Adjusting your schedule to your biological clock

photo credit: Kirstea

I’m heading to the gym as soon as this post is published, and while I feel really annoyed at the fact that I have had to move most of my day forward and around (and even pushing some work to tomorrow, Saturday), I feel really strongly about maintaining my exercise regime. I have noticed that, whenever I don’t exercise in the morning, my body is weaker and I want to sleep more, but not to replenish my body. This sleep feels – how do I say it? – unhealthy. I used to be a night owl, and since coming back full time to university-level teaching last year, I switched back to mornings.

The “switch back to mornings” has worked really well, but due to the massive amount of work I need to get done before my Mom arrives in Vancouver (on June 23rd, for a whole month), I have been really stressed and (contrary to what I expected), I have been waking up a bit later (around 6:45am, when normally I’d be up by 5:00am). Also, I’ve been attending a lot of media events, so that’s also contributed to my exhaustion.

What I do when this happens (unless I am teaching early in the morning) is – I just adjust my schedule to my biological clock. So for example, if today I exercise from 9-10am (and Friday is one of my flexible-teaching-days), I will not have a full-on breakfast and just have a snack, and then eat lunch at 12:00, then continue with my work and take a deserved break at 4:30pm for a few drinks.

If your schedule is flexible, I’d suggest that you adjust it to your biological clock. I know that I am needing more sleep this week, and instead of being groggy and forcing myself out of bed and go to the gym at 6:00am, I am letting my body relax and just work through this period of increased sleep in the mornings. Which, as I said is kind of surprising. The sun is rising at 5:00am and setting at 9:00pm!

Be Sociable, Share!