Recently I have finished school and I’ve realised that most of my life since I was 4, I’ve been waking up at 6/7 am and I was just thinking why our body isn’t used to waking up early assuming you’ve had a good night sleep.
In: Biology
For most of human history, people went to sleep when the sun went down and woke up when it rose. We evolved to follow this cycle closely. Now, we have plentiful artificial lighting and most people stay up long after dusk, and many also wake up before dawn. Our circadian rhythms can only get so used to that.
We have evolved to wake up when the sun rises. It’s usually waking up while it’s still dark that tend to be difficult. The reason is that it would’ve been really dangerous for Paleolithic humans to wander around in the dark in the morning. So our brain is hard-wired to wake up as the sun rises.
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My body *is* used to waking up early. I’m lucky, even if I stay up late, to sleep in until 7 AM. I’ve been getting up not later than 5AM pretty much my entire adult life, so my body pretty much automatically wakes up then (if not earlier)
I think for the most part it’s unique to the individual and everyone has the massive ability to adapt. Think about everything throughout history people have adapted to. I have created a work/life/social schedule where most of all my activity happens from 12:30 pm on ward. TIL 12:30 am in terms of any work or social activities
Do you mean waking up earlier than 6/7 am or that you are not used to waking up at 6/7am ?
Your body really like routine. We even have a name for the routine our body does in a day: a circadian rhythm.
When you go to bed and wake up at same the time everyday, your body will get used to it. It does it so well you won’t even need an alarm clock to wake up. Of course, other factors will play a role like the length and quality of your sleep and exterrnal cues like light and temperature.
If you keep waking up tired after following a good sleep routine for some time, you may have a sleep disorder like sleep apnea.
Depends on the body. Sometime in my 40s I had to start going to bed at a reasonable time because my body just decided to start waking up at 6am no matter how little sleep I had the night before. I was a pretty serious night owl before that so it was quite an adjustment, but now I wake up before sunrise most days and feel great. I’ve become the morning person I used to loathe. 😛
I don’t understand this question. Is it hard for most people to wake up? I don’t use an alarm and almost always am up before 8 usually even before 7. Is that not normal?
My dad wakes up at 4 am so maybe this is not something that is universally applicable. I’m not sure exactly what you mean by “isn’t used to” but I assume you’re referring to how groggy you are. Well, when you wake up there’s still a lot of melatonin in your system. This makes you tired. It gets flushed out as you get up and about. But I don’t think it has anything to do with the actual time you wake up, it’s more about whether or not you were able to get through all your REM cycles
I am wide-awake the second any light is visible in the morning. Not fun in the summer when it’s bright by 4 am… but I can sometimes sleep in until 8 am mid in the winter!
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