Before and After: Wake Up 15 Minutes Earlier, and Put the Alarm Clock Out of Reach.
I’m writing my next book, Before and After, about how we make and break habits–an issue very relevant to happiness. Each week, I post a before-and-after story submitted by a reader, about how he or she successfully changed a habit. We can all learn from each other. If you’d like to share your story, contact me here.This week’s story comes from Patrik Edblad.
I used to set my alarm clock as late as possible each day, and then hit the snooze button at least one or two times before getting out of bed each morning. As I’m sure a lot of people can relate to, this sort of morning routine is far from ideal, as your day gets a very stressful start and often leads to being late.I’ve noticed that when people successfully change a habit, they often use several strategies simultaneously. We need a lot of fire-power to change our habits! He’s using the Strategy of Convenience, the Strategy of Starting, and the Strategy of Monitoring.
After a couple of attempts at becoming an early riser and having a taste of the benefits it has, I decided to really commit to it and devoted myself to understanding the mechanics of habit creation and how I could re-programme my brain to love 6 am. I learned that a habit consists of a cue, a routine, and a reward and that I needed to optimize all of them have a successful habit change.
I knew from experience that setting my alarm to 6 am when I was used to 8 am wasn’t going to work in the long run, so I instead committed to pushing the time back for just 15 minutes once a week to give my brain a better chance of adapting.
Starting out, my cue was my alarm clock which was neatly put just out of arm’s reach so that I had to get out of bed before I could turn it off. This routine made it much more likely to stay up than if I gave myself the chance to snooze.
As a reward I used the awesome habit app “Lift” and crossed off waking up early. Lift is designed to keep track of your habit-building streaks, and as I put in more and more days without failing to get up on time, the more I didn’t want to break the chain.
As I started my days, I knew that I needed to expose myself to a lot of light to help my brain set its circadian clock to a light-dark cycle of my choice, so I went ahead and turned on a lot of lights as soon as I got up (it’s ridiculously dark in northern Sweden this time of year).
Today I almost always wake before my alarm goes off at 6 am and spend my mornings taking walks, planning my days and doing meditation. This way I’m much more productive, feel better and show up on time.
If you’re interested in how people’s sleep habits are affected by light, I highly recommend Till Roenneberg’s Internal Time: Chronotypes, Social Jet Lag, and Why You’re So Tired.
Waking up earlier isn’t a habit solution for everyone, but for many people, it’s a great way to get more out of the day. (Want a painless way to get an extra hour in your day? Try this.)
Have you ever tried to start waking up earlier? What strategy did you use?
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I'm deep in the writing of my next book, Before and After, about making and breaking habits, and there's nothing more satisfying than reading the success stories of people who have changed a habit. If you have a Before-and-After story of a habit you changed, and you're willing to share it here on the blog, please contact me here. Once a week, I'll post a story. We can all learn from each other.
A Lagniappe For You (That Is, a Bonus Gift for You).
I have many pet words, such as winkle, chirk, and mellifluous, and one of my favorites is lagniappe: something given as a bonus or extra gift. That’s the extra doughnut in the baker’s dozen, or the prize in the Cracker Jack’s, or the tote bag you get for coming to an event.Now I’ve prepared a lagniappe for you.
The paperback of Happier at Home is coming out in a few weeks. If you pre-order, I’ll send you a nifty Tips Sheet of “9 Extremely Quick and Easy Steps to Become Happier at Home.” “Quick and easy,” meaning, steps you can take in the next ten minutes, and that take almost no extra time, energy, or money.
You can pre-order the book here, and you can sign up to get the Tips Sheet here.
To keep this process quick and easy, you don’t have to submit any proof of purchase. I’m doing this on the honor system. So be honest! Also, if you’ve already pre-ordered, and now you’d like to get the Tips Sheet, go ahead and sign up.
For most of us, it’s a lot easier to be happy when we feel happier at home, and sometimes very small changes can make a big difference.
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How to Spot a Psychopath.
Every Wednesday is List Day, or Tip Day, or Quiz Day.This Wednesday: How to spot a psychopath.
I love finding–or inventing–ways to categorize people. I agree with philosopher Isaiah Berlin, who observed, “Every classification throws light on something.”
I’ve devised several of these, and of the ones I’ve come up with myself, my favorites are the Abstainer/Moderator distinction and the four Rubin Tendencies.
Because of this interest, I was intrigued to come across the Psychopathic Personality Inventory, a personality test for traits associated with psychopathy.
I think that we can all agree that one thing that does not contribute to a happy life is a relationship with a psychopath. But what traits are associated with psychopaths?
The test seeks to measure:
Social influence — a tendency to seem charming, persuasive
Fearlessness — a tendency to embrace risk without fear or anxiety
Stress immunity — stays cool in difficult circumstances
Machiavellian egocentricity — a tendency to consider only personal needs
Rebellious nonconformity — a tendency to neglect of social conventions and regulations
Blame externalization — a tendency to assign blame for problems or obstacles to other people
Carefree lack of planning — limited willingness to make future plans
Cold-heartedness — no guilt or remorse
People throw around the terms “sociopath” and “psychopath” quite frequently, but these are technical terms with very specific meanings. That said, if there’s someone in your life who seems to show many of the above traits, it might be useful to reflect on that.
Do you know anyone who fits these traits? To my great relief, I realize, I don’t.
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