I am a natural morning person. Even when I was a kid or teenager, I enjoyed waking up early and watching everything around me come to life. And I have always been my most creative, energetic and productive during morning hours. Because of that, I tended to schedule my day so that I would finish every major thing until the afternoon and did easier stuff (or didn’t do anything) after that. In fact, at some points, I started sleeping earlier so I could wake up earlier, as early as 4.30 (not anymore but I did this for a while). I just love morning hours. The longer they are, the more I enjoy them.
And I thought that was the better way. That is, I thought that everyone should be a morning person because that is natural. Not that I imposed that on anyone but I advertised it a lot.
Now I am not so sure anymore and that is because I saw a lot of people reaching their creative top at night and pass the morning hours. I saw people finishing papers or exercise better at night. I saw how natural this felt to them. It was not that they were forcing it to be like that. It just was. Then, I started questioning the conclusion I had arrived.
I had always thought (and still think) that there is something magical about morning hours. Watching and feeling the freshness of the day. But with those night-people, I started realizing that mornings are not the only special times of the day. Nights are just as magical. Listening to the silence of the environment around us is something. Watching and feeling that calmness brings in a different kind of energy. Maybe it is just that different people are driven by different types of energies. Some by the freshness of the morning and some by the calmness of the night. Now I think that what is really natural is what fits our own individual nature and that is variable.
So now let me know what you think. Are you a morning or a night person? Why do you prefer that time over others? Do you think there is a natural, all-fitting best time of the day? Let’s chat.
I’m a person that is best in the afternoon I believe and perhaps the evening. I’ve never really been a morning person but it’s when I have the most physical energy. Afternoons are for mental work.
Nice division of labor!
My blog on the same topic. Another point of view.
https://wordpress.com/post/papagnipages.com/930
I will check that!
I am very much a morning person and have been all my life. And it is not only about creativity for me. It is my soul’s need ❤️
But yes, it takes all sorts to make this world 😇
Same here!
I have always been a night owl. There’s something to the calm blackness of night that simply releases the subconscious mind and let’s flow the creative juices. Maybe it has something to do with the time of day one was born, I was born at 1:47 am so the night just feels right. Who knows? It’s all relative to one’s own preference.
That is a nice description of how night feels! Because I have never been a night person, I don’t know how it feels, so it is nice to hear it.
Also, yeah, there might be such a correlation for some people.
I’m a night-owl too, and I was born at 12:18 AM. Wonder if anyone’s ever looked at the possible connection?
Not sure. It would be interesting to find out that there’s a correlation.
Yeah!
There was another comment on the same, and maybe there is. Who knows.
I am NOT a morning person. Never have been. Hated waking up early to go to school all my life, and I’d be sleepy and grumpy in class in the morning. I also get irritated by anyone talking to me before 9am. Then I drink my coffee or tea and am fine for the rest of the day. I can’t get anything done early morning even if I wake up early. I also set like 5 alarms, 5 minutes apart if I have to wake up before 7am.
I can see the frustration if you are not a morning person. Unfortunately, most things and jobs are designed for very early morning😔
This is an excellent question that will most likely prompt me to write my own piece about it.
To keep it short, when I was younger and all throughout my teens very much a night owl. However, as I am getting older I enjoy q good night’s sleep and waking up early.
I consider myself lucky that my sleep pattern isn’t consistent and I vary from night owl to morning person from week to week.
Being flexible is actually a good thing. Because I am a morning person strict, I sometimes suffer from inflexibility.
It is a very interesting topic. I am a morning person with same energy to move in the evening, but my daughter likes to read and write in the night!
This pattern changes even from mother to daughter! Diversity!
Yes, true. Unity in diversity!👍
morning is always the best…
I tend to agree.
I’m more of a morning person, too. I mean, I always wake up early and I like doing important things in the morning. It’s also the best time to exercise and read. 🙂
Same energy here:)
👍😊
I’m a natural morning person. Because the morning freshness makes me feel energized so I can be more productive. Morning also makes me concentrate on my works better than at night.
same here!
I’m a morning person, I love waking up and having a cup of coffee and reading when it’s quiet an peaceful, and getting ready for the day.
Sounds very nice!
I’m a morning person. As long as I am free to choose / doing something I enjoy. Getting up for work can be a chore. I love the potential of the new day, it feels like I’ve wasted my morning when I get up late & it kinda makes my day feel like a write-off.
I get the same feeling too! Like I wasted my whole day if I wake up at 10 or something
I’m a natural morning person…I enjoy the quiet tones of morning. However, I enjoy evening activities with friends. An afternoon or early evening nap makes everything possible. Why choose?
Well, I still have to sleep early even if I take a nap. I guess I just like sleeping maybe:) But yes, it is possible to do both!
I wake early but I’m not entirely sure I’m a morning person. I like the quiet and the alone time, but I like the dark and the stars and the sounds of the night. My meds, however, dictate my reality somewhat. I take them with dinner and I’ve pushed dinner back to 7:30 p.m. because within a couple of hours the side-effects are awful and I sleep to escape them. Which means that although I sleep not well, I’m up relatively early. I’ve adapted but I do miss hanging out in the wee smalls.
Hmm, do you remember how it was before you started medication?
I was more a night person, I think. At least, I stayed up late to read.
Ok, well, then there seems to be a pattern-shift there but we need to adapt sometimes.
I was always a night-owl until I retired. Now that I could stay up until sunrise and sleep until afternoon if I wanted, I tend to wake naturally between 6 and 7 AM. Go figure…
From the point of view of a working night-owl who found salvation by becoming a shift-worker for the last 25 years of my career, I have a take on the constant attempts to convince night-owls that we’re “doing it wrong:” The reason night-owls tend to suffer in the workforce while morning people thrive (and rub the night-owls’ noses in it) is not because morning people are inherently superior. To the contrary, it’s because the night-owl is forced to adapt to a schedule that is not natural to his or her internal clock. Put a morning person on a night shift, and they wander around as dazed as someone who’s taken a blow to the head. I’ve witnessed it thousands of times as I’ve breezed through my night shifts; it’s only too real, and in some industries can be physically dangerous.
Very entertaining post that’s bound to stir up some controversy; well-done!
Thank you for the nice comment! I also think that our whole system is not designed to embrace all humans. As a morning person, I don’t think I could survive in a job in which I had to stay up late.
I am a natural night person, but to be fair. I also love the early morning hours myself. With my work schedule I wake up early and have accepted it in stride. Personally I turned it to my advantage so I can wake up and get a little reading in or my thoughts together. This being before I have to get ready for work. However, if I stay up later than I should…my body celebrates and goes right back to the night owl routine which can be torture on a work day with little sleep.
Win some, lose some.
Well, technically, you can train but the job system is mostly designed for morning people. In your case, you need to adapt to something that is not too natural for you but oh well.
Yep it is what it is and the mornings are still pleasant. 🙂 I love hearing the birds sing.
Yes!
I am a morning person and have been this way for decades. Its the way I am wired.
Me too!
I am a night owl. I always have been. I do my best work in the middle of the night when it is quiet and no one wants to talk to me or need my attention. I find that it is easier to relax at night, especially in the summer when you can hear the nighttime noises through the open windows.
Sounds awesome! Something I have not experienced much.
I have always been a “night person”. I love the silence of night and the intimacy of it. Something about night time makes you feel like you’re the only one conscious and alive when the rest of the world is fast asleep, which research and statistics actually show is not at all the case. Insomnia is rife! Still, it feels like beautifully lonely period, I think.
You know, “night people” are really “morning people” who often just forget to go to bed!
I love the last sentence! True!
I’m definitely not a morning person. I’m a better afternoon person and an even better night person.
What is attractive about being awake at night?
Actually, I don’t know. I’m just a lot more creative at that time. I really like the silence when I’m always trying to get some work done and at that time, everyone is asleep.. I guess, win win?
Sounds like it!
I always preferred night to study and think and do things, always loved to stay late at night and sleep in the morning, I like to sleep until 11. or noon if I have nothing to do! When I’m at mountains I would love to wake up on birds voice and watch the beauty of nature but probably because I never had the right circumstances so never loved to wake up early…I don’t know why I’m like that actually but I feel surprised sometimes when I see people so energetic and hyper in the morning, I’m not usually grumpy but I rather not have long conversations and so…But when I have things to do, I wake up and I’m not grumpy when I wake up usually, I believe it all depends on the entourage, the place, the people,m the circumstances, probably I will discover I’m a morning person if all this has changed!
Well, I have almost always been all-energetic in the mornings. But as you say, some circumstances might tamper with our default. Currently, I am a bit less of a morning person, though still not a night person either. We will see if I (we all) can change my (our) default.
Yes that’s it, things change with circumstances I guess
They do!
I cannot really conclude that I am either of the two but mornings are so important to me in the sense of setting the tone for my whole day. If I miss it in the morning, it becomes difficult to catch up with the day.
I feel like that too! If I miss the morning, I feel like the day is messed up in general.
Personally I enjoy getting up early too, since I’ve lived in Vietnam where morning is a cooler time, but I find my mind is running at its best creatively after lunch, years ago I was not a morning person, partly because the UK is often cold, wet and much less light, a lot of people feel the same there, we are social and effected by those around us, in Vietnam it would be pretty busy on the street at 5am.
That is an interesting take! The weather could really affect this! Thanks for this nice point!
I am definitely a morning person! I love to wake up to singing birds and just experience life itself. I also have more energy in the morning and plan accordingly. Thank you for following BrewNSpew.
Same here!
Thank you for writing this!!! 🙂 This article resonated with me very much. I have forced myself into all kinds of waking/sleeping arrangements and really don’t have any idea right now about what is best except to just do what feels right for myself. Fortunately, right now I have the immense luxury of doing just that, but the clock is ticking, I’m afraid, and I will probably have to become more structured soon.
But I very much relate to your identifying energy and magic in different times of day. 🙂
Establishing habits take time and I am sure you will find what is right for you. But most important is to listen to what your body wants. Thanks for dropping by!
Night owl over here! I am surrounded by morning people and I have always been baffled by their ability to function and function happily early in the morning. But some crazy days I wake up early on the weekends (before 8 am for me is early) and I can’t deny how lovely it is to have that fresh morning air, nature feels like is waking up and stretching right along with you.
To me the early morning makes me very contemplative though, so I don’t get much done, I sit there with my coffee ruminating on the meaning of life and why are here, what does it all mean.
I am not a naturally energetic person but at night I am filled with curiosity and filled with a sudden need to research at depth everything I’ve read that week or been exposed to. I started my blog impromptu one night, because my brain was suddenly brimming with words.
I think there is beauty in both the early morning and the middle of the night. How convenient that both times have their followers, ready to worship at their altar.
You are a natural night-lover then! I could never feel that vibe from the night, but I do in the morning. That energy comes to me in the morning. It is the same energy, just different times.
I am a night owl. I am more energized and adrenaline-filled in the afternoon to evening. Mornings make me sad, withdrawn and weak, but my strength begins to rise at about 11 am and from this time, I can work till midnight ( sometimes without lunch break) with joy and happiness. I could remember a time I tried to be a morning person, the practice lasted just for 2days.
Then you are naturally a night-person. You should just keep it to that. Otherwise, you will go against your own natural being.
I could never understand how creativity and the time of the day go hand-in-hand. I believe creativity can flow any moment irrespective of the time of the day. At least that’s happened with me 😛
Although I agree with you, mornings have an ethereal aura around them. You feel every breath of yours come alive, each day at dawn.
Creativity can come at any moment, I agree. But for me, it tends to come more often in the mornings. If you can be creative at any time of the day, that is awesome!
I love this. I do both since I don’t sleep much. They are different but some people only gravitate to one way. Fascinating!
Thank you for sharing your thought! If you can do both, you are one of the rarer kind:)
I go in spurts this week I’m before the sun type but sometimes I just can’t sleep and stay out all night. I do live in Las Vegas though and I can always go do something or be inspired by the 24 hr glam so maybe that helps.
I am sure it does! It will attract anyone who lives there:)
I worked the graveyard shift (overnights) most of my life. Ever since retirement, I’ve awakened very early to meditate and write. I suppose that is some sort of balance.