*Follow Up* DIY Simulate Sunrise for Early Mornings
After using the Morning Simulator for about 3 weeks now, I feel now would be the best time to send out an update on this has affected my mood for early morning work days. Before I get into the status update, I would like to go more into my background.
I am a morning person, meaning I will wake up with the sunrise, this doesnt necessarily mean I will wake up with a bunch of energy. But once I wake up, I cant go back to sleep, so you can say the sun really affects my sleeping behavior. I could be up until 3 AM drinking with friends and I will still wake up at sunrise. If Im hungover I may fall asleep after, but for the most part, I usually wake up with the sun, yeah even on the weekends. I dont drink coffee or any energy drinks, so Im not dependent on those supplements to get up in the mornings, yeah im weird. So maybe thats why this simulated sunrise really helped me out.
BEFORE
I have to get up 2 hours before sunrise to get ready in time, this messes up my body clock and mornings are a dread. This also doesnt help that my body clock doesnt let me get tired until around 10 or 11 PM so on average Im getting only about 4 hours of sleep. I tried to go to sleep earlier but I will just end up starring at the ceiling for a couple of hours, pretty much a waste of productivity. Like I could be working on other projects, rather just wasting it. I would constantly hit the snooze button and would rush to get to work, usually barely making it on time. I stuck with this poor sleep cycle for months and finally decided to do something about it. I had to do something, its for my job and more importantly, my well being.
AFTER
I want to say after about 1 week, I stated noticing a difference in my sleep cycle. I started getting tired earlier. Like first I noticed that I was going to bed at around 9 and falling asleep within 30 min. Right now I actually getting tired at around 8 and falling asleep with 30 minutes of going to bed. Well of course now that I am getting 8-9 hours of sleep, I feel way better waking up in the morning, and less groggy.
THOGHTS
Its crazy how changing the way I wake up by simulating the sunrise, doesnt trick my body to waking up with energy like I usually would with the normal sunrise. But instead, make me fall asleep earlier. Maybe naturally waking up with the sun makes your body compensate for it by adjusting when you go to sleep. But when we use our alarm clocks to force our bodies to wake up, we loose that natural cycle. Or maybe its just me.
What do you think?
Here is the link tot he original post.
https://steemit.com/diy/@theelectronoob/diy-simulate-sunrise-for-early-mornings
I am really not that clear on the science behind it, but since we know that the temperature of light in our environment has an effect on our levels of alertness, I think it makes sense that it's going to shift it toward when you're concious, like falling asleep vs waking up. Great idea, glad it is making a difference in your quality of rest and I really like the idea of floor lighting just as a design element. Has me thinking I have a potential diy project in my future!