DEV Community

Cover image for Why you should be a "Night Owl"
Austin French
Austin French

Posted on

Why you should be a "Night Owl"

1. You get more time in the day

OK, the amount of time you are awake, and in the day would be roughly equal. But your productive hours are when everyone else is asleep.

2. You get a sense of achievement

Knowing that you use the hours best for you, regardless of what "office hours" generally are.

4. You get a proud feeling that while most of the world is sleeping, you are working. This feeling is really good for your morale💯

5. 🌸You'll feel better about yourself🌸

If you are a night owl, being on your schedule is great! Going grocery shopping at 10pm or 6am is a great experience!

6. You’ll Have a Better Chance at Completing your tasks💯

A happy well rested self, is going to get more done with a higher degree of quality.

7. You can also just take it slow

With all the morning plebs sleeping, you can buckle down and write code, strategize, and not get sucked into as meetings.

8. 💝Some health benefits 💝

Ok, the science here isn't great for us night owls. Hopefully it's correlative. But the Gym is generally empty between 11pm and 4am!

And although studies say our health tends to be worse, we also tend to have more creativity, endurance, and better reasoning skills!

9. 😆Some funny (and possibly sarcastic) reasons 😆

You can talk about it on social media.
Internet speed is usually faster in the middle of the night.

You can brag about being awake all night, getting stuff done.

Serious Talk

This is a joke of a response to: https://dev.to/nirbhayvashisht/waking-up-early-in-the-morning-how-and-why-1eem

Us night owls get a lot of crap for our chronotype. It isn't easy being tired all day, and then once the sun sets getting a burst of energy.

Unfortunately, when the world was figuring out how to run businesses, factories, and schools; some jerks with money and power chose to slot us all into the great lie about the greatness of early risers. Multiple shifts would be better IMO.

My suggestion: Do what works for you, if you can. And always push for flexible hours. Even if you are a morning person!

And finally, Nirbhay Vashisht offers some great advice for us all! Whatever your schedule is, make it a schedule. A consistent bedtime and wake-time each day will help your route immensely. For me, the perfect bedtime is about 7am (when my real life allows it)

Top comments (16)

Collapse
 
nicolaerario profile image
Nicola Erario • Edited

I only agree with point number 3.

Collapse
 
ben profile image
Ben Halpern

lol

Collapse
 
athomsfere profile image
Austin French

I'll take some lulz

Collapse
 
phantas0s profile image
Matthieu Cneude

I think early risers are better because they rise early. The sun rise early too, and it does a great deal of stuff, like keeping us alive. It's quite nice, and I think early risers enlighten their peers. After all, it's a question of discipline and will and habits and personal purpose, like I have, and you don't.

I think as well that OOP is better than FP, that space is better than tab, and that static type checking is better than dynamic type checking.

It's quite scientifically proved, but I lost the link to the studies. It's behind a paywall, anyway.

Collapse
 
athomsfere profile image
Austin French

It's a bit presumptuous to assume you have any characteristics I don't because of our circadian rhythms being different.

There have been GREAT people who were night owls. Obama, Carl Jung...

We also have to consider perhaps on the reasons we might have "night owls". Our very distant ancestors were nocturnal. Perhaps we have vestigial night owls because of that.

Collapse
 
phantas0s profile image
Matthieu Cneude

What I regret the most with Internet is the difficulty to be ironic.

I'm sorry. My post was a total joke. I don't think anybody is better because they work the morning. It's a false debate which has no sense to me.

What I think is: learn to know how you work and don't listen to anybody telling you how to do stuff without experimenting for yourself.

Thread Thread
 
athomsfere profile image
Austin French

This! lol.

Yes, that was my goal with the post. Whatever works for anyone is exactly what they should be doing!

I mean, I knew spaces over tabs just had to be a joke ;)

Collapse
 
Sloan, the sloth mascot
Comment deleted
Collapse
 
athomsfere profile image
Austin French

Yes, that was my final point actually. We all have "chronotypes" or our own circadian rhythm. I think it's something like 20% of us are "wired" to be night owls.

So while one might be on a cusp of say a morning person, and a mid-day person and a little discipline can override that person's natural cycle. There are people like me who can spends years trying to adapt to a "morning" routine and it sucks, everyday, for years. A week of a little freedom though and I snap to a night routine without issue.

Messing with my internal rhythms means: waking up early.

Collapse
 
Sloan, the sloth mascot
Comment deleted
 
athomsfere profile image
Austin French

It certainly can be harder with all of life happening around you. Lucky for me, I can sleep almost anywhere, anytime.

As for the 20%, it was from memory. I tried to find a current, relevant post for you however:

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3...

It's far from exactly what I had in mind though, as the demographics are pretty slim.

Collapse
 
athomsfere profile image
Austin French

I gotta say, as much as I am a night person... I'm also a summer / outdoors person. Kayaking at night would not be a great experience! Although, 20 miles on a bike at night is fine! It's also a blast at sundown for me.

Collapse
 
mhhashemian profile image
M-H Hashemian

I had not looked at it that way. 👌

 
athomsfere profile image
Austin French

I love rivers and the ocean. I just can't imagine doing them very safely at night! Although I have debated a few lakes for a lake kayak adventure!

Collapse
 
andrewbaisden profile image
Andrew Baisden

I agree with point number 2 if it can work for Batman then it can work for everyone.

Collapse
 
arerex profile image
Arif Zuhairi

Make the most of the night time then