Five Reasons to Be a Night Owl
When I wrote my recent popular post, Five Reasons to Be A Morning Person, I could not have envisioned I would then go ahead and write the exact opposite article a week later. But alas, my mother had other ideas.
When she received my newsletter in her email inbox (you have signed up, haven’t you?) extolling the benefits of being a morning person, she reacted.
Quickly.
Seeking to defend her species (read: The Night Owl), she sent me a comprehensive list of five reasons to be a night owl. Since some of the comments on the the morning person post brought out such reactions from some of you, I’m hoping that my mother’s words will help everyone see the benefits of living like the other half.
Many folks who are well known as productive, influential leaders do swear by their late night hours. Not only because their bodies have them singing at such hours, but also because they – like my mother – believe that the quiet and stillness of those hours in particular leads to great work. (One recent might owl I stumbled across is professional blogger and podcaster Pat Flynn, of The Smart Passive Income Blog.)
Ultimately, many of my mother’s words focus on the exact sense of stillness and quiet that morning people generally believe is theirs. As I think we can all agree, night owls can have it also.
- You can take night walks and the air smells so good, like jasmine sometimes, and it very still outside with lots of stars.
- It is quiet in the house and you can read or watch late night talk shows and laugh a lot.
- It costs less to run your appliances at night like your washing machine and your dishwasher.
- The phone isn’t ringing.
- You don’t have to worry about people being nicer or not, because there are no people around.
If you’re a night owl, now’s your time to tell us how you create productivity in those night time hours. What do you do in the wee hours to get you on top of the next day?
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About Claire:
Claire Diaz-Ortiz (@claire) is an author, speaker, and advisor who was an early employee at Twitter. Named one of the 100 Most Creative People in Business by Fast Company, she holds an MBA and other degrees from Stanford and Oxford and has been featured widely in print and broadcast media. She writes a popular business blog at ClaireDiazOrtiz.com and is the author of eight books that have been published in more than a dozen countries.
Dirigeant chez Spar Holding
6 年Sorry I am very active and creative from 11 AM to 11 PM...
Executive Director, Clinical Services at Consana with expertise in change management, health informatics, and comprehensive medication management
6 年Night time is the right time...
Co-Founder, Director Of Operations at Wentworth Executive Recruiting | Co-Founder, Arrangr.com | Author, A Mindful Career
6 年Our national dogma around getting up early has been set for generations going back to Benjamin Franklin "Early to bed, early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise." (I guess women got to sleep in back then). The early risers are quick to point out all the benefits of getting up before the sun comes up. But when everyone else around you is an early riser it's often difficult to find that "quiet time" for reflection or to work on the book or blog or plan out the day. But when those same folks run out of steam around 9 pm and go to sleep, there is finally some quiet "alone" time. Like the few private minutes in the shower, night owls can work on planning their next day, write, read, watch some stress-relieving mindless TV, and do some uninterrupted thinking. We are all essentially programmed from birth: go to school, get a job, get married, have kids, buy the house, retire. This early rising thing is just another way we're programmed.