no timer on timing

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chance, perfect timing, photos, quote, sleep, snooze, time, timing

As I have an early class today this morning everything is down to the perfect timing. After all I didn’t want to sacrifice those precious extra minutes of snoozing in my warm cozy bed.

So yesterday as I set the alarm I worked out how many minutes I needed for the different morning activities: getting dressed, brushing my teeth, breakfast, packing my school-bag (I’ve owned a lovely leather satchel since my first year in secondary school), make tea and walk to the bus-stop.

But when I woke up this morning I realized that perfect timing is something you really just can’t work out. Life is not an egg, that you can let boil till it is exactly the way you like it, in my case the white hard the yoke soft and creamy, but life is a little bit trickier than that. After all we can’t calculate the trips and bumps that we encounter on a day-to-day basis.

But while I was contemplating the matter of timing while sipping my tea I realized that it is exactly those minutes we can’t plan that make life exciting and interesting. Bumping into that cute guy on the bus could mean meeting your future partner, or sitting in traffic may end up with you having a life-changing idea,  meeting an old friend could give you that little bit of “friendly  gossip” that makes you smile or send a much needed compliment our way, and reading “just one more blog” may just make you happy, think or even give you exactly the information you were looking for.

So with all that said time is running out for me this morning and I need to get going and hope that timing is with me today. But as you can’t set the timer on timing, and you never know what the day will bring I will follow some unknown thinkers advice:

Don’t wait for the perfect timing, take the time and make it perfect

The World Time Clock in Berlin- different places different times.

Max Richter at the National Concert Hall

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classical music, Dublin, film music, Kafka, Max Richter, music, National Concert hall, quotes, sleep

Yesterday a good friend whisked me off to the National Concert Hall to experience the music of Max Richter. This German-born composer grew up in England and is possibly best known for the stunning score he composed for Shutter Island (On the Nature of Daylight) and his scores for the TV series The Leftovers.

We had front row seats and the ebb and flow of a mix of classical and contemporary music washed over us without any barriers. The violins lamented and soared, the cellos moaned and exalted, the piano sang, hummed and often led the way.

The concert started with The Blue Notebooks, inspired by Kafka, and the  words of Kafka led into imagined worlds of sound. After a short break we were treated to 90 minutes of Sleep. Max Richter calls it an eight hour long lullaby or cradle song and while listening it is easy to see why. Sleep is an exploration of the unconscious, which both music and sleep are doors into. The melting of strings and wordless vocals in a high, clear soprano, with the piano echoing, conjured up dreams and gave flight to the imagination.

It was a wonderful night out and the experience will linger with me for a while, just like the notes played lingered in the air.

Music is a moral law. It gives soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, and charm and gaiety to life and to everything.

Plato

early rising and sunshine

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alarm, early rising, getting up, mornings, sleep, sleep cycle, stages of sleep, sunshine

It is so much easier to get up when you are woken by sunny skies. This morning the sun tickled my nose before the alarm went off and I enjoyed a few minutes stretching in bed.

Being woken in this gentle way is not only much better for us but seems to be the way nature intended it to be. Loud ringing, buzzing or screeching alarms are not only really annoying they are also not good for us as they often interrupt us during our deep sleep and REM phases. Since our bodies are designed to wake up in our light phases of sleep, either before or after an REM, if we are pulled out of our deep sleep we feel groggy and tired. It also means that we start the day with or bodies already feeling stressed.

There are actually five stages of sleep in a cycle, and each sleep cycle is about 90 minutes long. The first two stages are considered light , the next two (three and four) are deep and the final stage is REM ((rapid eye movement), in which you dream. It is fine when you are woken up out of the first two stages of sleep, you feel rested and  good – that is why short naps work – but once you are pulled out of one of the last three stages it’s a different story. You will feel more tempted to press the snooze button and long for more time in bed.

That is why it is always better to allow your body to wake up naturally – even if it is early – you will feel more rested for the rest of the day and you won’t feel drained or stressed before you’ve had your breakfast. And of course everything is better when the sun is shining!

getting up is hard to do

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early rising, getting up, morning routines, mornings, routines, sleep, waking-up

Being more like an owl than a lark, early rising doesn’t come naturally to me. I’d rather stay up until well after the sun has set than get up with the sun rise. But since I don’t really have a choice I try and make the most of getting up early in the morning.

So when I recently read a few interesting tips (thejournal.ie) that are meant to help you get up easily I decided to give a few of them a go:

• Don’t hit snooze – now I like those few extra minutes huddled up under the duvet before I have to get up but sleep expert Timothy Morgenthaler says that’s not a good idea. By hitting snooze we are in risk of falling back asleep and since we won’t be able to finish that sleep cycle we end up feeling more groggy and less rested.
• Stretch, don’t curl up – I don’t know about you but when the alarm goes off my instinct is to curl up tight but, according to psychologists, that is counter productive. If you stretch as wide as you build up confidence making your start to the day happier, less stressed.
• Put the light on – I know it can hurt to flick the switch and let the glare hit your sleepy eyes, but by getting up and ready in the dark our bodies still think it’s nighttime and put up a  fight. A bright light suggests daytime and helps us wake up.
• Make your bed – now I have always done this and now studies have shown that people who make their bed in the morning tend to be more productive throughout the day. The presumed reason behind this is, that making your bed is a ‘keyhole habit’. According to author Charles Duhigg these keyhole habits spake chain reactions of productive habits, so by making your bed your more like to do more throughout the day.
• Stick to a routine – scientists say we only have  a limited amount of willpower per day and we spend by making decisions. So if we have to make up our minds what to do next early in the morning we have less of it for later on in the day. However if we stick to a routine we don’t waste willpower but save it up for more important tasks throughout the day.

Now I only hope by sticking to these rules, as best I can, my early morning starts will be that bit easier and my days maybe more productive and happier.

a long grey day

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feeling tired, grey clouds, grey skies, sleep, snooze, sun, weather

This morning the sun isn’t coming out to play and grey skies a looking down gloomily from above. With a long day ahead of me I can’t help but feel a little bit tired already.

And when  I look at my calendar with all the appointments and events marked in with pencil I already know the week will stretch, like a rubber-band, with very little time for sleep. But after my gift of time yesterday I suppose I shouldn’t complain.

But when the days are grey and the sun seems to be having a bit of time off, you can’t help but feel a little bit sapped of energy. It’s as if the world is on snooze, a stand-by mode that keeps things ticking over, but not really working to it’s highest capability.

However it is only March and we will hopefully have a long sunny summer ahead of us (according to the New Zealand weather Guru Ken Ring it will be sunnier than average but not a scorcher like two years ago).

And since it is just the beginning of spring, maybe all those hidden flower bulbs and seeds simply need a little bit more resting time before they fill our world with vivid colours. And hopefully by then the sun will have waken up from it’s slumber and filled our spirits with sunny joy.

But for today I will just drink some strong coffee to waken me up, keep as active as I can to keep myself from dozing and hope that I can crawl in to bed a little earlier tonight, restful sleep preparing me for tomorrow even if the forecast does say the grey clouds are here to stay.

 

dark mornings

Tags

morings, quotes, sleep, thoughts, William Arthur Ward, winter

Opening your eyes in the morning and only seeing darkness doesn’t make pushing away the covers and clambering out bed any easier. But get up we must, even into darkness.

I have been trying to get into a new rhythm, I naturally lean towards late nights so getting up early isn’t always an enjoyable event And since I don’t do a 9-5 job my schedule is a little bit fleeting, time-slots scattered around my calendar like footprints in the snow.

But with 2015 nearly two weeks old I decided I wanted to try and go to bed  a little bit earlier and greet the day a tad sooner too. I thought that ,maybe, be creating a more regular timeline I might be able to get more done. And I have to say I have been enjoying the extra time I have in the morning.

An extra cup of tea and an unhurried approach to the new day ahead does seem to change how I step out into the world and close the door behind me. But I do have to admit it hasn’t quite steeped in to my subconscious and the dark mornings that greet me aren’t making it easier.

This morning I did linger a little longer under the covers, the cold night still clinging on to the world not really luring me up and out. But since the nights are slowly getting shorter and daylight is creeping in earlier I hope, in time, that too shall change.

And I have to admit there is a certain magic to being awake when the rest of the world is still hidden in darkness.

Opportunities are like sunrises. If you wait too long you miss them.

Author William Arthur Ward

deep dreams

Tags

Calvin S. Hall, dreaming, dreams, Oscar Wilde, psychology, psychology of dreams, quote, REM atonia, REM sleep, sleep, sleep paralysis

I didn’t want to wake up this morning. I was so comfy in my bed and a wonderfully vivid dream captured my attention, luring me away from the day, holding me  captive to the night.

It wasn’t any special kind of dream, but it felt like being inside a novel, a story I would enjoy to read. I could feel my feet as they ran barefoot over grass, I even believe I could smell the sun on the flowers.

As I curled up in my bed, my eyes tightly shut my thoughts thoroughly occupied, sounds from outside drifted in through my window, pulling me away from my imagination, into reality. And as I slowly let go of my dream and turned towards the day I felt a little sad, knowing that world I was just in would be lost forever.

Dreams are wonderful things and we all have them, even those who claim not too. But they are funny things as we don’t really know all to much about them.

An average dream can be anywhere between 5-20 minutes long which means we spend about six years of our lives dreaming. So why can’t we seem to hold on to them, remember them? Well, for one thing brain scans taken while people were asleep show that the frontal lobes, the area that plays a key role in memory formation, are inactive during our REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep, our deep sleep.

Another interesting fact about REM sleep is that we are sort of paralyzed while we dream. This phenomenon is knows as REM atonia and prevents us from acting out our dreams, this just really means that our motor neurons aren’t stimulated, ensuring our body doesn’t move, protecting us.

The freaky thing is that this paralyzes can carry over into our waking state. For as  long as ten minutes someone who has awakened from a dream can feel unable to move, this condition is know as sleep paralysis, and can be frightening but should soon pass.

An American psychologist called Calvin S. Hall did research over a period of more than forty years and collected over 50,000 dream accounts from students. The surprising result of these dream accounts is that people tend to experience more negative emotions than positive ones. Why this is, is a little unclear but many researchers believe that this helps us tackle stress.

But the most interesting dreams are the lucid ones, dreams that we can influence and that we are aware of. These are dreams we direct and often remember, but only half of all people can recall at least one instants where they were able to control their dream and only few experience them quite frequently. I seem to be one of these lucky ones.

But for now I am awake and will make the best of the day, maybe wander down to an antiques fair in a little while, or take a stroll on the beach, happy in the knowledge that dreams don’t seem to run out and await us all when we close our eyes at night.

A dreamer is one who can only find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world.

Oscar Wilde

 

sleep-robbing alarms

Tags

alarms, neighbours, sleep, sleeplessness

I was finally able to sleep last night, and what a long good sleep it was. The reason for my past sleepless nights has been an ongoing alarm across the road.

On Thursday afternoon it started, a high-pitched ringing sound that vibrates through the body. For some reason, unknown to me, the neighbours intruder alarm had triggered. Of course I thought it would soon be turned off but as the hours ticked along the shrill ringing started to grate on my nerves.

As night approached and all the noise of the day calmed down it amplified leaving me tossing and turning in my bed, trying to sleep but my ears just couldn’t tune the blaring out.  When Friday morning arrived I was vexed and annoyed, tired and not really myself. Since my neighbours obviously weren’t home, but I did knock just in case they were deaf, I called the alarm company to no avail. After several left messages and emails I decided it was time to take a different route so I called the Gardi, the Irish police.

But I didn’t find help here either. They told me that all they could do is check the property for any signs of intrusion but wouldn’t, couldn’t, turn the alarm off. The next step, suggested by the Gardi, was to call the Dublin City Council, but here too help was limited. They told me I could file a complaint for noise pollution but it would take  a minimum of seven days before they would, could, do anything and even so it didn’t mean the alarm would be shut off.

As the earsplitting noise was getting too much to bear and I couldn’t stand to be at home and wasn’t sleeping I tried to stay away from my home as much as possible. This made me even more annoyed as I had just dropped my New Zealand friend off at her new abode and finally had my home to myself.

But thankfully when I arrived home late last night he sleep-robbing alarm had finally been turned off. I couldn’t believe it and when I curled up in bed, my nerves gave a sigh of relief and after three sleepless nights I was able to sleep!

wee small hours

Tags

BBQ, dreams, Frank Sinatra, music, sleep, Wee Small Hours of the morning

The sun has gone up and the street-BBQ has come to an end. After a night filled with chat, neighbours, friends, food, drink and even some live music it is finally time to give into the wee small hours of the morning and go to bed.

So while the first early risers start to stir in their beds and the morning beckons them back into being, I will drift off into the land of dreams for a few wee hours.

It is 5am, more morning than night, a new day waiting, filled with promise under the pink haze of the sun awakening. But I will let the tinted light soften my reality and cushion my sleep. And while I rest I leave you with Frank Sinatra and his “Wee Small Hours of the Morning”

after-hours mutant

Tags

after-hours mutant, Fbxl3, genetics, late night owl, late nights, miscellaneous, random, science, sleep, thoughts

It’s way past my bedtime but I am still in the throws of preparing classes, organising notes and doing some filing while I am at it. Now this may seem excessive to some but I am a night owl and enjoy the past midnight hours, the quite of the night, the dark skies filled with dancing stars or eerie clouds and my mind free to run wild.

Sadly I can’t often give in to my witching hour desires because convention demands a daytime working schedule. But every now and then I willingly pay the price of lack of sleep to let my nightly surge of energy out.

What I didn’t know till quite recently is that 50% of this nighttime urge of mine could be down to genetics. A study from 2007 by the Mammalian Genetics Unit in Harwell, Oxfordshire, the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Hills Road, Cambridge and the New York University School of Medicine, USA found that in some cases there is a mutation on the gene Fbxl3, which is linked to the circadian cycle (24hours), and this mutation allows the carriers to have a cycle of about 27hours opposed to the standard 24hours. The scientists named this abnormality aptly the “after-hours mutant” and somehow it makes me think of the X-Men.

So while I sadly do not have the ability to read thoughts, move objects with my mind, change my appearance to match the wall-paper nor can I fly run very fast or turn things into ice or fire, but I do seem to tolerate late nights extremely well.

Further research into night owls and early morning larks has shown mixed result but it does tickle my ego a little to know that on average the nightly mutant tends to be more intelligent and creative, even though the larks get better grades and are more successful in their chosen careers.

With that in mind I better get back to clearing my desk as I do have to get up tomorrow and teach all day, which I can do on little sleep but find hard to do on none at all.

Somewhere here mine could look a little funny

So You Are A ‘Nightowl’? The After-Hours Gene Might Be The Reason Why