Getting out of bed in the morning.

Seriously guys.

Okay, stop what you’re doing. Think about this for a moment.

Getting.

Out of bed.

In the morning.

…

What the FUCK.

Do you like it? Do you like this horrible thing we do? Why, WHY do we do this? I’ll tell you right now, it’s not programmed into us. Our evolution has not included millions of years of being awoken before we are ready. This is a relatively new thing to our kind, and it is so cruel!

Every fiber of my being shrieks in agony at waking. My skin feels so perfect against the sheets. Far better than it does against my clothes at any time of day, or even the same sheets when I go to bed at night. The act of making my limbs push me up into a sitting position, then feet on the floor, then standing and walking…it is knives in my soul.

Did I get enough sleep the night before? Well, yes, yes I did. I mean, often times I don’t. But even if I did, this morning thing is still experienced as a grim atrocity. I even wake my old dog and make him get out of bed too, if only to force him to share the pain. He doesn’t like getting up either.

I think that the haziness and forgetfulness that shrouds our sleep and hangs over the first minutes of our waking time obscures the profound hatred we feel for this act every day. We complain about it, sure, but I think we would complain a whole lot more if we were fully awake when it happened. An unjustifiable agony, visited on us each morning, only to be marginalized and compartmentalized by a still-rousing mind.

Ever notice how much easier it typically is to wake up without the aid of an alarm? Yet if you get just as much sleep but are awoken by something, the horror returns. I know people who will literally punch anyone who attempts to wake them.

Years ago a friend of mine was driving in his car and listening to a local radio station when they broadcast the sound of a typical alarm clock going off. The sudden instinctual response to destroy the clock (vaguely in the direction of the snooze button, but nothing is off-limits to this kind of rage) caused him to strike at his car radio with his hand, confused by what he was doing. So focused on stopping that sound was he that he struggled to keep control over his moving vehicle.

The sound of the alarm clock is absolute anathema to our subconscious.

I think that ancient humans slept until they woke up on their own. They also were physically active all day and probably went to bed exhausted, and had many important things to occupy daylight with and so went to bed at a reasonable time and woke early on their own. But I don’t think we evolved to wake with an alarm of any kind. We’re too slow, too groggy, too full of vicious hate upon being woken. It’s unnatural, I say.

There is this idea that folks whose biorhythms make them more effective at night may have descended from humans who were stationed to be awake at night. Guards, watchmen. Perhaps portions of a clan slept at night, and some during the day. Would make room for sleeping as long as you need. After all, sleeping as much as is needed will make you healthier and more effective. Seems a nice idea, that my tiredness in the morning is assignable to human evolution. Or maybe I just like attributing my disgust at the screeching alarm clock (and subsequent irresponsible sleeping in) to a convenient biological excuse.

Have you figured out a way to mitigate the awfulness? I mean, if you’re a morning person, this really isn’t for you. Thanks for reading but, yeah, I don’t get you man. And if you’re a morning person who also tends to fall asleep at like 9PM, we’re basically as different as people can get. I live my whole LIFE in a world you don’t know about.

Share your secrets!

P.S. There’s an alarm clock that vibrates your junk instead of screaming at you. Could this be the answer we’re all looking for?