5 Reasons You Should NOT Wake Up Early
If you aren’t a morning person,studies show, you are smarter and more creative. There is, however, a catch.
Not all humans are wired to be early risers. I am one of them, and not waking up early made me healthier and more creative.
You’ve probably seen articles on Medium telling you to wake up at 4 A.M. and be productive, or how delighted you’ll be if you just make yourself do it. If it’s not the early bird that catches the worm, it’s the second mouse that eats the cheese.
So, what is the secret to their success?
Is it possible that many successful people began their day at 4 a.m., and therefore they are so successful?
Stories like these promise that getting up early will improve your sleep quality, make you happier, more productive, and successful.
However, none of these assertions are completely true. I’ll flip a coin and show you that being a night owl is healthier and more creative, according to studies and my experience.
Yes, it’s true: we’re more creative and have a greater IQ than morning people.
Let’s debunk this myth!
There is, however, a catch.
I belong to the night owl club
I’ve always despised getting up early since I was a teenager. I still hate it. Since I was a nursing student, you are required to get up early as part of your curriculum, and I couldn’t adjust to the early hours. Never. Then I felt guilty for not being fresh at six AM. I was called lazy who never will achieve anything.
Also, working at home required me to begin my shift at seven AM; I did so for eleven months, getting up early, but constantly felt tired and had no energy.
Nothing helped, and I tried everything: early bedtimes, relaxing films, melatonin, meditation. Still, I took a nap during the day because of getting up so early made me exhausted.
I even tried to go to bed earlier, but then I woke up around 3–4 AM and could not go back to sleep. In the morning, despite getting drowsy again, the alarm will rouse me up.
My friend suggested, I try to go to sleep at around 11:00 p.m., which was my usual bedtime, but I eventually realized that my finest time for sleep was midnight.
Finally, I learned that if I went to bed at midnight or after, I would naturally wake up between 0730 and 0800 without the alarm screaming in my ear.
In addition, in Spain, the sun rises at 7:55–08:15 a.m. throughout the year. It is natural for me to wake up around this time.
After doing some research and looking at many studies, I concluded that we all share:
Different sleep chronotype
We all have different wiring. I’m sure you’ve heard the terms morning lark and night owl. They aren’t only words; they’re statements that contain a lot of truth.
According to the book Why we sleep? Prof. Matthew Walker who is a researcher at UC Berkeley explains that 40% of the population are early risers and it is natural for them to wake up in the wee hours but another 30% are night owls who like to go to bed late and wake up late.
According to scientists, 30% of us have an “inner clock” and are energetic in the evening and lethargic in the morning because our brains are still in sleep mode. For us, it’s natural to sleep in and wake up late. We’re not lazy or strange; we’re just wired differently.
Early risers who prefer to go to bed and wake up early are called early larks. They are more productive in the morning and have a higher quality of sleep. They become tired after lunch hours and are ready for bed as soon as the sun sets in. Is true early risers are more productive, but they are less creative. And I will explain this phenomenon later.
The catch is the sleep time and your chronotype: the night owl. The most important thing with sleep is time. We should sleep at least 7–8 hours, not less because then we become sleep deprived, which doesn’t work as a rechargeable card. Once you lose sleep, it is lost.
So, if you are a night owl, then you should wake up later to :
Be More Creative and have a higher IQ
Late risers are often more creative than their early morning counterparts. Improved mental clarity and creative problem solving are major benefits of waking up late.
But here is the catch: you need to have a chronotype of a night owl because for us waking up earlier than usual is hard on the body’s natural sleep cycle. Your body needs time to adjust before waking up so that it can function properly during the day.
“…researchers asked participants to do three tests that measured creative thinking and scored them based on originality, elaboration, fluidity, and flexibility. The night people aced the tests across the board. The morning people struggled to score over 50%.”
Students who went to bed late and woke up late performed better on exams and had a higher IQ, according to another study conducted in Madrid with over 1000 students.
Stay healthier
For those who have trouble waking up early, you’ll be relieved to learn that sleeping in till noon is beneficial to your heart. The study shows that adults who wake up later are less likely to die from cardiovascular disease. This means getting adequate sleep can decrease the risk of having a heart attack or stroke.
If you wake up too early, cortisol will rise and can cause weight gain and other negative health effects.
Be more productive
If you are a night owl, you’re less productive in the morning hours, so it may be more beneficial to your life balance if you don’t wake up as early as possible.
If you naturally wake up late, you feel well-rested and you have all the energy to be more productive. When I woke up too early, I was still in my sleep mode, and it was hard to get anything done when my brain was still sleeping.
Be in better shape and have more energy
According to a study by doctor Eve Van Cauter of the University of Chicago found out that people who don’t get enough sleep are much more likely to become obese. This is because sleep deprivation spurs the body to release high amounts of ghrelin, which communicates with your brain and tells it you need to eat.
Sleep deprivation reduces the amount of leptin your body produces, showing that you are full. These chemicals impact how hungry people feel throughout the day.
So, if you want to lose weight, get at least seven hours (8 is ideal) of sleep every night. This way, their body will control their hunger better.
Be less likely depressed
It is very hard to change your chronotype if you are a night owl. Therefore, waking up earlier than your own “inner clock” can make:
This makes sense if you are like me. Going to bed earlier won’t help you and if you need to wake up early, you will feel tired, with no energy, and just sleepy all day and this can make you depressed.
As I mentioned earlier, you can’t recharge your body during the weekend by sleeping more. Our bodies don’t function that way.
In a nutshell, night owls are more successful and less stressed in life. While a typical morning person may be more successful than you, keep in mind that everyone has unique talents and interests.
It’s time we accept the fact that we’re night owls and will never join the ranks of successful morning larks. That is fine with me; I like to be creative rather than productive. I accept my chronotype: the night owl. Do you?
Thank you for reading!
