It truly pains me to say this…I am becoming a morning person….As in someone who wakes up way too early and actually enjoys it. My younger self would be so disappointed seeing as I pretty well vowed to never be one of ‘those’ people.
Yet, I spent the majority of my life up until this point begrudgingly waking in the early hours of the morning. Whether it was Timbits hockey practice at 7am, school, class, and/or 6-7am morning workouts throughout college, I was “forced” (not really–I wanted to–at least part of me did) to do things in the morning. I wasn’t necessarily happy about it and I was almost always extremely tired until I was about 30 minutes into whatever I was doing. So not only did I not like mornings, I was convinced that I was just never going to be a morning person.
Fast forward to a couple months ago, I started to notice that when I was waking up at my usual time (around 7am) I felt really groggy. I took a look at my sleeping patterns and it didn’t seem to have anything to do with not sleeping enough, either. I was genuinely confused–more sleep should equal feeling more rested, right? As I continued to wake up feeling tired for the next few weeks, I started journaling in the morning using an app called “How We Feel”. Things were pretty consistent; I felt tired, apathetic, uninterested, etc Then, one morning, I was up early to get a morning workout in and I noticed I felt different. I was energized and I felt physically and mentally awake which I was surprised by because I had gotten just shy of 7 hours of sleep. So I tried it a couple more times, and the pattern continued. When I woke up at 5:30am, I generally felt better immediately upon waking up but also throughout the rest of the day.
Given my history, I was appalled. First off, I’d hated mornings for as long as I could remember and I was seeing data that was telling me my body felt otherwise. Secondly, I was going to need to let go of my notions of ‘sleeping in’ and ‘getting my full 8 hours’ because, clearly, that’s not why I needed to feel my best.
But honestly, the coolest part about this is that I figured it out through my daily journaling practice. It’s proof that journaling doesn’t have to be about writing long, poetic, emotional entries. It can be as simple as saying ‘how do you feel when you wake up’ or ‘what’s your energy like today?’
– Coach Lauren
