Ask HN: how to become a morning person?

When I was working, my trick was this:

I made a stack of stuff on top of my alarm clock (my iPhone) by my bed in the morning, and kept it far enough away from me that I couldn't just slap it. On top of it, I put my work out clothing and my running shoes.

I also make sure that the alarm clock is loud enough to scare me awake as the adrenaline dump into the system makes it impossible to fall asleep. My wife wears earplugs.

First thing I do is run, usually a 5k or 10k run in the morning depending. It helps clear the head, and I'm awake for the day.

Right now I run at night, which makes me wired, but I find showering and benadryl takes care of that. And also the 22 month old that I'm now home with every day.

I'm lucky to work at a company that isn't retarded--I can show up at noon and as long as I get my shit done, they don't care and I don't feel like a slacker. However, waking up at 10 is still hard, and I drink about 2 cups of coffee a day to cope. My last job I had to be there at 8am sharp--I worked there 2 years and wasn't much more than a zombie with computer skills. Not worth it if you ask me, which sort of, you (by you I mean OP) did.

Looking out of your window onto sunny empty streets, with a whole day of hacking (and lazy breaks outdoors) ahead of you, is fantastic.

Hacks for getting to sleep at a specific time:

- Take an hour long walk, go to the gym or go running during the day to get more tired.

- Try to get exposed to direct sunlight during the day, this is supposed to do something in your brain that helps it maintain the circadian cycle.

- Use F.Lux to keep your monitor from blasting your brain with sunlight analogue wavelengths in the evening.

- Try a cold shower or a cold bath about an hour before bedtime. Several people have reported that this helps them sleep.

- Have a schedule for doing specific non-open-ended stuff that doesn't get you anxious or worked out for half-an-hour to an hour before bedtime. The repeating ritual will prime your brain for sleep.

- Don't read in bed. Make your brain associate being in bed only with sleeping.

- Try meditation. Either do sitting meditation right before bed, or do mindfulness meditation while lying in bed.

- Maintain a very small sleep deprivation, like sleeping half an hour less than you would without any alarms, to fall asleep quickly.

- Fast during the day and eat a carbohydrate heavy meal right before bed. Post-dinner coma will knock you out.

Hacks for waking up:

- Set an alarm 60 or 90 minutes before the time you really wake up, eat a 100 mg caffeine pill and go back to sleep. The caffeine will kick in while you're asleep and you'll wake up when it's fully effective.

- Get a sunrise lamp or rig one up yourself with a power timer. The light will prime your brain for getting up when it's time to wake up.

- If you have a smartphone with an accelerometer, see if there's a smart alarm clock app that will detect when you're sleeping lightly and wake you up then. There's ElectricSleep for Android and EasyWakeup for iPhone.

- Committing to attending something early in the morning like 8 AM will make you anxious to wake up and get up in time. Anxiety isn't very fun though.

- Use mind judo to get up from bed without willpower: http://lesswrong.com/lw/fh/willpower_hax_487_execute_by_defa...

- If you've gotten yourself out of the bed at the time you want, but feel like going right back in, try a shower, a walk, or a run to make your body wake up a bit more.

It's much harder to spend two consecutive nights sleeping much less than usual to adjust to an early wakeup time than a single night.