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Alarm clock picture via Shutterstock

7 tricks to waking up earlier

Rise and shine sleepyheads, it’s a new day.

NOT ONLY DOES the early bird get the worm, he’s generally happier and has a higher overall satisfaction with his life.

“We don’t know why this is, but there are a few potential explanations. Evening people may be more prone to social jet lag; this means that their biological clock is out of sync with the social clock,” Renee Biss, a researcher wrote in a study conducted by the University of Toronto.

“Society’s expectations are far more organized around a morning-type person’s schedule.”

Robert Oexman, director of the Sleep to Live Institute, told us that “lack of sleep can manifest itself in erratic behavior, short tempers, and bad decision-making.”

Sleep-deprived people also have difficulty remembering details, and don’t deal as well in high-pressured situations such as meetings or new business pitches.

And it’s getting worse nowadays because of technology usage. Young adults in their 20s are experiencing earlier signs of aging attributed to sleep loss.

So if you’re not a born early riser how do you acquire good sleep habits? We compiled some tips to help you get an early start on the day

1. Skip the caffeine
According to a study published in the journal SLEEP, caffeine intake six hours before bedtime is just as disruptive as caffeine three hours before. We know it’s delicious but it’s for your own good.

2. Limit technology usage before bedtime
“Your bedroom should be reserved for sleep, sex, and nothing else,” Oexman told us. “There’s no excuse – if your cell phone is your alarm clock, then buy a $5 alarm clock and solve the problem.”

3. Mentally prepare yourself before you go to sleep

Jeff Goins wrote in his blog that you need to make decisions before you go to sleep, because you can’t trust your brain in the morning.
“When I realized waking up early is a battle fought on two fronts, everything changed. We must prepare our bodies, but we must also trick our sleepy minds,” he said. This could help you avoid a potentially disastrous outfit choice on casual Friday.

4. Wake up to light

Meredith Jaeger advised in her blog that you should sleep with the curtains open so that sunlight can come through your window in the morning. If you’re unable to experience sunlight from your bedroom window, get a timer that increases light intensity, which resembles the sun. Some of these models also have built in alarm clocks.

5. Don’t hit the snooze button


It might be tempting to hit your snooze button to sleep for a few more minutes and we’re all guilty of it, but this doesn’t actually help you, Jaeger wrote. This is because the 15 to 20 extra minutes of sleep won’t give you any restful REM sleep and you might even feel more groggy when the alarm goes off again.

Hitting the snooze button is also habit-forming and the more you do it, the more you’ll likely do it in the future.

“Alarms should be there to remind you to wake up, not wake you up after six snooze hits,” Oexman said.

It might also help to keep your alarm clock far away from your bed so that you’re forced to get up in order to turn it off.

6. Find an alarm that doesn’t make you angry

Seth Simonds at Lifehack advised that you should “experiment a bit and see what works best for you. Light, sound, smells, temperature, or even some contraption that dumps water on you might be more pleasant than your old alarm clock.” High pitched, irritating ring tones will haunt your dreams and ruin your life.

7. Have a morning routine

You need to get your blood flowing when you wake up whether this is stretching, crunches, jump roping or going for a walk to the nearby coffee shop, you need to “chase the sleep from your head,” Simonds wrote.

Whatever you decide to do, remember that what you do during the daytime will affect your sleep at night, so quit beating yourself up with a bad diet and poor sleeping habits.

- Vivian Giang

- Additional reporting by Michelle Hennessy.

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    Mute Joanna
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    Jan 6th 2015, 10:44 AM

    This is what happens when you bring good exclusives to the table *embraces PS4 lovingly*

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    Mute Liam Ó Séaghdha
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    Jan 6th 2015, 10:53 AM

    Brilliant device! Much better than Xbox and better exclusives. However the range of games still needs improvement. Big releases like COD Advanced Warfare and Killzone failed to deliver.

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    Mute Kieran Ryan
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    Jan 6th 2015, 5:37 PM

    You can’t really blame Sony if someone makes a game for it that isn’t good. Didn’t Microsoft buy Call of Duty anyway? Sony can hardly have a say with that obviously

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    Mute Derek Mahon
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    Jan 6th 2015, 12:05 PM

    Now that Sony are making a profit, might we see some investment in their server capacity to stop these DDOS attacks from taking down the system. Lizard Squad repeatedly said Sony and MS’ systems were useless so now with all that money hopefully they’ll invest some of it into the people who made their profits.

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    Mute Dave
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    Jan 6th 2015, 12:55 PM

    To my knowledge MS use Cloudflare for such attacks. Sony don’t which is why their service was down for days

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    Mute Damien
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    Jan 6th 2015, 3:59 PM

    Your knowledge is wrong.

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    Mute Dave
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    Jan 6th 2015, 5:19 PM

    Right or wrong, XBL was back up in 24hrs after the attack. Sony for their size should step it up especially after 2011.

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    Mute Live Long
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    Jan 6th 2015, 11:11 AM

    Xbox rules, PS4 drools!

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    Mute Seán A Haon
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    Jan 6th 2015, 1:17 PM

    18.5 million * €400 = WTF!!!!!

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    Mute Joseph Murphy
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    Jan 6th 2015, 12:08 PM

    It’s pretty incredible how well it’s selling considering how lackluster the second half of 2014 was for exclusives. The Last of Us Remastered (a last gen game), DriveClub (disastrous broken launch, but now fixed finally) and LittleBigPlanet 3 (sent out to die) the only ones that I can think of. Thank god for 3rd parties! Really looking forward to Bloodbourne in March, though! I think Microsoft must be kicking themselves for the cock up that was E3 2013. All that online only stuff and Kinect disaster drove people away from them in droves and they’re only now recovering.

    It will be an interesting year ahead between the two.

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    Mute CitizenSmith©
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    Jan 6th 2015, 10:49 AM

    The play station is a loss leader, they make the money on the games

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    Mute The Doctor
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    Jan 6th 2015, 11:00 AM

    No, they are now making a profit on each unit sold.

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    Mute Sternn
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    Jan 6th 2015, 2:36 PM

    Doesn’t beat the Xbox One. I see they glossed over posting how those sales were in comparison…

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    Mute Kieran Ryan
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    Jan 6th 2015, 5:39 PM

    Yes, how easy it must be to gloss over sales figures that have not even been released

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    Mute Cormac Mc Greal
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    Jan 7th 2015, 1:02 PM

    Tyumen

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