"Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise "-Ben Franklin.
I am a startup entrepreneur from India and living in my 30 `s. I am facing all the struggles normally a bootstrapped started -entrepreneur need go through.
And every day I am committed to improving me and this transformation, from Night owl life to Early Birdlife, waking up early morning, added great value to my life. At the same time, I have to say it's not easy maybe but its possible and very useful.
I made some preparations every day to achieve this goal- going to bed early and waking up early. I am sharing all these from my experience and definitely- it will help you.
You Should have a strong reason to wake up early.
This is very important you have a reason to wake up early and have a plan for how to use that extra god gifted time.
I have my purpose that I wanted to use that time to read more about new technologies and writing blogs based on that studies. Morning time won't have any disturbances and liked that fresh silence which gives me more concentration to my studies.Decide your sleeping time and waking up time.
I set up my alarm based on my sleeping plan . I decided to wake up 4.00 am so I keep my bedtime 6.00 hours before that is 10.00 pm. I selected this time based on my requirement and you have to customize that and will suggest going to bed early if you want to increase your sleeping time.
- Include Sunday (your holidays)also in this plan.
This is a new habit or lifestyle we are creating. So don't exclude your holidays from this then this plan will stop there. You should believe strongly this habit will create more wealth in your life.
- Have food at least before 8 pm daily.
Stop having food late at night. I had this bad habit, in reality, I don't have any proper time for taking food. First I created proper timing for me to have food and decided I won't take any food after 8 pm. I don't want to give a job to my stomach while I am sleeping.
- Stop using electric gadgets at least one hour before going to bed.
Its one of the very important steps we have to implement. We should be ready to stop using mobile, tv, laptops at least one hour before our fixed bedtime. As your brain revs up, its electrical activity increases and neurons start to race -- the exact opposite of what should be happening before sleep. Instead of watching electric gadgets I started a new habit of reading books in this last one hour before going to sleep.
- Try to maintain your sleeping place clean and hygienic.
I have a very normal bedroom but I took a very special care to make sure my bedroom is clean and hygienic. This is very important for a healthy deep sleep.
- Stop drinking tea, coffee at least two to three hours before bedtime.
To me, this step was very easy as I am normally not interested to have tea or coffee. All these drinks have a negative effect on our ability to sleep soundly. Although caffeine affects everyone differently, it's safest if you avoid consuming any amount of caffeine after dinnertime. A 2013 study published in the "Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine" reported that consuming caffeine six hours before bed can have a harmful effect on your ability to sleep soundly. I hope we can understand the importance of this step.
- Keep alarm a little away from the bed.
I am using my iPad alarm and I will keep the alarm a little away from my bed.So I need to walk to turn off the alarm but that timing is very important to me to come to the reality of the new day. So I set up my alarm one hour before I go to bed.
- Prepare a to-do list for tomorrow.
To me, this is a very important and very interesting practice. This will give a clarity about my duties. I will maintain this lists and evaluate daily and it will eventually help me to achieve all the points I note down.
- Meditate 10 minutes before going to bed.
This helps me a lot, meditation was not on my list at the beginning. I read the importance of meditation from some of the articles I saw on the internet. Beginning it was very difficult for me to close my eyes and breath in and out for ten minutes, but I did not give up. Slowly I start to enjoy meditation. I am doing daily two times.-morning and night before bedtime. I meditate only ten minutes now and in want to slowly increase.
Conclusion:
Next step is happily going to sleep with the strong intention of waking up the morning. The alarm will me call as per the plan and will start my new day there.
I strongly believe to create new habits we need to give up our old unhealthy habits. These new habits definitely help us to achieve our life goal. Thanks.