The goal of a good night’s sleep is to wake up in the morning feeling refreshed and ready to start your day.
Here are seven things you can do to wake up easier and feel refreshed.
Put Your Alarm Clock Out of Reach
Even from the deepest stages of sleep, an alarm clock will pull you back to consciousness. Hitting the snooze button, however, can return you to REM sleep. Though this phase of the sleep cycle is crucial and highly restorative, it is difficult to wake up when you’re in the middle of it.
When your alarm goes off in the morning, you’re usually nearing the end of your last REM cycle, making it easier to wake up. When you hit snooze and go back to sleep, you can re-enter the REM phase and, as a result, wake up feeling foggy and disoriented.
Get Light Exposure
Exposure to morning light can have beneficial effects on promoting wakefulness by suppressing melatonin and increasing levels of serotonin. Our bodies follow a natural circadian rhythm and light has the strongest effect on this biological clock.
Ideally, you would wake up to sunlight streaming in your window every day.
Drink Caffeine
Millions of people start their day with a caffeinated beverage like coffee or tea, and this is indeed an excellent way to wake up. Caffeine blocks adenosine, a chemical that makes us feel sleepy. Hence, a cup of coffee reduces fatigue and improves focus and concentration. The effects of caffeine can be felt 15 minutes after it’s consumed and generally continue for a few hours.
Exercise and Be Active
If you have trouble emerging from sleep and jump-starting your day, you may want to be active first thing in the morning. Scheduling a short period of exercise upon awakening can help get you going. Furthermore, getting regular exercise each day has been shown to improve your sleep overall.
Eat Breakfast
It seems like simple advice, but having breakfast is a great way to wake yourself up. Even a small morning meal can give you a burst of energy to get your day going. If you include a caffeinated beverage, you may get even more of a benefit. There is evidence that eating low-glycemic and high-protein foods at breakfast can increase morning energy levels.
Maintain a Regular Sleep Schedule
On average, adults need around eight hours of sleep per night, but the amount you need may vary.
Our bodies prefer to follow regular patterns and our behavior can reinforce these natural circadian rhythms. One of the best ways to get a good night’s sleep and wake up on time is to establish a consistent sleep schedule. Research shows that too much variability in your bedtime and the time you wake up in the morning can lead to too little sleep.
Conclusion
A variety of strategies have proven to be helpful for waking up more easily in the mornings. These include getting natural (or artificial) light exposure, putting your alarm clock out of reach (so you can’t hit the snooze button), and drinking a caffeinated beverage.
