I am an early bird. I go to bed early and wake up early. I love the quiet of the early morning hours but come 8:30-9:00pm I am ready for bed and sleep. I love to nap and those who know me well know not to call me on a Saturday or Sunday between 1-3pm. I love sleep. My body tells me when it needs sleep and I listen.
I have also had insomnia in my life where I would be wide awake in the middle of the night because my mind would go in all different directions. Then there were the months after my children were born where all I wanted to do was sleep at 2am and 4am but had other priorities.
Flash forward to this morning:
4:05am: I lay there and stare at my alarm clock, which isn’t set to go off for almost another hour.Sigh, I lay there. I toss and turn. I scrunch my pillow and roll over – turning away from the clock. 20 minutes later I am still wide awake. Sigh. Insomnia? I think to myself. Nah. Excitement? I think to myself – YAH!
4:30am: I am now out of bed making coffee. I decided it is better to get up and get started than to lay there and not fall back to sleep, considering the alarm clock will go off in 30 minutes.
During this almost thirty minute process I thought to myself, “Why am I WIDE awake at 4am when I went to sleep at 10:30pm the night before. Surely my body is tired, it was a long day yesterday and I have a long day ahead.”
Some friends and family think I am insane that I get up before the chickens some days. They laugh at me because they sleep to a “normal hour” of 7 or 8 am.
In my early morning analysis, I’ve come to the conclusion that I am so excited about my projects and my work that my body must be giving me the time I need to rest then shouting: “C’mon, let’s go!” “This is fun, I’m ready”.
I tell you this short story so that you get to know a little bit more about me but I also want you to think about the following:
1) Are you so excited about what you are doing that , depending on if your are a night owl or early bird, you stay up late in the night or get up early in the morning because you are so passionate about it?
2) When you wake up are you refreshed and raring to go or are you dragging yourself out of bed in the morning to do something you aren’t thrilled with or dread?
3) If you answered NO to #2 do you have an exit strategy in place?
You have a choice as to what the future holds. It may take some work to get there if you’re not there yet. Let the excitement keep you going, even if it seems a but insane to those around you and even yourself at odd hours of day.
Passionately yours,
