Getting up before 6am everyday for a week.
Are you an early riser? If you are, do you do it on purpose or is it for work? If you're not, do you wish you were or do you have a more productive time?
These are the questions I am wondering about other people as I sit here at 6.30am on a Sunday morning waiting for an Asda delivery order that is due to arrive between 6-8am. I had no issue picking this slot as I tend to be awake by 6am everyday anyway.
Please bear in mind I really don't need to to get up this early, I don’t actually need to get up for work as an architectural assistant till 7am.
My body just does this.
Photo by Julian Hochgesang on Unsplash
I have always been able to wake up early and in the past, especially during university I would use that time well, literally waking up and moving straight over to my desk to write, work on my project etc. In the past year or so however I have seen it as more of a curse and have basically wasted the time usually just on my phone watching tik-tok videos or ‘thinking’ about all the stuff I need to do for an hour wishing I was asleep.
This makes absolutely no sense, I know it doesn’t and I am missing out on at least an hour of possible productivity time a day, 5 hours a week! What I should be doing is using that time wisely to be more productive and get ready for the day or week. So that’s what I am doing to do for the week. I am going to aim to get out of bed by 6am every weekday this week and do at least an hour of work on my desktop computer before I get ready for work. Enjoy the struggle journey!
Monday
So I woke up at 5.30am this morning and was at my desk by 5.50. I run a tiny Etsy store focusing on paper gifts that had an order due to be delivered today so I got that done, printed and packed. I really wanted to get some work done on my PEDR sheets today but I also wanted to increase chance of sales and a bit of extra money coming in so I updated my Etsy store page, uploaded a new listing to replace one of my best sellers that was taken down (very annoying) and started a new print design. For me Etsy is one of those things where you put a bit of work in for a few hours/days however long and then once it’s listed the workload is just fulfilling orders as and when they come in. It works for me!
So that was Monday, fulfilled an order and opened up opportunities for more in the future. Tomorrow and perhaps Wednesday my focus needs to be on a Studio Tutor presentation that I need to get done and sent across to the university for midday Wednesday. So I guess PEDR focus will have to wait until Thursday morning.. Not ideal but they’ll get done!
Tuesday
Woke up at about the same time as yesterday according to my Fitbit App (Would highly recommend it) but got to my desk a lot earlier which was good! As mentioned, the plan this morning was to make a good start on the slides for my tutor talk at the university and then finish on Wednesday. The talk will be under the theme ‘Light and Shadow’ and since I designed a tunnel through some hills in Italy for my final Masters project, I found my portfolio so that I could take some inspiration from the precedents I researched to get light into the underground spaces.
I spent a bit too much time just looking through my old work critiquing layouts, white space, fonts, photo quality..as you do but found the development book I was looking for and got set up on my desk to start the PowerPoint. After about 30 mins of researching, choosing content and laying out the slides, I decided to take a little break and check my university emails for any word from the principal lectures/tutors. There was an email, and it said I needed to get the slides sent over by next week Wednesday rather than this Wednesday. Unfortunately for me this meant that I didn’t need to do it now and in true ‘Aliya can only work to a deadline’ fashion, I turned off my computer and chilled for the remaining 20 minutes I had before getting ready. -_- Tomorrow I will do better.
Wednesday
I didn't do better. I did not do better at all, in the slightest. I have been so so tired this week, whether it's due to a particularly busy week, driving into work everyday or just getting up early in the morning. I have not got a clue but this morning I basically stayed in bed until I needed to get up at about 7ish. Now was this a waste of time? Perhaps, but I think this was my body telling me I needed more sleep and sometimes whether I like it or not, rest is needed.
As a student I definitely did not listen to my body telling me I needed to sleep or take a rest or even to eat healthier. I worked towards a deadline and filled my body with unhealthy snacks to give me the energy I needed to get through the next hour or 2 of work. That sort of lifestyle is not something I recommend at all, and if I could I would reach out of this post and get you to look me in the eyes and promise me you won’t go down that road, I would. It is something I am still working on and in some ways I am glad that I was able to listen to my body today, I do however need to find a balance. The work ethic of me as a student with the knowledge and wisdom that I guess that I have now.
I did however make lunch this morning and do some light tidying around the house before I left which was good! I am not entirely sure what my expectations for tomorrow morning are to be honest. I actually assumed that my ‘unproductive morning’ would be Thursday as it’s my day at the university as a Studio Tutor and I don’t have to get up as early. I will see how I feel!
Photo by Tim De Pauw on Unsplash
Thursday
Thursdays are studio day which means I leave the house an hour later than the other 4 days, at about 9am. This should technically mean that I have 3 full hours to be productive… I was however still very tired this morning and subsequently did not use my time wisely which is annoying. I did get up to my desk which is progress and contributes to the new habit i am trying to create but I mostly did some bullet journal organising and sketched out some ideas for Etsy so I was not as productive as I wanted to be, doing something that I technically shouldn’t be doing. A very short reflection today as I feel like I didn’t do enough to reflect on tbh :/
Friday
The past 2 days of a bit of extra sleep plus some good days at work put me in a much better mood today and I felt like I had a lot more energy which is what i like! I got up at about 6.30 (I can’t believe I now consider that a lay in now) and worked on another Etsy order to send off today. I design my prints for Etsy so that I can just input data into a template so it took about 10ish mins to create the print and package , ready to be sent off. I had about 30ish mins to spare so I decided to sketch some more new ideas out and play around on Photoshop. I still didn’t get any PEDR work done and my presentation slides for my university studio talk are still pending.
Photo by David Travis on Unsplash
So, what have I learnt?
Well for starters, something I technically already know is that I procrastinate unless I am working towards a deadline. I am sure a lot of people do this but if I know something will take me 7 hours to do, I will leave it until I have 7 hours of free time left, give or take a couple of hours. This is something I desperately want to change as I know I can be a lot more productive with everything I am doing, my PEDR sheets, archistudentnotes content & my small Etsy business.
Another thing I learnt was how hard it is to actually get out of bed and do something productive. I thought because I woke up early that I was automatically a morning person. Don’t get me wrong, I know I am but I am very out of practice. My mornings for far too long have been centered around my bed and my phone and this week taught me that it's going to take time and a lot of dedication to break that habit.
I also learnt and can see from my posts how my energy drops throughout the week. My posts paragraphs Monday-Wednesday were a lot longer and I felt more energetic throughout the day. I knew I was tired on Thursday but even though I said I had more energy, I could see by how I was writing how tired I was.
What was interesting this week was how much time I spent doing tasks for my Etsy business. I have barely touched anything to do with Etsy for weeks if not months, fulfilling the odd order here and there but nothing major. If I’m honest the reason why I gravitated to Etsy stuff this week is partly because I had 2 orders to fulfil but also because I started my little business from my desk during lockdown and having dedicated time there again meant, in my head, that I could get back to doing more for Etsy. Difference now though is that I am working as an Architectural Assistant and I have my PEDR sheets to complete. This NEEDS to be my priority for the next week and well I guess 18 months of my life.
That is the end of this post and I want to thank you for reading! If you have any tips please write them in the comments and please let me know if you want to read more of these ‘challenges’.
Thank you,
Aliya :)
