For years my problem wasn't falling asleep, it was waking at 3am and immediately doing the maths on how little sleep I had left, which just made it worse. The harder I tried to force it, the more awake I got.

What finally helped was CBT-i, the clinical approach for insomnia that sleep clinics use before they ever reach for medication. The counterintuitive part is it tells you to spend less time in bed, not more, so bed stops being the place you lie awake dreading. It genuinely rewired the 3am panic for me over a few weeks.

I felt strongly enough about it that my wife and I ended up building an app around it (Lunara), but honestly even if you never touch an app, look up CBT-i sleep restriction and stimulus control. It is the thing that worked when nothing else did.

One thing I would add, since CBT-i doesn't work for everyone. If it doesn't get you all the way there, the part I am most proud of is the report side. It pulls your real sleep data from Apple Health, Apple Watch, Oura and similar, and turns it into an accurate report you can actually hand to your GP or a sleep clinic, rather than trying to describe your sleep from memory in a ten minute appointment.

Happy to answer anything about what the process actually felt like.

Body: I have been struggling a lot lately with hitting snooze five times every morning no matter how early I go to sleep. A friend recommended getting one of those light alarms that slowly brighten up the room before the sound goes off.

For those of you who have tried them, did it actually make a difference long term or did you just end up getting used to the light and sleeping right through it? Would love to hear if it is worth trying out.

I have discovered this ability through dumb means years ago

There was some creepypasta challange that required thinking about an hour you want to wake up at. 3 am or something like that, then doing spooky ritual or whatever

But what stuck to me is that I actually woke up at the hour I was thinking about. It has something to do with an internal clock, cortisol and adrenaline release. Anticipating an hour sets that brain timer. Like thinking about the hour and how many hours are left until it approaches

Like I went to sleep at 11pm yesterday and willed to wake up at 5am. Woke up at 4:50. Feels like a mild panic

Fun to try. Human brain is weird

Why cant i just stop waking up

20mins till i clock in work and i'm still in bed

If you’ve tried a challenge-based alarm, what worked, what made you stop using it, and what do you wish it had?

Would walking challenges, personal vocabulary, collectibles, or competing with friends help, or is something else missing?

This feedback will shape Ember before launch: https://emberalarm.com

looking forward to what you guys have to say!

I have an iOS Shortcuts automation that automatically sets 250 additional alarms (each one minute apart) the instant my primary morning alarm goes off.

The only way to prevent these from going off (other than going into the Clock app and manually turning them all off) is to go downstairs and scan an NFC tag. When its scanned, another automation triggers which confirms the correct tag was scanned and if so, deletes all the alarms.

For the longest time, I genuinely thought I was lazy.

Every morning looked exactly the same.

Alarm.
Snooze.
Another alarm.
Snooze.
Then suddenly I'd wake up an hour later with absolutely no memory of turning off six alarms.

The weirdest part?

I wasn't making the decision consciously.

It felt like my body had learned how to silence alarms before my brain even woke up.

One morning I decided to record myself sleeping.

I wasn't expecting much.

Watching the recording later honestly shocked me.

I sat up.

Unlocked my phone.

Turned off the alarm.

Put the phone back.

Laid down.

Went right back to sleep.

My eyes were open.

But I wasn't really awake.

That completely changed how I thought about mornings.

The problem wasn't motivation.

It wasn't discipline.

It wasn't that I "didn't want it enough."

My brain simply wasn't online yet.

Since then, I've stopped asking myself, "How do I become more disciplined?"

Instead I ask:

"How do I make it impossible for my half-asleep brain to win?"

It's a much more useful question.

I'm still experimenting, but changing the question changed everything.

I built NoSnooze for myself, and it helped me wake up early every single morning. Let me know if you want to try it!

hi guys! looking for techniques on how to wake up from an alarm. everytime i google it says “place it across my room” but getting up after it goes off isn’t my problem, my problem is that i physically DONT WAKE UP.

for example, i had an alarm for today at 6:30am, i slept through it. until 1pm. snooze was still on. i’m a very deep sleeper, my friends have told me this, i even have a video on my phone of my friends physically screaming and shaking me to wake me up but i was practically dead 😭

IF I WAKE UP, i can stay awake, easy. i just can’t wake up in the first place 😭.
for some more perspective. last summer i ended up never being able to sleep to alarms so badly - bare in mind i WAS active and doing stuff during the day - that i literally inverted my sleep cycle. like as if i worked night shifts i was waking up at 8pm and going to sleep at 10am or some bullshit left my job because of it man LMAO im genuinely not exaggerating i cannot wake up no matter what happens. this genuinely happened because as i was waking up so late in the day bc my alarms weren’t waking me up it just progressively got worse and worse. looped right back around too to be normal again

so how tf do i wake up bc im a working person and I HAVE A LARGE PROBLEM HERE GUYS 💀💀 please give me tips i literally don’t know what to do anymroe

heres some things ive tried:

max volume ❌

sleeping with phone next to ear ❌

max vibration ❌

blinds completely open ❌

timed lights ❌

my cat being in the room so he sticks his claws into my face ❌ - WORKED ONCE in the probably 1000 times i’ve done this

atp i might as well get a bucket of water to fill and pour over my head but knowing me that probs wouldn’t work either.

Hi everyone! A while ago, I shared my technique for falling asleep. Today, I want to share the other side of the coin: my technique for waking up.

Here is how my morning routine looks, which I’ve developed through trial and error over 50+ years:

No snooze button: I wake up to my phone alarm and have trained myself never to hit snooze. I force myself to get up on the very first ring. I give myself this mental command right before falling asleep, so I truly believe that falling asleep and waking up are just two parts of the exact same process. Maybe there is a scientific explanation for this, but it’s just what works for me.

The 20-second pause: Right after getting up, I sit on the edge of the bed for 20–30 seconds with my eyes closed. I still feel sleepy, but this is the official start of my awakening. Mentally I am thinking about blood circulation in heart, brain. Sometimes if eel dizzy when wake up straight after alarm. So now I am no skipping this step.

No phone before breakfast: I used to immediately reach for my phone to check social media, but I recently decided not to look at it at all until after breakfast.

Mechanical routine: I go to the bathroom and then go straight into a routine that is so practiced it feels mechanical—I turn on the kettle and start brewing coffee. By this point, my brain is starting to function, though I’m still a bit grozy.

Healthy protein breakfast: I’ve trained myself to eat a healthy breakfast. Usually, it’s a one-egg omelet with milk, cooked without oil. Instead, I sprinkle salt directly onto the pan (I believe salt is healthy, or at least healthier than heating up butter on a pan). Don't get me wrong, I still love butter, but I eat it separately and just a little bit in the morning. I also eat one cucumber with my omelet.

Hydration first: Right before eating the omelet, I drink two mugs of warm water.

By the time I finish the omelet and sit down with my coffee, my mind is completely clear. That is the exact moment I finally open my phone to check the news and social media.

I wanted to share this because I’ve come to realize that good sleep isn't just about the night—it's about the whole day. Proper hydration, the right food, and physical exercise all play a massive role in how we sleep and wake up.

What does your morning routine look like? Does anyone else use the "mental setting" trick before sleep?

Sometimes I wake up WAY earlier than intended and feel properly awake, even if I’ve only had 3-5 hours of sleep. It takes a bit of effort but I can fall asleep, but then it’s hard to get up when my alarm goes off. Should I get up when I wake up at say, 5:30am like I did today and deal with the added sleep debt, or should I go back to sleep until 7:30?

so i’m a rising college freshman and i got my schedule back. i have a couple 8ams and i think it would be best for me to sleep from 10:30pm-ish to 6:30am each day. it’s the summer right now, and i’m trying to adjust to a 12am-8am sleep schedule. but i don’t go to bed on time, and then i sleep until like 5pm and it screws everything up. i set my alarms on my alarm clock, phone, and apple watch, but i just snooze them all and go back to sleep. should i try pulling an all-nighter tonight and go to bed at 12am tomorrow? what else can i do to fix my sleep schedule?

Hey everyone!

I'm a Year 11 Australian student completing a research project as part of my school VCE Extended Investigation research project and I'm looking for people aged 15 or over to complete a short, completely anonymous survey for my research.

The study explores how caffeine consumption relates to people's habits and behaviours, in beverages such as coffee, tea, energy drinks and other caffeinated beverages. The survey takes around 5-10 minutes to complete.

Participation is completely voluntary and anonymous. You'll find more information about the study, consent and how your responses will be used on the first page of the survey.

I'd really appreciate anyone who can spare a few minutes to help out!

Survey: https://forms.gle/57cKS6sGn4TEeCnA9

Thanks so much! 

Hey everyone,

Is it just me, or is the Bevel alarm snooze setting secretly working *against* us?

It looks like it’s locked at 9 minutes… which sounds reasonable in theory.
In reality? That’s enough time for me to fall back into a full-on dream, start a new life, and *still* not wake up.

I’m a heavy sleeper, so 9 minutes is basically a reset button on my sleep cycle. By the time it rings again, I’m deeper than before 😅

Has anyone figured out how to shorten it to like 3–4 minutes?
Or found a clever workaround that doesn’t involve buying a second alarm clock and placing it across the room?

Appreciate any tips before I accidentally sleep through my entire life 🙏

Every morning it’s a struggle to get out of bed all I want to do is keep sleeping, curled up with my dog. And once I’m actually up, I feel this complete lack of drive. Not in a literal dark sense I just have no energy and absolute no desire to do anything.

I can’t see the point of going to work or doing any of my tasks that I like or dislike. The only thing I genuinely want is to go back to sleep.

I’ve noticed that if I go to bed much earlier, the effect is weaker but I’d have to go to sleep like 9-10 hours before my alarm, which usually just isn’t realistic. Normally I sleep 6-8 hours, which in theory should be enough.

Does anyone else deal with this? Is there a way to fix it? I’d love to wake up with actual energy and motivation to do things.

I’ve tried no screens before sleeping, glass of water right after waking up, preparing everything (clothes and stuff) so I don’t have to think about it in the morning and since I have two dogs usually in the first hour after waking up I’m on a walk with them

I’ve been using Alarmy for a while now and loved it, but I was starting to be able to turn the alarm off in my sleep so I changed it to the option that makes you get up and take a photo of something to make the alarm stop. Anyways, alarm goes off this morning, I go to turn it off and it kept wanting me to take photos of my feet and toes, every time I refreshed it would just go back to toes, mouth, feet 😭
screenshots:
is this not kinda weird???

I used to sleep at around 1 AM and wake up at 8 AM. Recently, I decided to change my routine and become more productive, so I started going to bed at around 10 PM, hoping to wake up at 5 AM.

But somehow, even when I go to bed at 10 PM, I still end up waking up at 8 AM. That's almost 10 hours of sleep, and I don't understand why it's so difficult for me to get out of bed earlier.

I've tried setting multiple alarms on two different phones and placing them in different spots around my room so that I'd have to physically get up to turn them off. But even after doing all that, I still can't consistently wake up at 5 AM.

The main reason I want to fix my sleep schedule is that I'm planning to join a gym and work out early in the morning. I also want to have a more disciplined and productive start to my day.

i’m thinking this might help me get up from some sunlight entering my window. but i’d want the blinds to be up before i wake, not controlled by my voice nor a remote. all im seeing is things like amazon alexa pairing or remote controlled blinds. anyone know where i can find something automatic?

I am a night owl through and through. I have tried waking up in the morning multiple times. I have tried so many things. I put multiple alarms, I wake up close all alarms and sleep again, I tried the puzzle alarm app but after completing the puzzle, i go back to sleep. I tried keeping my phone far so I have to get outta the bed to get it but after closing it, I still come back to bed. Sometimes I even go as far as getting up, brushing teeth, washing face and then back to bed again. Anyone has any better idea I can follow? 🙂