the day. I had a 'boring' evening routine because I had no
mental energy to do anything other than veg on youtube videos and pass out
early. Since I've quit, I have the same morning routine, but when I get home
the productivity continues into the evenings. I feel like I have my teenage
energy again. I always wondered what changed or if it's just me getting old,
but no, it's because I started drinking coffee at one of my jobs in my early
thirties.

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jpatokal
The other secret must be not having kids. Or maybe I need to extend my evening
routine to dropping them off at school/childcare the night before, which would
both reduce the time needed for my morning routine _and_ guarantee quality
sleep!

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astazangasta
No mention of children in this article, or anywhere in this thread. I guess
parents are just doomed to be annoyingly unproductive, no matter how early we
get up.

~~~
MRD85
I'm a single parent of two young kids. I go to bed with them (i.e. 7:30-8pm)
and I wake at 4am. They tend to wake about 6am, this gives me a solid 1.5
hours of productive time and about half an hour of muck around time.

~~~
ttul
Single parent of three kids reporting in here. We make Timothy Ferris types
look like total losers by 6am.

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amriksohata
The electrification of the night (light bulb, then tvs, then mobile phones)
has forced people deeper into the night.

Ironically, slightly unrelated, but Hindu texts speak that Rakshas (demons)
that come out in the night and that the best take to wake and start the day is
Brahmamuhurtha.

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mark_l_watson
Great ideas. Article bookmarked. I already do some of Nick's suggestions, like
lay out clothes at night and organize food. Setting priorities of night life
vs. productive mornings is easy for me except for about once a week when we go
out at night for entertainment.

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GoToRO
The secret to wake up early is to sleep early. And yes, it makes a big
difference to my productivity.

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NiceGuy_Ty
My secret: got a dog. My awake/sleep cycle shifted 3 hours earlier overnight.

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aashishkoirala
Do any of these "I get up and meditate" people have infants/toddlers/little
kids? Now THAT would get my interest.

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SubiculumCode
I have work. I have family. But where is the "me" time: Well for me, it is
when everyone else is in bed ( 10PM-> ).

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hanging
I'm not comfortable taking productivity advice from somebody who still uses a
_typewriter_. (See the photo)

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blaze_run
I don't understand why productive, morning people are perceived as annoying.

~~~
pavel_lishin
As a night owl, it's because often time by the time I get to work and am still
ramping up my day, they're going at full speed and expect me to do the same.

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lr4444lr
Try doing all that having children under the age of 5.

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skookumchuck
I'm an annoyingly productive night person. Why should I change?

~~~
xkcd-sucks
Because the majority of people, who probably include people richer than you
whom you beg for money, personally enjoy waking up early and they feel like
their personal preferences are moral absolutes.

