As a normally decidedly non-morning person, getting up really early (2-4am) works surprisingly well for me. Allows for a really slow, but stress-free morning, which leads to a more productive rest of the day. The hardest part (for me) is realizing that yes, I have done enough and am tired, and should not power through an evening-low and stay up until after midnight.
YMMV of course, but getting up really early might not be as outlandish as it sounds.
You aren't truly a non-morning person, I think, because it works for you. You might not like mornings, but it isn't wired in as it is in some of us.
Waking before 8-9am seriously affects the very quality of sleep. 8-9am takes a little attention to my sleeping and continued use of an alarm clock, but I can get a decent enough sleep. At 6-7am wakings, it is doable with a great deal of work. I then continually run the risk of oversleeping sporadically (I often don't hear alarm clocks early in the morning). Sometimes I'm just wide awake after midnight even with continued waking. Outside of taking sleeping pills, I'm not sure how to combat that.
I worked exactly one job that started at 4:45am and had to quit due to lateness. I physically couldn't do it. Half the time the alarm wouldn't wake me. I can do this occasionally for a couple days at a time, but it is rough. I'm much better working overnight than early mornings. I used to get told I'd grow out of it, but I'm 38. I don't think I will.
I feel like you about the 6-9 period, and I still prefer and fall back to getting up at 9 (or later if nothing stops me).
But if getting up late is not an option, 3am beats 6 or 7 am for me. Which is a solution for times when I have to do something early.
But again, just my personal experience. Everybody is different, and nothing is worse than telling other people "oh, you are doing it wrong, just do X and be a normal person!"
As a non-morning person, waking up before 8AM usually ensures that I am absolutely dog tired by mid afternoon (~2-3PM) and completely non-productive from 5PM onward.
Waking up at 4AM would mean that time-frame moves up another 3 hours and I would have to finish doing everything I need to during the day by 2-3PM and most jobs would generally look down upon that.
> YMMV of course, but getting up really early might not be as outlandish as it sounds.
Doing it once or twice isn't especially difficult or outlandish, but I haven't managed to keep it up longer than a week despite my best efforts. And it always resulted in absolutely miserable afternoons.
I noticed something similar. A few years ago I tried for a few weeks to be in bed early and get up early. The result was that a) I had more trouble falling asleep because the world around me was a lot more active, b) I wouldn't actually be productive earlier than I would had I gotten up at a "normal" time, and c) I would feel miserable starting some time in the afternoon.
When I go to bed late and wake up late, however, there is no such "miserable" time period.
That said, if I go to bed later than 2-3AM, I'll feel tired the next day.
Sleeping 1AM to 9AM has worked fairly well for me thus far and I'm just glad I have a job that allows me to work flex hours.
I have to add that I find lying in bed unable to fall asleep one the most miserable human experiences. I suspect it's what ultimately led to me developing the late night sleeping habit, since if I was unable to fall asleep within 10 minutes, I would get back up and keep reading or doing something until I was more tired.
i wake up at 4 am everyday because i need to get into the office by 5, and lots of things needs to be done by 7.
by noon my productivity falls off a cliff and I am a zombie by 6 pm but the social life begins at the time when friends and family get off work. you can choose to cut that out of your life... but that's a huge sacrifice.
when the weekend comes around, i'm in bed until noon, and then by sunday i'm back to ready to hit the sack at 2am again, except that work starts in 3 hours.
every week this cycle of absolute torture goes around, and has been my life for the last 5 years.
but what this article is not about is the time you wake up, but the quality, quiet time you put aside for important things, before work starts. for me, that would be 2 to 4 am before i go to work, but obviously that's not happening. so just because you wake up at 4 doesn't obviously mean anything on its own, the important thing is waking up at 4 when your workday begins at 7.
YMMV of course, but getting up really early might not be as outlandish as it sounds.