Waking up — literally, like in the morning — is among the most difficult parts of my day and my life. Waking up effectively, I mean.
Let me share a bit of context. I am one of the founding members of the Society of Difficult People, which formerly met at restaurants around Cleveland and now meets only in a quiet and friendly corner of Facebook. The gist: Pick a difficult goal that you will achieve within the week. Report back. Be accountable. I bring this up because I’ve used “wake up at a decent and consistent hour” as my difficult goal on several occasions. I’ve failed too many times, and I continue to fall asleep and wake up at different hours every single day. I am not “training my nervous system to rock,” as Tony Robbins would say. I announced this as my goal — yet again — this week. I’ve high hopes.
I take great joy in sleep. (I harbor a weird goal of serving on the board of the National Sleep Foundation one day and helming the cutting edge of sleep research and opinion.) Sleep is wonderful, from the anticipation to the execution. It’s the beautiful combination of pure comfort and relief, solitude (or communion with someone special), dreams, physical and mental rejuvenation, and the notion of a gateway to a new day, a new life. Because of all of the above, I find it terribly difficult to pry myself away from the splendor and into the aforementioned new day. We spend approximately one-third of our lives asleep; shouldn’t we revel a bit?
In 2014, Timothy Ferriss interviewed Tony Robbins. That’s where the above quote comes from. He discusses his morning routine — a universal topic in which I find great interest (because mine is non-existent and terrible) — and he talks about the importance of jolting yourself into the new day. It’s a resetting, an explosion of endorphins.
Bit of a ramble here. There’s not much more to say outside of my quick thoughts on sleep and the link to the Robbins interview. I’ve set my goal for the week; the die has been cast. More to come.
Sandy 