Perhaps It’s Not as Difficult as It Seems

Several thoughts are running through my brain right now. Topmost among them is this: getting up early is as simple as making the decision to do so.

This seems like a stretch for someone who has been a late riser for the entirety of my twenty-eight years.

But it is. And not only that, but I’ve realized this past week (which, for the record, did not entail rising early for the most part) that deciding to get up is different fundamentally than getting up when I finally can’t go back to sleep anymore.

This may seem obvious, but let me explain.

I’m talking about energy. I’m not a morning person, if that hasn’t been made clear, but I am someone who is awake once I get up. It’s a rare day (and probably an excessively long night) that I wake up, get up, and am not immediately aware of what I’m doing, where I’m going, or what needs to be done that day.

But when I decide to get up with my alarm before I’ve slept myself into no other option, it’s a markedly different day. I’m more decisive. Maybe a little tired, but that usually wears off in an hour or so, and that bit of tiredness doesn’t impede my alertness. It’s just an aside and it doesn’t last.

When I sleep until I can’t anymore, I’m awake, sure, but I’ve probably slept half the day away and I don’t have the decisive drive that I need to get things done. Lose-lose.

When I wake up with my alarm, I’ve already made one decision. It’s likely going to be a decisive day. And this idea goes further into what I’ve been thinking about this whole past week: that making a decision to do something is much more driving and likely to get done (for me, anyway) if I don’t attach modifiers like should.

I should do this today. I need to get this done today.

I won’t do those things. Not because I don’t want to do them, but attaching duty and responsibility to the to do list is really detrimental to what I will actually do.

I mentioned in last week’s post that I’m more disciplined at work than I am at home. That stuck with me because I want to know why. I wasn’t satisfied with the answer I told myself, and now I think I understand what I was missing: at home, there’s no accountability for me, true. There’s less urgency to do things when I’m home because I’ll get them done eventually.

No. The reason for this disparity (discipline, yes, but also other things) is that I just do things. I don’t think about what needs to be done, I just see something and I get it finished or pass it along to someone else who will do it.

I don’t do that at home. I stare at things and think about how they should get done, and obviously that does nothing. And then I get distracted by something else because I’m not invested in finishing whatever needed to be done.

The core of the issue is a lack of care. I don’t care enough to clean my kitchen or my bathroom until it gets to a point that I find repulsive, and then I’ll get it done immediately.

Because I make the choice. Almost subconsciously. I don’t stop to think about how it needs to get done. I don’t stop to think about how I should have cleaned it days ago. I see it, I know all the reasons it hasn’t gotten done, and I just do it. Little thought in the thing beyond the muscle decision to move.

Waking up is the same way for me. The same thing happens day after day. I wake up with my alarm (most days), I think about how I should get up and start my day, and then I go back to sleep. Or I could turn my alarm off and stand. No thought.

Overthinking in social situations is one thing, but I overthink everything.

Case in point: post above.

And the crazy thing is that social situations are the same way!

When I stop to think about them, I get into all kinds of awkward social trouble because 1) I pause too long to respond and then give a response that sounds fake, 2) I fail to respond at all and we just all stand in awkward silence for a lack of conversation, 3) I think long and hard about what was said but am so deep in thought that I don’t realize the conversation has moved on and then I blurt out a response and people look at me like I’m crazy because I interrupted and I’m off topic, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

I also get in trouble for complete lack of thought when I only react to things and don’t think about what I’m saying. Cause reasons, people. Some things need not be said, and other things need to be thought through before they’re said out loud. Read the room, know your audience, all that. I don’t do that well when I’m in react-only mode.

Balance in all things, I guess.

Anyway, this past week was difficult. I slept an average of ten hours a night, and I’m blaming this on the melatonin I’ve started taking at night, but it’s also because the days have been getting shorter and darker. My symptoms have been getting worse and more consistent.

The descent has begun, though I’m thankful that it took a little longer this year to come. We’ll see how long it lasts and how bad it gets.

This thought experiment has been a dive into my brain, and I’m thankful you all chose to follow along.