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I get into these kicks sometimes where I could stay up half the night. Last night was one of those times. I just wasn’t tired when 10 pm rolled around and Travis was ready to catch some zzz’s. So I stayed up. I wish I could say that I was digging into my spiritual life or being creative or doing something productive, as this blog post points out can happen, but the truth is, I was just sitting at the computer playing a puzzle game that I find highly addictive. If I let myself, I can get absorbed for hours. To that end, I’m not going to post the link because I don’t want to infect anyone else with it.
While I do believe that being a night owl or a morning person is just a matter of personal choices, I also know that when I get my butt into bed and get up in the morning I tend to feel physically better. Ideally, I would love to go to bed at 11 and wake at 8 every day. Yes, I know that’s 9 hours of sleep but truthfully it takes me a while to fall asleep at night no matter what I do, unless I am completely exhausted or sick. So it evens out to closer to 8 hours. But then last night, I was up until 2 am. And the thing is, I don’t feel good when I stay up that late. Most of the time it’s just a matter of being too awake to bother with sleeping but also too tired to accomplish anything worthwhile. Facebook, computer games, television… none of these help me to get sleepy but they pass the time. I could read, but lately I’ve been on a no-reading kick. Weird for me, since I’ve always loved to read, but I’ve found since becoming an adult that I go through these seasons where I just can’t convince myself to pick up a book, even one I’m interested in. Usually the only cure is to go to Borders, but that costs money and after I devour the new book in a few days, I’m back to square one.
I know of at least one friend who reads this blog who is a night owl, too (hint: she commented on yesterday’s post), but are there any others out there? What is your ideal sleep schedule?
Blooming Joy! 
I am not typically a night owl. I had trouble sleeping last night, though, and almost got up in the middle of the night. I take some meds at night that pretty much keep me asleep and I use a CPAP for sleep apnea, so like 10:30 to 5:30, right now, and usually try for 8 hours if I am working normal working hours. But, if I am up at night I can be addicted to being on the computer. Facebook can occupy me, and I have scarcely ever met a Tetris game I could not get lost in.
I used to read a lot. Since doing our master’s degrees, I haven’t read that much. I should get in the habit of going to the library, I guess – it is cheaper than Borders by a long shot.
I’m going to respectfully disagree with you on one point: I don’t believe being a night owl or a morning person is mostly a matter of choice. I would LOVE to be a morning person. Troy is a morning person, and so is Annalie, and it would make my life so much easier in so many ways if I could only conform to their schedules! But even if I go to bed at 10pm, getting up at 7am is HARD for me. I drag and feel groggy till 9 or 10am, regardless of food or coffee or exercise or showering or exposuse to sunlight. Sure, there are the occasional mornings when I wake up in the right part of my sleep cycle and I’m more chipper than normal, but the vast majority of days I’m just not as awake in the early hours.
If I go to bed at 2am and wake up at 9am, even though I get less sleep than the 10pm-7am scenario, I feel better-rested every time. The same thing is true for my mom and my brother, too. Mornings are just not our thing! 🙂
I guess I misspoke when I said that it’s a matter of personal choice. What I meant is that preferences lead to choices on whether or not to actually stay up or get up early. The nice thing is that our world has shifted because of online capabilities, and a lot of people can live according to their own clocks now. Granted, there aren’t tons of jobs that allow for it, but we’ve been lucky enough to have flexibility in our lives other than Sunday mornings. But I know what you mean about needing the sleep at certain times – getting up before 7am is torture for me, but if I stay up past midnight I’m also in trouble. So I guess I’m neither a night owl or a morning person, but something in-between.
I was a night owl in college — it was very typical for me to be up until 2-3 am several nights each week. I also never (4-years) had a class that started before 9 am, because I knew I’d be a wreck in the early morning.
However, life circumstances have changed … first with a job that required me setting my alarm for 5 am. Now it’s kids and school schedules, etc that get me up in the morning. My “ideal” sleep time is 10:30 pm – 6:30 am. So I guess I still get a little bit of night owl and morning person together! 🙂