Early to Rise: Day 5 (I enjoy a Challenge!)

“Every morning he wakes me.
He teaches me to listen like a student.” ~ Isaiah 50:4b

Although my goal time for the Early to Rise Challenge is 4:30, Fred (the alarm) went off at 4:03 this morning. (I use the Sleep Cycle app on my iPhone most days.) Wow. THAT felt early, even though I went to bed at 8:00 pm last night.

Today’s reading in the Early to Rise book talks about the meaning of “challenge”. Basically, if it were easy, everyone would be doing it.

Challenge is why I picked “4:30” instead of “5:00”. I bought the book near the end of January and began the 30-day challenge with 5:00 as my goal time. Because I’ve been an early riser for most of my life, getting out of bed wasn’t much of a challenge.

Oops. Let me rephrase that.

Waking up at 5:00 wasn’t much of a challenge. Getting out of bed when I woke up WAS more of a challenge. By the end of the first 30 days (which ended February 28), I was doing great with that one, though.

So I decided I needed a REAL challenge. 4:30 a.m.

I also realized that many mornings, I was wide awake at 4:00. Dead to the world again by 5:00, when the alarm went off.

The greatest challenge in this Challenge for me hasn’t been waking up early.

My greatest challenge is going to bed early.

Last night was easy. I had a really hard workout yesterday. I didn’t sleep very well the night before (Too much dark chocolate before bed, I think). Eight o’clock came none too soon.

Hopefully, tonight I will manage to stay alert until 9 pm. Hopefully…

What has been YOUR biggest challenge with getting enough sleep?