Changing Time

Over recent years, I have been working hard to slowly change my schedule.

When I was a youth pastor, I was a late to bed and late to rise kind of person. Much of my work was done in the evening. I did not have a social life outside of church. So, I would often go to bed well after midnight, I would get up mid-morning, I would put in another 10 hour day, and then I would start all over again. It worked well for me, and this schedule worked well in my ministerial context.

After I got married and became a solo pastor in a small town, I came to the conclusion that I needed to visibly working by 9am during the week. I would go to bed a little after midnight. This even worked well when our child was an infant. I could stay up and do her midnight feeding, then go to bed, and get up around 8am.

Today, I have a hard time sleeping much past 7am. I still hate mornings, but now I get to work a little after 8 instead of 9. I get a lot of my work done before my family gets home.

Has anyone else out there ever changed their sleeping schedule? What prompted this change?