Finding Focus: Building a New Sleep Mode to Improve Discipline, Support Better Habits, and Save Me from Myself
For many, sleep is a complicated matter. It is vital to our health and well-being, yet many struggle to get adequate rest. According to the CDC, 36 percent of adults in the United States, approximately 120 million people, sleep less than seven hours each night.
Over a quarter of the US population needs to sleep more. Regretfully, since becoming a parent, I've become part of this unfortunate statistic.
Like most parents, The struggle became greater after having children. As if inconsistencies of sleep that are beyond my control aren't enough, I've recently started doing something that is certainly not in my best interest: staying up well after the kids are asleep and things are cleaned up. I don't do this every night, but I cycle through a couple times a week where the desire to just stay awake and enjoy some quiet time to decompress wins out over the better angels of sleep. My wife, who deals with the same sleepless nights but is far wiser than me, prioritizes what little sleep she gets over anything that doesn't involve her family. She's an intelligent woman, and as I often tell her, when I'm learning from her, I'm taking notes.
Some nights things works out. I go to bed later than I should, and everyone sleeps through the night. Other nights, I only get a few hours of sleep before the waking up begins. After a particularly tough week of this cycle, I made a conscious decision to take action and make a change.
The Goal
I started this project by making a short list of my goals. Here's what I came up with:
Aim for seven hours of sleep every night
Access to apps that promote relaxation and sleep
Limit access to apps that inhibit sleep
Turn on automatically 30 minutes before ideal bedtime
Use context shifting to reinforce sleep time
With these goals in mind, I set out to reduce distractions during the time that I want to be sleeping and also improve my sleep discipline. After some planning, I started building a revamped sleep Focus mode.
Letting the Right Apps In
Okay, I have an admission to make. I use my devices in bed before going to sleep. Most often, I'm on an iPad Air or iPad Mini, writing a journal entry and reading on the Kindle app. Sometimes, I do this on my iPhone if I'm traveling or don't have an iPad near me.
I know that using technology before bed can contribute to sleep problems. More specifically, I know the apps that can distract me and present problems. I keep the few social media apps I use, streaming apps, email, and the open web, off limits.
So, what's allowed? Honestly, not much.
The Home Screen
I Have one widget and four apps that are a part of my Sleep Focus Mode. Phone and Messages are also accessible, but let’s be honest, they are easily ignored.
The Kindle Widget
I read when I wake up and before I go to sleep. I read several short passages from "daily" books in the morning, while I usually read one or two full-length books at night. The content of these vary, but it's typically nonfiction. Lately, I've been rereading Kitchen Confidential and The Diary of Anne Frank. The first is an old favorite that I'm rereading for the first time since It was released nearly 24 years ago, and the second is part of my research into journaling. The Kindle Widget is ideal here because it's bigger than any other app icon and will get me right into reading a book.
Ulysses
I do all of my writing in Ulysses. I like accessing what I'm working on quickly, especially if I'm in bed early. While that's rare, it's often because I want to do a little writing before I call it a night.
MindNode
I'm a nerd. Nerds mind map. I'm working on several active mind maps for various parts of my life, including management and team-building ideas, journaling, event or trip planning, and general content for this site.
Dark Noise
I often use Dark Noise while I sleep. I've always been a fan of white noise, and having two kids who like white noise machines has just reinforced my preference for it. I set up this simple shortcut to turn on brown noise, which I prefer over the more traditional white noise option in this app.
Gratitude
As part of my journaling practice, I use this shortcut to create a new daily gratitude entry in Day One. That's table stakes for my journaling practice. Some days, I write in other journals or do multiple entries, but at a minimum, I post a photo and a sentence or two that share something I'm thankful for.
Moving Safari
I've always kept Safari on my dock on all my mobile devices. It's one of my most frequently used apps, yet it's one of the apps I don't want easy access to in Sleep Mode. Right now, Apple doesn't let you have different docks for different focus modes, so now Safari lives on the Home Screen of my iPad and iPhone.
The Apple Watch
Most days, I wear my watch until I go to bed, so I have an automation set to change the face from California to the Breathe face an hour before my ideal bedtime. This furthers the shift from where the day-to-day noise of calendar, fitness, weather, etc., can become overwhelming to where the focus is much more on winding down.
The Honor System
I am at my best when I follow this simple rule: if I wake up in the middle of the night and can't sleep, I can pick up my iPad or my iPhone, and I can do anything I want as long as it's reading a book or choosing an option on my Home Screen.
Having used this Focus mode for more than a month since beginning the first draft of this post, I can report that it works well. The context shift does make a difference. It reminds me that my interests are best served by not accessing social media, news apps, or any noisy inputs the broader net offers. Anytime I ignore this reminder and abandon my responsibilities around getting the best sleep possible, I am worse for it.
Finally, I know Focus modes can only do so much. It’s as much about making the right decisions and advocating for myself. Still, using the tools at hand to make it a little easier to make the right decisions is worth doing.
Weekly Quote: Finding Clarity in Motion with Thomas Mann
On a beautiful day last week, I loaded my son into the stroller and walked through a nearby park. We do this regularly, although this time, my primary focus was to find clarity around a difficult decision.
About twenty minutes into the walk, my conscious thinking had gently drifted into unrelated topics. I was considering the birds and beautiful sunshine, thinking about what to make for dinner, and recalling how much my children have changed in the last year. I was becoming more relaxed, but my subconscious was working.
We wandered quietly for another fifteen minutes. Then I took my iPhone from the cupholder of the stroller, opened my Personal Reflection journal in Day One, and began using voice-to-text to dictate my stream-of-consciousness thoughts on the situation.
We arrived home shortly after, me feeling relieved and my son ready to play. The day moved on. It wasn't until that evening that I had a chance to review what I had dictated. I was surprised by what I read. I was able to come to new conclusions and organized a jumbled mess of thoughts into something actionable.
The walk with my son isn't the first time I've had this experience. I've learned that movement is a force multiplier for separating meaningful thoughts from distractions. Dictation is a helpful tool, a bridge to push those thoughts to where real work can begin. The result of combining these two actions can be clarity.
Our ancestors and their distant relatives knew this too. While their lives were different in so many ways from our modern existence strewn with convenience and comfort, the human concerns that they struggled with were very similar to what we deal with today. They knew the power of movement. We need to relearn it. It can be the difference between feeling stuck in the mud and finding the path forward.
I send a monthly newsletter about the power of reading and journaling, the benefits of finding focus and productivity through intentionality, and how tech can help you grow in the ways you want. I also share a recommendation of something I'm enjoying or finding helpful. You can read past issues and subscribe here.
Finding Focus: Why Waking Up at 5 AM Helps Me Get More Done
I've long been the kind of person who likes to wake up at 5 AM. The time before the day starts is one of reflection and personal development for me, whether through physical exercise, journaling, or reading. I've discovered since launching 24 Letters that this time is where some of my most productive work on content and ideas comes from.
Here are a few reasons why being an early riser helps me get more done.
It's Quiet
I get distracted easily and also have plenty of responsibilities once the kids are awake, so having a quiet house helps me get into the writing groove. Once I've made coffee and fed the cats, I come into the studio and get started. I use a focus mode to keep the digital distractions at bay, and I have a shortcut to launch my preferred mix in Dark Noise. My mind is quiet, and if I can keep it from getting polluted with notifications and calendar items for the coming day, I'm much more likely to get work done.
It's my Margin
Whatever you're doing with your day, you likely have something that takes up the bulk of your time that, in most cases, is not your creative endeavor or passion project. I'm a stay-at-home dad, which requires a lot of attention and care. Finding the margins means figuring out the time that works around your other priorities. Unless my kids are awake extra early, the predawn time is usually available for me.
It Starts the Day Strong
When I get some work done on a post or a draft of the next newsletter started, I start the day with an accomplishment that is meaningful to me. As a result, I find myself in a better mood and can better focus my attention during the day instead of becoming distracted by the projects I'm falling behind on.
It's Incremental Growth
An hour or 90 minutes a day may not seem like much, but that adds up to a few weeks' worth of writing time if you do it every day. Realistically, it doesn't happen daily, but even three or four days a week moves the needle. For me, it's about progress over time, and I’m happy with that as long as I can build content that helps people.
It's my Peak
In his book When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing, Daniel Pink writes about Your Daily When, the natural fluctuations in energy and alertness that everyone feels throughout the day. Dan's research shows that most people peak in the morning, and I'm in that group. I'm often happiest and most effective at getting things done between 5 am and 12 pm.
What I Work On
I try to make before I manage, as David Sparks frequently says. The early hours are reserved for creative work. I either get stuck into an ongoing draft in Ulysses or begin pulling ideas and sources together to prep for a new piece. This work usually takes place in apps like Craft and Mindnode.
I have a weekly planning document in Craft that I use to roughly map out what I want to get done with the week, and I also have a simple review process built-in with that.
Navigating the Ups and Downs
We sometimes have less attention or time to devote to the things we would like to get done than we would like.
It's frustrating to have a plan and then watch it not happen. We all have more practice with that than we realize, yet it's still difficult to experience. My rule is to start with kindness and understanding. It's helpful to remember the first principle of Stoicism, shared by Ward Farnsworth in The Practicing Stoic:
I like starting the day by acting on something important to me. It improves my mood, sharpens my senses, and helps me achieve the goal of creating content that can help people become a better version of themselves by learning something new. It doesn’t always work, but it did today and I will try for tomorrow too.