The jet lag route to heaven

When I landed here in Seattle, a few months back - I was sleeping at 4pm and getting up at 1am. Weird but that's extreme jetlag for you. IST is 12.5 hrs ahead of Seattle (that's without day light savings ofcourse), so all hell broke loose when I landed in Seattle after a weary, gruelling 26.5 hrs of journey time(Hyderabad - Frankfurt - Portland - Seattle). But in a way it was good, because it was an opportunity to experience the freshness of early mornings. Unfortunately it didn't last long, soon I was back to sleeping at 4 am. My friend commented on how I was sleeping IST in seattle - that's not exactly true but, yeah(btw, in that vein I used to sleep East US time in India).
The point I am getting to is, for people who are on the border line as I sometimes get to - sleeping at 6 am - 8 am and getting up at 2 pm in the afternoon, there's 'another' way to get back to normal sleeping times, by normal I mean sleeping around 9 - 11 pm. Just extend the jet-lag principle, you are halfway into it anyway.
This for example is an excerpt from my sleeping routine some time back:
Day...Sleeping time
1 .....4 am
2......5 am
3......7 am (when you are used to sleeping at 4 am, so far is manageable. The pain starts from the next entry)
4.....8:30 am
5.....10 am
6.....2 pm (This was a little too much for me, but keeping the end result in mind, I endured)
7....4 pm (Note, I have reached the time stamp I was sleeping at when I landed in Seattle, from now on is familiar territory!)
8... 5 pm (End in sight, keep it going)
9... 6:30 pm (Going good, a few more days before I stabilize)
10... 7 pm
11... 7:30 pm
12... 9 pm
13... 9 pm
14... 8 pm
15.. 9:30 pm (More or less stabilized)

So it took me around 13 days to stabilize to 'normal' sleeping time. That's ridiculous you say, not to mention the pain of staying awake for an extra hour or two or more every day so that you can go down the time line. Well, the point is, it works and I have tried it out both during the recent winter break and during the last quarter loaded with assignments and quizzes. Besides, it was only day 4 - day 7 that seemed really tough for me, days 1 - 3 and days 8 - 13 was familiar turf. This method is more suited for people who have 'real' flexibility in working hours and other committments; if it were not to be so, this wouldn't apply to you anyway since you would more or less be having a set routine. Having said that, you need to be more or less desparate to take this route, having given up on all other methods.

So how do I come about sleeping at 4 am anyway. Well, I have always been good at procrastinating things and so if I have a deadline tomorrow, say in documenting some work, I don't start still late into the night at 11pm. So that I sleep at 6 am the next day. Now, keep repeating this 6 am thing and you would soon stabilize at 4am, when I say stabilize, it means the body is ok with sleeping at 4 am but it's not a 'great' feeling getting up at 11 am.

On the other hand, sleeping at 10 pm and getting up at 5 am is actually heaven, especially if you were to go out early in the morning for a jaunt or run. Even if you don't that's fine, I am sure you would have a window or two to open up. The freshness of air, the cool breeze and a more or less heightened state of awareness resulting in better functioning of body and mind are a few things that make it worth your while if you were to sleep early and wake up early.