331–340 of 358 posts
The theory is basically thinking of humans as coupled oscillators that are entrained by sunlight.
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal...
This blog post discusses circadian rhythms; sleep cycles. I've noticed that my sleep cycle also differs from 24-hours. It's usually around 28-32 hours. Having a 9-5 job _really_ kills my productivity.
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I'm sorry, but people who claim "they've made the switch" just don't get it. You don't really make a switch from being a night owl. I thought I'd made switches multiple times too: * Taking early classes in college * Deliberately cooling myself down and going to bed super early * Getting a puppy that forced me to wake up super early Every single method regressed to night-owl schedule within 2 months. Not to mention my…
I'm sorry, but people who claim "they've made the switch" just don't get it. Agreed. At 46, and having been a night-owl pretty much my entire life, I'm skeptical that you can just "switch" to another mode. Maybe you can, through very conscious and focused effort, manage to adapt to what appears to be a "morning person" lifestyle; but I suspect that people who do that are ultimately just faking it. That said, I've nev…
When I had to wake at 4:30 for work, I hated it. Now that I don't have to go to work so early, I love getting up early, because those first couple of hours are my most productive. There are zero distractions and my mind is fresh from a good sleep. I'd rather have these most productive hours for myself, whereas when I was getting up and going straight to work, I'd only have the evening hours where I was already exhausted after working 13 hours.
I'm almost certain I couldn't do it without the proper diet and exercise though. If I let go with the diet or stopped going to the gym, I reckon I'd probably slip back to becoming a night owl, and become more lazy too.
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I've done everything too, and the only thing that works for me is sleeping pills. I think it's a very unpopular view nowadays (esp. after Why We Sleep), but a small dose of a benzodiazepine changes my life completely. I'm in the midst of a full diagnostic course including cerebral scans, a sleep study and blood analysis, but my neurologist told me there's a good chance that nothing actionable will be revealed and tha…
I’ve upvoted your comment but I would disagree with saying “ your clock is messed up ”. The OP’s clock is fine and acting as it it’s ‘programmed’ to. What’s messed up is the way society places a higher value on the circadian rhythms of early-risers over those of night owls. I recall hearing a theory that having individuals with differing circadian rhythms within the same social group provided an evolutionary advantag…
This also applies to oncall rotations at software companies!
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So the solution is to own 24 homes and move one timezone over each month?
An easier solution would be to colonize different planets and send the folks with non-24-hour sleep–wake disorder to planets with orbits that corresponds with their circadian cycle.
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I was never a night owl but I've found that allowing the sun to naturally wake me leaves me much more rested and refreshed in the morning. Sure there's those "sunrise lamps", but nothing compares to the real thing. Go to bed with your blinds open or get ones that are translucent.
At my latitude, that’s excellent advice – for a few weeks each spring and fall. The rest of the year, the day is either too long or too short.
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I have a very hard time believing that this stuff has to do with anything other than having the discipline to have a proper sleep schedule. It's possible to adjust your sleep schedule. People do it all the time when they change timezones. I didn't read the article, I'll go read it and update if I change my mind..
Seems like an unpopular opinion, but this is my experience as well. Went from sleeping from 4-10AM to 11PM-5AM over the course of 3 years, without changing time zones. I swore I was a night-owl my whole life, but I definitely fall into the category of early-risers now. Overall happy with the switch; I love having those quiet morning hours to prepare for the rest of my day. For me, it was about establishing new habits…
How is this harder to believe than the huge amount of other human characteristics that are directly affected or even effected by the genes?
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Anecdotally, at 51 and previously thought the same as you, I'm going to disagree. I'm closing in on two years of getting up at 5:00 am and it doesn't bother me anymore. I never thought it would be possible for me to adapt, but so far I have and I have no intention of changing. Time will tell.
People's circadian rhythms change over the course of a lifetime very considerably. Trying to keep all age groups on the same schedule is actually a pretty bad idea. Check out the book Why We Sleep. I think especially how we treat adolescents, who are usually late shifted by 2 or 3 hours compared to adults, is going to look barbaric in another 30 years. People think that 9 AM is a "late start" for high school, but it…
Or running civic services 7 AM - 3 PM which makes it impossible to schedule without a free day or understanding boss. Something that should be available with perhaps only a minor downtime works only for a few hours.
The cumulated morning/evening hours tend to overload transportation facilities too.
I've been a night owl my whole life, with the exception of that period during secondary school where I was so depressed in the evenings I went to bed early and as a consequence woke up super early. I have followed every advice, meditation (1yr), excercise (3*1.5hrs per week for 18 months), staving off screens after 18:00 (8mo), no caffiene, no sugar, no food of any kind, I also tried: too much food, cooling my body d…
What you’re describing sounds similar to me years ago Then one day I moved to a house that had no internet, and we would have to wait a month to have satellite put in, and we had no smartphones After 20+ years of just thinking I had a sleeping disorder, losing internet access and living like a pilgrim caused my sleep schedule to naturally coincide with the setting and rising of the sun Without any deliberate effort f…
I did an accidental retreat by attempting to climb the Cotopaxi volcano, in Ecuador.
Lodged at "Secret Garden". To our suprise on arrival, they had no wifi and we could not get cell tower signal. So we had to find other ways to be entertained. They helped: activities + daily group hikes and mountaneering trails that are bound to leave you ready to crash by 8pm. We are not big hikers, in fact we hike at most 3 times per year - but we found that the combination of peer pressure, adventure/adrenaline plus the need to do something kept us going on daily treks.
1-2 weeks of that and you could be forming a positive routine. At least you will be rested.
PD met an SRE from Netflix there. He successfully summitted the Cotopaxi. We hiked it... but did not try to summit due to difficulty + sleep deprivation requirement to make an attempt :)
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Rising body temperature is correlated with tiredness, that's why you feel exhausted after you've been home for 5 minutes. Meditation itself was 'mindfulness', some of it was guided, most of it was not, guided meditation was once a week (I'm not counting the yoga, which was also meditative), I spent 5 minutes in the morning, 5 minutes at lunch, 15 minutes when I got home and 5 minutes before bed. (and I'm pretty well…
Check out the somatic work of Thomas Hanna. 30 minutes of supine coordinated movement is great for the parasympathetic. EDIT: the one I use is paid on Glo.com. Found a free one that seems similar https://youtu.be/F0jwdoSWsio