My commitment to writing daily on this and my day job blog has demanded more than it’s shares of late nights and early mornings.

Unfortunately, I’ve also binged on Netflix a couple times and stayed up late watching college or pro football.

Today, I listened to Pat Flynn’s interview with Shawn Stevenson (check Shawn Stevenson’s podcast and blog here).

Much of the interview was about sleep. Since today was a Saturday full of emergency home projects (2 major bathroom rehabs), I’m eager to take today’s action item from that interview. I could use some sleep.

Stevenson has written a book all about sleep (Sleep Smarter: 21 Proven Tips to Sleep Your Way To a Better Body, Better Health and Bigger Success) and handed out a couple tips in the interview:

1. Give yourself a caffeine curfew (2pm)
2. Use black-out curtains (those cool things they have at fancy hotels)
3. Keep electronics out of your room or at least away from your noggin.

I really want black-out curtains, but since I can’t pull that off tonight, I cut off caffeine early and will keep the phone away. I’ll use the old-fashioned clock radio.

I’m averaging 5-6 hours a night and feel a slow wear-down happening. It’ll take faith to go to bed 9pm-10pm and let myself sleep a little later. Will I get things done that I need to get done?

8 straight hours sounds like a very nice thing though, so I’m up for the challenge.

What kind of sleep do you get? Are you like me – you pride yourself on only ‘needing’ 5-6 hours a night? Is that really a good long term plan?