Turn it off!

Research shows if you turn off technology and hour or two before bed, you will have a much more sound and peaceful sleep. Yet, many have their eyes on the computer screen or phone screen until right before they become unconscious, asleep. I used to be one of those people.

In fact, I was so surprised there would be such a study because I thought, how can I even fall asleep in the first place, if my eyes don’t get tired as they only get tired when looking at the screen for too long. Of course, reading a book at the time seemed so much more difficult for me than just watching my favorite show before bed. Then again, at that time, I didn’t sleep until well into the night like 2 or 3 am and woke up much later during the day. However, I am a new person!

I have been applying disciplined efforts for about a month now to change who I am. I want to become the person who easily turns off technology hours before bed and spends that time contemplating and planning for the following day or just relaxing by reading something or praying or doing some light yoga or meditating or doing a bit of arts and craft. I want to become the person the person who wakes up at 5am without a problem and start my first jam session in the morning right after I write on my blog and have my first cup of coffee. Perhaps I could do some light yoga in the morning when I wake up that early or meditate or clean the house and do laundry. It seems like whenever I wake up early-er, like even if I just wake up at 7am on a weekend day or 6 or 6:30 am on a weekday, I just get so much done.

Now for the past week, I have been experimenting with turning off technology before bed. It has been challenging at times and sometimes impossible since I still have some last minute things to work on the computer or I’m so tired and want to de-stress by watching Friends or just some youtube videos. Although I have reduced my “Friends” time enormously, like one 20-min episode a night versus spending 2-3 hours watching it like before, I still wasn’t happy with myself. I think last week, I managed to “turn off technology” 2 or 3 times. Other days, I either did watch the show or worked on my computer or was on my phone.

On the other hand, due to needing to be in the city (Santa Monica) until 6 or 6:30 at times and the crazy traffic on our way back, we usually get back home by 7:30-8ish and until last week, I would spend that time cooking something to eat if not eating crappy snacks just to fill our stomachs. This week, due to my diligent bulk-cooking practice that I did last Sunday, I was able to save so much time already! Yesterday, we got home at 7:30 as usual and just heated up the dinner for 10 minutes, ate our dinner and finished cleaning up the table and it had just turned 8p! That is quite an improvement I would say! Now, because of my new rule, I couldn’t go to listening to Telegram messages or checking email or worse of all, watching television, so I utilize my extra 2 hours before bed to wash the dishes (a task that always fell on my husband’s shoulders but this time I decided to do it so I can avoid technology and also help digest the food we had for dinner), clean the bathroom (a very important task that I just never seemed to get to before), prepared my outfit for the following day (something I always struggle to do early in the morning when my brain is just not functioning well and I manage to just put something on that don’t necessarily match each other, the weather, or even my mood for that matter), and I was able to read before bed for 30 minutes, a habit that I have been trying to instill in myself for a couple of weeks now. In the end, I was able to have a nice ritual of drinking herbal tea while reading, prepare the food for the following day (just take it out of the fridge and put into the containers), and even apply lotion to really calm down and finally have a very peaceful and sound sleep.

I was able to wake up at 5:45 am this morning, without too much struggle. All in all, I would call this a success and a beginning to a very successful habit & discipline-oriented lifestyle.