For most of my working life — working a job — I worked swing shift beginning in 1977. It fit in with my night owl ways. In 2015 my boss designed a schedule that worked for maybe 75% of the team, but not for me. Between a weird schedule and waking up in pain I was averaging 4 hours a sleep a night for about 18 months (not recommended). I took vacations to normalize my sleep patterns during that period.

I retired from working for somebody else in early 2017. I have a part/time business and I’m developing an second business too. Old habits die hard though. I love staying up to 2 or 3 am, but found it was contraindicated to a good night’s sleep.

I have a sick cat that’s on a strict schedule of getting small increments of food from cans 4 times per day to help keep her weight up. I know this is an excuse for finding the groove for a healthier sleep pattern but it seems to be working.

An alarm at 10 pm reminds me to get the cat on schedule for her last successful food ingestion of the day. It also allows me to begin a surrender process of going to sleep.

I’ve been trying to ease back from 2 am. So far after 9 months I’m going to sleep around midnight to 1 am.

Midnight is my ideal, maybe a little before.

The biggest sleep hack that works for me is managing caffeine for morning and early afternoon use only and surrendering for sleep when I notice that I feel even slightly fatigued around 11 pm.

Loved your piece, BTW.