So I said I would update things here for new habits that I’m working on forming. So I am!
The habit I’m working on now is waking up without using the snooze button. The old habit was some 20 years in the making and is quite difficult to break.
But as discussed in the past, snooze sleep is terrible sleep, and I absolutely need to stop doing it.
For for the past maybe 3 weeks, I’ve been working on never hitting the snooze button. And so far I’ve kept to it! While I have physically hit the snooze button, I have not gone back to sleep a single time after my alarm has gone off.
It’s been hard. In particular, I think was hardest up until a few days ago. I’ve heard that new habits are harder and harder to keep up with right up until a certain point, and then they start getting easier. I’m happy to say I think I’m at that point!
I’ve been getting up way earlier, and it hasn’t been as much of a burden. Previously I’d have so much willpower depleted that I’d just sit on my phone, sometimes for literal hours. Obviously that’s not much better than sleeping through the snooze, but I was still building the habit.
Now I’ve gotten down to where I wake up easily and don’t even spend that much time on my phone. Work has been way more productive, which is amazing. I’ve had so much more time!
And this morning, mere moments before my alarm went off, I was half-awake, and I thought to myself, “I actually think I might be rested enough, I could probably wake up!” and I got up.
And weirdly, I don’t know that the sleep has even been incredible. I’ve been a little restless. But I’m not tired during the day. I’m thinking that maybe I actually don’t need nearly as much sleep anymore if I just don’t use the snooze. Maybe the reason I feel like I only am rested after like 10 hours, is because the snoozing has messed up my sleep cycle so much.
So I’m excited to see how this plays out. I’m hoping that within a month, it will start to be effortless, and I really won’t need to ever snooze again!
And once that habit is established, I can move on to another.
I’ll keep posting updates here.