I Need A New Planet

I read a lot of stuff about ways to improve stuff.

Meditation for beginners.

How to up your word count.

How to be consistent with your exercise and fitness.

How to do x,y,z.

It seems that almost all of these things have one thing in common:

They all suggest “just get up a half hour earlier every morning.”

So, based on all the things that I want to do and improve, I should be getting up at 2 AM.  Because, naturally, I only need 4 hours of sleep.  Riiiiiight.

I conclude all of these so-called experts are morning people.  :cue booing and hissing:

Since that’s not gonna happen, I suppose I need to get behind some kind of colonization effort for a planet with a 36 hour day

Seriously.  So many of the things I want to do require QUIET and SOLITUDE.  And that’s just in limited supply.  I can’t get up any earlier or I won’t function.  If I get less than 8 hours of sleep, there should be a terror level warning issued.  I am NOT a nice person without sleep.

The exercise happens in the morning or not at all.  That’s the thing I get up early to do.

I listened to a compelling argument from Holly Lisle earlier this week about why you should get up early to write, even without caffeine (she uses this really great example about how when you go hunting, you go before dawn to get in position before the game starts moving–which is something I did with my dad growing up, so I totally get that).  Wait, you expect me to produce something other than caveman grunts without caffeine?  Oh you are HARD CORE.

No question, I tend to write more easily earlier in the day before my brain is cluttered up with evil day job and life stuff, but it’s just not possible.  Sometimes I’ll managed to rip out a couple hundred words during breakfast, but there’s just not TIME.  Eight o’clock comes way too fast.  Someday when I’m able to quit my job?  Yeah, I’ll be all over that.

But it was the meditation for beginners that really got me.   There’s a lot of “Make sure you aren’t interrupted” being tossed around.  Clearly he doesn’t have pets or small children.  And if I got up half an hour earlier to meditate, I’d just fall right back asleep in whatever position I chose to use for meditation.  It’s why I stopped doing relaxation style yoga first thing.  I kept falling back asleep during all the prone poses and even during some of the seated ones.

Maybe I should do a search on all these topics as relate to non-morning people…

6 thoughts on “I Need A New Planet

  1. For one year I actually meditated in my car. No, not while I was driving! I would drive into work and stop at a park two blocks from the office. I usually got there 30-40 minutes prior the start of work. I’d meditate for 30 minutes and go be at work with a few minutes to spare. Then I changed jobs. It is truly a shame when the day job gets in the way of life. Don’t you think?

  2. I’ll toss your way “Walking meditation” … Nothing more. Personally, there are no rules to meditation. Anyways, I wish you the best and please take care this weekend 🙂

  3. I can’t even make it to work on time, so doing ANYTHING extra in the morning, for me, is not feasible. I need my sleep, too. I don’t get enough the way it is, so getting up earlier would not be a good thing.

    I really like the idea of 36 hour days. Alas, we can’t control the universe.

  4. Add “life with little kids” to the “get up even EARLIER? Are you KIDDING??” list. I can honestly say thank god they’re hitting puberty–the elder sleeps through noon whatever the noise level.

    Morning people, hmph.

  5. Wow, this post really spoke to me, Kait! I feel the same way. In fact, as a Christian, I can’t tell you how often I’ve read or heard that you should start your day in “alone time with God,” and there are stories about spiritual giants who rise at 4:00 a.m. to pray and meditate. And I’m like…Holy Canoli, that CAN’T be the secret to this whole thing!!! Whenever I’ve tried to get up early to pray, I doze off somewhere right after “Dear God…” I feel the same way about writing. I need about 30 minutes to be functional enough to say “hi” to myself in the mirror, much less form a coherent scene on the page. So let me know when you find that planet with the 36-hour day. I’ll happily be in the first colonization party! 🙂

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