Stop Hitting the Snooze Button (3 Tips You Probably Haven’t Tried)

Hi, my name is Jimena Ramirez and I’m a behavior change coach and I’m the director of coaching and permanent strategy at Body Brain Alliance. 

 

Not snoozing your alarm or having a peaceful morning are actually some of the behaviors that we work on the most with our coaching clients, and I understand it’s not just the behavior of snoozing your alarm that feels annoying. 

 

It’s what comes after, which are the consequences of snoozing your alarm… 

You have a rush morning, you forget to do things, and you basically start off your day thinking that you don’t have it together.

 

Common Strategies That Don’t Work

 

Maybe you’ve used a number of tricks before, like putting your phone away before bed or using some apps to prevent snoozing. Or you have told your partner to not let you go back to bed, and yet you’re still engaging in this behavior. 

 

So I’m going to give you three tips to start working on this that you probably haven’t tried yet.

 

Three Tips to Stop Snoozing Your Alarm

 

1. Focus on Your Bedtime Routine

Number one, focus on your bedtime routine. Yep, I said what I said. I know that you’re here for all the morning tips. However, getting a solid seven hours of sleep at least is what we’re aiming for to make sure that you can prevent snoozing. 

 

If you have a baby or toddler or there is another circumstance that is preventing you from getting to bed at a time that allows you to get seven hours of sleep or to get consistent sleep, that is totally fine. We are talking about getting as many hours of sleep as possible and controlling what is within your control.

Disclaimer on Sleep Control

Now, a little disclaimer, consistently going to bed late because you still have pending work to do that you procrastinated on doing throughout the day… Or feeling like you’re not sleepy enough to go to bed or staying up streaming on your phone are not out of your control. 

 

*If you’re finding yourself in those situations, this might require you to work on building other skills around self-regulation or time management. We actually have a number of other blogs that are covering these topics, so be sure to search for them on the blog or our YouTube channel. 

2. Identify What You Can Look Forward To

Number two is identifying what you can look forward to and make your transition as easy as possible. Now, think about this. What is good about tomorrow? What can you look forward to? Can you maybe even go to bed painting this vivid picture, this clear idea on things that you can look forward to on the following day? And can you start a really enjoyable habit or transition out of bed in the morning?

Creating a Pleasant Morning Environment

This might entail identifying what is not pleasant about getting out of bed first so that you can actually do something about it. So maybe if it’s wintertime and it’s really cozy in your bed and you don’t want to leave your bed, maybe creating an environment that is actually cozier to move towards will help. Maybe that’s moving to the couch and covering yourself with a blanket and starting your morning slowly. Or making sure that coffee is waiting for you as soon as you wake up.

Personal Examples

To give you an idea of this, I can give you some examples in my own morning. One thing that I look forward to in the morning is breakfast because it’s my favorite meal. I usually have the same thing for breakfast since forever, and I really enjoy it. So I’m excited for that. 

 

I also like having a quiet morning. I like having time for myself in the morning and I’m usually the first one to wake up in my household. So that gives me enough time to create the type of morning that I like to have. I really look forward to that moment and I look forward to greeting my dogs and saying good morning to my dogs.

3. Work on Acceptance and Self-Talk

Number three tip to help you stop hitting the snooze button is to work on acceptance and self-talk. We have established that we are human beings, that we need a certain number of hours of sleep to function properly and to perform. Now, provided that you’ve had that much sleep, that you’re actually in a place where you can indeed function and feel good throughout your day.

Challenging Your Expectations

What are your expectations when you’re waking up? Are you expecting to feel super energized, not sleepy at all? Maybe you are making sleepy the condition that if you feel a certain way then you probably shouldn’t be getting out of bed? Are you finding yourself telling yourself that if you’re not fully ready and awake to take on the day, then you should go back to bed? 

Embracing Acceptance

Here is where I want to encourage you to lead with acceptance. If your brain is thinking that when you open your eyes and you still feel a little bit tired, then you should probably go back to bed, it’s probably anticipating that and it’s making decisions from that place. 

 

This is your chance to start changing that narrative. 

 

We can start with creating different thoughts. For example, you could tell yourself “It’s okay to feel tired. I’m going to give myself a few moments to wake up.” Try to think of it as a warmup.

 

Conclusion

Remember that snoozing is a cognitive habit that you have developed. It’s a way in which your brain is making a decision about waking up with a condition of not feeling sleepy. And as such, you can start changing that and realizing that we can feel sleepy and we can still wake up. 

 

We can choose to not snooze, get out of bed and test the water before we make further decisions.

 

If you need more information on how to create a morning routine or how to make your transition out of bed more pleasant and more aligned with your vision for yourself… Then check out our Meaningful Mornings Mini Course that specializes specifically on that. 

 

 

If you have any comments or thoughts or if you have any experiences that you’d like to share related to this topic, you’re welcome to drop that in the comments. We’d love to hear from you!

 

Thank you for reading, see you in the next one!