I will need to continue working on this habit, however, to make it solid. I allowed enough interruptions and “snoozes” to keep it from becoming an unquestioned part of my daily routine. I am convinced that it is worth it. I really enjoyed the time I had in the morning and felt better prepared to deal with the day. I started out feeling ahead of things rather than running behind.

The sleepiness was a problem, probably the most difficult part of the challenge for me to overcome. I could make myself get out of bed physically but staying awake and alert enough to think, read, or write sometimes seemed impossible. I think the best fix for that is getting enough sleep on a regular basis; for me, that doesn’t mean eight hours every night but it does mean being aware of when I am tired and going to bed accordingly.

Build It: 5am may be too early for you (or too late!) but the essence of the idea isn’t the exact time but that you have a specific time and stick to it, day in and day out, until it is a habit. Once the habit is established, you have a little elbow room for sick days and off days; frankly, though, I would rather get up at my 5am alarm, have that peaceful, calm time, and then get a nap later in the day if I am that tired. Not everybody can work naps in, I understand.

So set a time that works for you and stick to it, consistently, for at least 21 days. Plan your morning time so you aren’t left staring blankly at the coffee maker, wondering why you aren’t in bed anymore. If that happens, the pull of the pillow will work on you and you will end up buried under covers, zombie-fied, rolling out of bed at the last minute, running around, back to the old frustrations.

Try it. It’s worth it.

Or I need to start taking naps in the afternoon. I napped a lot while I was pregnant but I’ve since gotten out of the habit. Now I find it difficult to slow down and rest in the middle of the day, even when I’m tired. I’m working on not being in such a non-stop mode but it is still habit.

Build Your Better Life: Set up a date night with your husband. Now. Get your calendar, give him a call, find a babysitter, do whatever you need to do to make this happen within a week. I let it slide too long, sometimes, and though we see each other we don’t get that focused time to reconnect.

Connecting with your spouse is worth whatever sacrifice it takes to make it happen. Remember, you don’t have to spend a lot of money. You can eat sandwiches at home and go get a cup of coffee together. Or just go walk around the mall. Just make sure that you have time and space to talk to each other about more than the kids and the car and the stuff at work. Get a little deeper. Ask questions. Pretend it’s your first date.

For the singles sisters, here’s a suggestion: set a date for yourself or with a close girlfriend and make a list of the five essential qualities for your future husband. Don’t be trivial (great abs) and don’t be vague (good character). You need to know the things that are make-it-or-break-it in a relationship, and if you share them with a friend who can hold you accountable, all the better. If you’re feeling really ambitious, make a list of the five essential qualities you need to have to be a great wife. Do you have them all? What can you work on? Get started!

I haven’t been getting enough sleep and this is why: my habit is to go to bed when I get sleepy, say, when I can’t concentrate on the page I’m reading or the movie I’m watching. Lately, I’ve been busy moving around, talking to people, working physically on projects. We are remodeling our basement; every night Joe comes home and works for a couple of hours and I try to help. We’ve also had several C.O.P.S. meetings, formal and spontaneous. When I’m active with work (physical) or with people (conversation), I don’t get those “hey-I’m-sleepy-and-should-go-to-bed” cues.

I’ve been feeling depressed in the evenings, too. I hate being depressed, so when I start feeling it I immediately try to figure out what the cause is. Do I need some time with Joe? Am I worried about something that I haven’t shared with him? Did I get my feelings hurt and not talk about it? Am I upset with someone and stuffing it instead of dealing with it? Am I overwhelmed? Have I committed to too much? This time I haven’t been able to pinpoint it, though, and that bothered me. Lots.

Last night we finished dinner and Joe and I flopped down on our big cushy couch-chair to talk and play with Mara for a few minutes before starting on the basement. As I’m leaning back, watching Joe and Mara (in a rousing game of “Get the Pen Out of Daddy’s Pocket, Drop It Behind Your Head, and Pretend You Don’t Know Where It Is,” one of our favorites), I feel my eyes get heavy… and heavier… and I realize something…

1. I am very tired. Sleepy. Ready for bed. Past ready for bed. Desperate for sleep.
2. Depression (for me, low energy + self-pity + “hopeless” feeling + no motivation) is because I am physically weary.
3. It is barely 8pm.
4. For the first time, it occurred to me that maybe I’m trying to do too much. I got up at 5, read my Bible, wrote 2 articles, exercised, cooked, cleaned, did laundry, took care of babies, ran errands, ordered a birthday gift, picked out songs for church, did website work, read books to Mara, nursed Robbie (4 times), talked to my sister on the phone (3 times), and finished reading a book I started the day before. And I was disappointed because I didn’t get to planting my seeds for seedlings.

When I’m going nonstop from 5am and only feel bad because I didn’t do more, perhaps my perspective is off. I’m getting so low on energy by evening that it is translating to depression. I’m falling asleep if I sit down for five minutes. My standard response has been not to sit down for five minutes. Ignore the signals, keep pushing on. Last night I decided that was stupid. So I put the kids to bed, cleaned up the kitchen, and put myself to bed. Joe told me to get some sleep, and he worked on the basement (by himself, sweet man).

Eight beautiful hours later, I actually feel good. Awake. Hopeful. Energized. And a little humbled.

I like to believe that I am Superwoman. Some days I can pull it off, and those days make me think I should be able to pull it off all the time. I get so caught up in the energy and accomplishment of doing things that I neglect the basics. Sleep. Relaxation. Talking. Resting.

I put “Decide on Next Monthly Challenge” on my calendar this week. I know what it is now: a month with no to-do list. I need the freedom. I need the discipline of not focusing on accomplishments and check marks and productivity for productivity’s sake. March should be an interesting month.

Improve Your Life: Simplify your schedule. Write down your appointments, activities, and just two or three to-do items. Give yourself some breathing room. You might actually be more productive.

Be Open-Minded:
You must learn to say no when something is not right for you. Leontyne Price

…the eyes of man are never satisfied. Proverbs 27:20
God does not judge us by the multitude of works we perform, but how well we do the work that is ours to do. The happiness of too many days is often destroyed by trying to accomplish too much in one day. We would do well to follow a common rule for our daily lives–DO LESS, AND DO IT BETTER. Dale Turner
He who trusts in his own heart is a fool, but he who walks wisely will be delivered. Proverbs 28:26

Improve Your Life: Bill Ford, in his book High Energy Habits, suggests making a list of all the little things that annoy you and then dedicating time to taking care of those things. Here’s what he says:

We pick up a lot of drag in our lives; little things that slow us down, which we hardly notice and come to think of as just part of life – inevitable friction, like barnacles on a ship’s hull. The good news is that we don’t have to put up with them and life is different when we do something about them.

Ford suggests making this list and then choosing three of the easy items on the list and tackling them immediately. He suggests making time every day to deal with these annoyances. And yes, for the inevitable protest of no time, he has an answer:

We are so busy that these little things do not seem to justify a high priority. But it takes energy to ignore them. And that is the cost – the energy spent on ignoring is wasted and it adds up.

So take his advice. I’m working on it. Yesterday I got rid of a dead plant that had been sitting in my living room, annoying me, for months. Then I tried to fix the loose screw on our table. I say tried because once I got the screwdriver and got under the table, the only screws I could locate were tight. So this is an annoyance I will have to pass on to my husband, the resident fixer-improver-constructor-man.

Be Open-Minded: Take a moment and think of a person you spend a lot of time with, like your spouse, your children, your cubicle mate, your best friend. Identify one thing you do, habitually, almost unconsciously, that has the potential to annoy that person. (Just pick one!) Work on eliminating that habit, or replacing it with something that will uplift and energize rather than annoy. You’ll find yourself more uplifted and energized as well.

By the way, you can buy Ford’s book online at Amazon for as little as $1.99. It’s a good framework for revamping some life habits that drain you and includes chapters and suggestions on using your strengths more often, clearing clutter, creating time to think, and more.

Improve Your Life: Take a few minutes each night to review your day and, in a planner or journal, make a simple plan for the next day. It doesn’t (and shouldn’t be) complicated or dictated by the half-hour, but it helps to have a short to-do list and an order in which to do things.

Be Open-Minded: Most people don’t schedule their off-time, such as evening and weekends, with priorities or to-do lists. Some of us don’t even really schedule social events; we just wait and see what comes up at the last minute. It’s important to relax, but why not plan for things you want to do rather than waiting to see if something you enjoy will spontaneously happen? Try it some night this week or next weekend: plan a specific time for something you want to do, whether it be personal or a family event or a social outing, or just something you want to do at home that keeps getting pushed aside by the more “important” things.

I’ve just started a Bible reading plan again. I had been wandering kind of aimlessly through parts of the Old and New Testament. My church had copies of this one-year plan, and it has you read four different passages each day, with about five catch-up days per month. I started in Genesis, Psalms, Matthew, and Acts. I like the structure. Sometimes I need to be told what to do or I get lost in the options. I also like putting a little check mark in the box beside each portion of the day’s reading. Genesis 9 – 11, check. Psalm 4, check. Matthew 2: 13-23, check. Acts 2:22-44, check.

One Year Bible Online has a similar plan available. You can download it (it is a .pdf document) and print it out. However, it has no little checkboxes and no catch up days in the schedule.

For the ultimate in check box accomplishment, check into the reading plan offered by Christianity.com. You become a member (it’s free), and record your progress online.

I don’t want to degrade the Scripture to a tick mark on my to-do list, but I do need help being consistent at reading the Bible and having a plan to follow helps me.

Improve Your Life: It could help you too. Find a Bible reading plan and get started. If you don’t want to tackle the Bible in one year, do a search on Bible reading plans. You can find one to fit your schedule.

Be Open-Minded: If you’re thinking, Why would I want to read the Bible every day? here is a chance to think outside your box. Oh-ho, my secular friend, are you tolerant enough to read something regarded as a holy book? Try it. I dare you. Even if you don’t believe the Bible is holy, it is full of stories and wisdom and principles that will challenge and help you. Are you open-minded enough to try it?

Not a good idea.

What is so difficult about consistency in getting up early? Let’s look at the factors.

Physical Factors

• Physical Weariness/Fatigue: Fatigue is caused by more than just how much sleep you get; unfortunately, most of us always attribute weariness to lack of sleep without considering other causes. Psychologically, then, if you experience lots of fatigue during the day, you’re much less likely to want to get up when the alarm goes off. The rationalization goes like this: I was so tired yesterday. I’m not productive when I’m that tired. I hate being tired. If I sleep in just a little longer, I won’t be so tired today. Sometimes, lack of sleep is the problem, but this should be addressed by adjusting your bedtime, not by hitting snooze five times in the morning. That “extra” sleep usually isn’t sufficient for another REM cycle anyway and won’t make you feel any more rested.
• Diet, Nutrition, and Exercise: Lots of processed food, lots of sugar, refined flours, fast food, greasy food, and too much caffeine give your body lots of hard work and can cause you to feel sluggish, unenergized, and unmotivated. Regular exercise, even if only for fifteen or twenty minutes a day, will boost energy.
• Amount of Sleep Needed: We all have this “eight hours of sleep” programmed into our brains from childhood. However, eight hours is not always an accurate estimate of how much sleep you need. People are different, and people’s needs change during the course of life. An article from WebMD points out that eight hours is an average gained from a classic sleep study, and that there are long sleepers (those who need nine or more hours) and short sleepers (those who need five to six hours).

• Sickness and Special Physical Conditions: When you’re sick, your body needs more rest because it is working harder than normal to fight off infection. Listen, and go to bed earlier, take naps, turn off your alarm, and do what you need to do in order to get extra rest. Special physical conditions such as pregnancy also create a need for additional sleep; the body is working hard to provide for a new little life. Naps and earlier bedtimes help a lot.

Mental and Emotional Factors

• Continual Stress: Situations that create anxiety, especially when the situation is ongoing, can cause debilitating weariness. Stress comes from work situations, loss of job, family crisis, relationship problems, financial problems or even things not tagged as problems: moving, changing careers, remodeling, major holidays, adoption, pregnancy, etc. Any situation that brings change, good or bad, also brings stress. Your emotional defense to this stress can be the “find a cave and hide” reaction, and it sends a strong message via physical weariness. This kind of reaction is especially common if you, like me, are a person who avoids conflict.
• Lack of Vision: Having no purpose, no vision for the day or week or month or year or life, or having a purpose but no plan for implementation will make it difficult to get yourself moving in the morning. If you have no reason, no goal that you are seeking to accomplish, no drive, then you have no motivation. You have no reason to get moving, and you also probably have depression because of a lack of defined purpose.
• Intimidating Project: Perhaps you have purpose, and a plan, but you also have a challenge waiting for you at work or at home. It could be a project you enjoy but that takes a long time and doesn’t show much progress. It could be a challenge that you don’t feel adequate to tackle. The knowledge that something big, overwhelming, and discouraging waits for you makes staying in bed much more appealing.

Environmental Factors

• Clutter: A messy room, home, and work environment sends strong messages that you can’t really ignore. Clutter makes you feel out of control even if you aren’t. It makes you take serious things less seriously; if your home or office isn’t important enough to keep neat and clean, then how important are the activities that take place within it? Waking up to a messy room tells you that you are already starting out behind.
• Lack of Light: A room with no windows or very heavy drapes that allow no sunlight creates a perpetual night. Light is the natural wake-up call. If you don’t have any in your room, you are sabotaging your own efforts.
• Weather: Hibernation instincts kick in during winter, especially on those gray days. Dark, rainy days anytime of year tend to make the bed feel much more comfortable.
• Family Habits: If your night-owl husband keeps you up too late and then sleeps peacefully through the alarm, it’s going to be much more difficult for you to bound out of bed and start your day. If you have children and no morning or evening routines, you’re creating even more difficulty.
• Social Obligations: Staying out too late with friends, not to mention the unpleasant effects of too much alcohol, work against your getting up early efforts.
• Bad Alarm Clock Set-Up: You need an alarm clock you can hear and cannot ignore (it should be very annoying); you need to put it close enough to wake you up but too far away to turn off without getting out of bed. If you can sleep through your alarm or hit the snooze button without lifting your head, you will still be in bed an hour after it rings.

Help Yourself

Don’t be a slave to habits that work against your efforts. Change a few things (the ones that made you nod and say, Oooh, that’s my problem) and renew your efforts to get up early.

• Drink lots of water during the day. Keep a bottle handy and refill it every time you empty it. Make yourself drink a glass of water before you have a soda or a coffee or a snack.
• Drink no caffeine after noon. Caffeine’s effects can hit you much later than you think. Too much caffeine isn’t good for you anyway, so get what you want in the morning and drink decaf after lunch. Better yet, drink water after lunch!
• Cut out fast food. If it’s a habit, then let yourself have fast food once a week, maybe for a treat on Saturday or something. Otherwise, don’t eat it.
• Cut out processed food for snacks. Eat fresh fruit and vegetables instead.
• Add a salad to your daily lunch or dinner, or to both. Eat your salad first.
• Get some exercise. Fifteen or twenty minutes is great. Start somewhere. Walk in the park. Get some exercise videos. Walk in the mall. Get some hand weights or an aerobic band. Dance.
• Don’t worry about a bedtime; go to sleep when you’re sleepy.
• Don’t talk about or deal with stressful matters at night. Turn off the phone ringer if you have to. Do things that are calming, repetitive, and relaxing. Don’t watch movies that are disturbing.
• Keep a notebook and pen handy at night. If you think of something to do, someone to call, whatever, write it down. That way your brain won’t feel like it has to remember and you can continue to relax.
• Use a planner and make a plan. Jot down your morning get-up time in your planner, and a short to-do list for the next day. Leave it out on the kitchen table or by the coffee maker so you see it first thing in the morning.
• Find your purpose.
• Get help with your challenging projects. Have a friend come over to help you paint or cook pies or whatever. Schedule a meeting to work on a project together. Make a date with your spouse to do taxes. Don’t tackle this stuff alone.
• Balance your day with long-progress projects and immediate- gratification items. Do something every day that allows you to see immediate results.
• Clean up your bedroom, including the closet. Take everything out of your room except what you need for dressing, sleeping, and sex. If you must, keep a couple of books by your bed; but don’t bring in a whole library and definitely don’t bring in work papers.
• Simplify your decor. Soft, muted colors are relaxing.
• Plan a special “reward” for yourself on nasty-weather days. Buy yourself a latte or have a cinnamon roll or rent a movie on the way home as a reward for getting yourself out of bed on those icky, rainy days. But you don’t get the reward if you didn’t get up on time!
• Tell your spouse you need help. If you’re dealing with a night-owl spouse, just let him know that you’re going to go to bed a little earlier than he does. Then when you get sleepy, go to bed. It’s okay. He’ll still love you.
• Set up routines for your children. Morning and evening. Nights will go smoother, they’ll get to bed on time, you can relax and get a good night’s sleep. Mornings will be easier and hassle-free and you won’t have to dread them anymore.
• Limit your social obligations. If you know it’s going to be later than you want to be, just say no. Save it for the weekend. Stay home more. Play with your kids. Talk to your husband. Knit something. Call your aunt in Nebraska. Write a letter to your sister (she’ll be amazed). Watch a good movie. Be a homebody during the week. It’s okay to slow your life down.
• Open the curtains, or get new ones. Let in some morning light.
• Get a good alarm clock, and set it up where you can see it but not touch it from your bed.
• Set up your coffee maker at night. When your alarm goes off, get up, turn it off, flip on your coffee maker, and don’t even think about going back to bed while it brews!