Few things are more impactful at setting yourself up for success than exposure to daylight early in the morning. However, this can be difficult for many in the northern hemisphere during winter, especially if also combined with a 9-5 job that means you're at work before the sun comes up. Luckily, covid has had some positive collaterals here, for me at least.
I could write a whole other post exclusively about how exposure to daylight as early as possible in the day helps set us up for a better night's sleep in the evening. While most have heard about and understand the benefit of winding down and relaxing in the evening in preparations to go to bed, few understand that preparation for good sleep begins in the morning. Long story short: Our body builds up a chemical called adenosine throughout the day that makes us sleepy (caffeine actually works by blocking adenosine from connecting to its receptors in our brain, thus it is preventing us from becoming sleepy rather than making us more awake).
When we wake up, adenosine is at its lowest, and seeing daylight as soon as possible is the fastest way to tell the brain that it's daytime and thus get adenosine production going again. So if you're somebody who struggles with not feeling sufficiently tired to go to bed when you want to go to bed, then the problem is likely that you've got the common but awful habit of staying indoors for hours after waking up, thus not giving your brain the signal that the day has begun and started your internal clock properly.
Additionally, moving your body as well as seeing daylight early helps give yourself energy and mental clarity for the day ahead. Thus, I've made the strict habit of always going out for a 20-30 minute walk as soon as I wake up (summer) or as soon as there's daylight available (winter). This morning was a perfect day for it, as it was quite sunny clear. Below is a couple of shots I took this morning during my walk through St. Hanshaugen park in Oslo, Norway. Conveniently right next to where I now live:
Getting into the habit
Seeing as I now live in Oslo, Norway, and have had 2 months now where the sun is up around 9 am, and down around 3 pm, it's been the time of the year where normally, people would go to work and come home all while it's dark outside. However, the pandemic has, thankfully, given some positive collaterals here thanks to the requirement and then normalization of working from home. Having recently moved places with my new apartment 2 minutes from one of the finest parks in town, and also having a job with a lot of flexibility in terms of how I organize my day, I make sure to be able to go outside and get daylight exposure as early as possible.
During the darkest days in December, this meant taking an earlier lunch break than usual to head outside at 10 pm. This morning, I could instead take an earlier break to head outside in order to catch the sunrise just before 9 am. Since I can organize my day the way I like assuming there is nothing so urgent that I have to be available for a meeting, I would rather prioritize getting this little walk in and then either work from a bit earlier or a bit later than usual. In the end, I want to structure my day around maximum wellbeing and productivity and seeing as this significantly boosts both, it's a no-brainer to fit it in.
How about you? Do you make sure to get daylight each day early on? Or do you have the habit of waking up and then staying inside for a while? Let me know in the comments!
I can understand why you are organizing your day in a way you get some sunlight.
I live in the center of Romania, called Transylvania, where the sun rises at 8:02 am and sets at 4:57 pm and it is mostly shining! I mean really shining. I'm addicted to light and can hardly imagine spending a longer period without sunlight. It's important to go our when the sun is shining, it changes you completely.
@erikah exactly my thoughts!
I do not get enough sunlight daily at all!
I do somewhat have the same habits as you on my off days, but on work days I wake up before the sun and is home after the sun. I live in Denmark, so we have pretty similar weather :D
But I have started a new habit to wind down, which works perfectly!
Unlike your friendly country here in Venezuela, the sun rises approximately at 6 A.M. and sets around 6 P.M. We practically have sunlight for 12 hours and good weather regularly, this is the time when it rains. I did not know the benefits of sunlight when I wake up since I am in the habit of staying at home and going out only when strictly necessary.
I never thought about the morning being so important for bed time! I will test this out directly starting tomorrow morning!
My issue with light at the moment is sports. I ride a lot of road bike. In the summer the mornings and evenings have plenty of light to safely navigate the country roads around where I live. In winter, like we have now, riding in daylight is practically only possible in the weekends. For one if you have a daytime job :-)
Riding in the mornings during the summer is the perfect combo of mind body and soul! It gets the juices going, it wakes you up and gives a clear mind to perform best!
Great goal!
It's so strange reading other people's experiences which are totally different from your own. I can't imagine how's like to live in a country where sun is up only at 9 and just for 6 hours, in winter season ofc. I live in Romania where at this point we have day light for about 9 hrs. Still, is a difference.
Day light is really important for both mental and phisical health so I'm happy that you could get organized and make yourself this healthy habit of exposing yourself to sun light.
Greetings from Ro
Lol, nice to meet you :)
Hey there :D nice to meet you too even though I do remember many of your flower posts back in the steemit days. Hopefully I'm not wrong but I think you were the one with many flower photographs. :d
I'm from West Romania though and I'm happy to know we are a handful of romanian in here. I just saw @vmoldo came back on hive and also we have a new Romanian guy, @lovelyscape. I know there are others but we are here and there, through all hive. Sometimes I miss our steemit Romania group, more correctly would be now hive Romania. hihi
zi frumoasa!
I did post flowers back on the old chain but I don't know if you remember me or confusing me with someone else :)
Anyway, there's a Discord channel for the Romanian community, which I left some time ago because there was no activity there :) But who knows ....
Well, idk. If you had same nickname at steemit, then I think I remember it. If you had another profile picture, that I dont remember. Only the name and the flowers. I know that there was another girl called alina something posting abput flowers too. Who knows...its been some time. Anyways it doesnt matter.
I know about the discord channel, yeah...it's pretty dead. Romanians didnt stick to much on steemit and I wonder why is that. There are just a handful of them which I see on hive too like Alex Van and Gabriela Travels...
Thanks for the reply.
My name was the same on steemit, I have this account for four years now, but my profile photo was another as these punks I use for my profile were minted in December or November last year. Check (erikahfit) this profile photo, it may help you remember me 😁
There are more Romanians here, like steemmillionaire, triplug ( I see you're delegating to him, so you must know him 😀), dragosroua, cmmemes, creativemary to name a few. Quite a few have quit over the years, unfortunately :(
To be honest, slightly I remember your photo. For a reason, I remember well Erikah and flowers. Yeah, I know triplug. He's a friend of mine I introduced him to hive recently. There is also pixaroma I brought to hive and he's still posting. I know there are more, I just mentioned a few. I dont remember creativemary though, have to check her out. 😁
Ugh, More beautiful landscape of characteristic towns that I miss. The culturally anonymous cities being built up have been a huge mistake for the world. Where are the real architects!
Do you have to battle against the darkness depression when light is so limited? Northern Europe always seems to appealing other than that huge caveat
I am horrible at this during winter times. I have the time to go out, but I avoid the cold, so I just stay indoors most days. Very much not a good thing to do... During summers though, I'm out the door first thing to pick berries for my breakfast. And later in the day to pick the weeds 😅
Id say the cold air of Norway is a good substitute for Caffeine in the morning :)
Covid has exasperated staying in for me. The morning commute to work always got me out and usually involved a lot of walking. Since working from home has become the defacto I find myself getting less and less sunlight in the morning.
Absolutely. Getting out in the winter days is important for us Northerners. Having a dog helps 😀 forces you to get out and conveniently, in my case, it means that I get to see the sunrise. There's those that hate the winter and those that embrace it. Getting outside is a must. Love the shots and you are very lucky to have a nice park on your doorstep.