Sleep When I’m Dead
I watched a short video podcast of Ramit Sethi and Tim Ferris discussing productivity and time-management.
The very first piece of advice they both gave was, “Go with what comes naturally. If you’re a morning person…do your work in the morning. If you’re a night person…do you work at night.”
I was instantly at ease when I heard this.
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I’ve been a night owl since I was 11 years old. When I was younger I was a pretty serious gymnast. I worked out 5 days a week, for 3 hours. Usually I’d come home around 8:00pm. I would eat dinner on the car ride back from the gym and then immediately start doing my homework once I got home.
Since I’m an incurable Virgo, I would usually stay up well past midnight getting everything done.
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Speaking of Virgos…I once got my fortune told by a man who could look into your eyes and tell you your exact birthdate.
Surprisingly, he got my birthday on point. Month. Day. Year. (I’m still debating whether he stole my wallet and checked my license…but part of me wants to believe he really was magical).
Anyway, after he successfully told me when I was born I said, “Ya know…I think maybe my mom lied to me. I don’t think I was born then. I’m nothing like a Virgo.”
The fortune teller asked me why I didn’t think I was a Virgo.
I went into a long explanation about how Virgos were perfectionists and I wasn’t. In fact, I told him, I’m a complete failure. I don’t do anything perfectionlly. I fuck everything up. I gave him examples. Lots of examples.
Finally the fortune teller told me to stop.
He smiled and said, “You are most definitely a Virgo.”
I looked at him. Confused.
“Only a perfectionist would waste an hour of my life telling me how imperfect she is.”
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Where was I going with this??
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Ah, yes. I’m a night owl.
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I’ve been trying to fight this “night owl” persona for quite some time.
In college, I always envied the girls who got up at 5:00am and went to the gym. I was usually still awake by 5:00am.
I would see these morning birds in the cafeteria. They always took showers. They always blow dried their hair. They always wore real clothes…by which I mean non-elastic waste pants. Real deal pants. Jeans even.
They always seemed superior to me, somehow.
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I think the reason I’m a night owl is because I have to be in a state of complete exhaustion in order to write.
When you’re exhausted…you become impatient with the part of your brain that fears sounding stupid. You write fast so you can go to bed and put the day behind you. And for some reason…my best writing is always produced like that.
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I bring this up because I’m briefing a bunch of cases for this oral advocacy competition I’m doing next week…and suddenly all of the cases are making a lot of sense.
I looked at these same cases during the day and literally thought I had lost my ability to read. Nothing was clicking.
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It occurred to me just now that this blog is becoming exactly what I feared that it would become.
A diary.
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Remember how Doug Funny used to have a diary…but he called it “Journal.”
I wonder if he did that because he thought “journal” sounded more manly.
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Manly like,
Me
