Sleep Like a Beast: How Knowing Your Chronotype Can Lead to Your Best Life

Lions are the new early birds. They’re the go-getters, rising early eager for the hunt. 

They don’t follow the rules — they make the rules. (Primarily because they’ve already done so before the rest of us have even considered breakfast.) 

Conscientious, stable, practical and optimistic are the adjectives that describe the lion’s personality, and they can be spotted overachieving in the office, gym or bedroom. 

When they’re not seeking out semi-competitive social engagement, they’re strategizing and making sure that even their contingency plans have contingency plans.   

Lions hit their peak well before noon, so if you fit into this chronotype, be sure to coordinate projects that require the most energy and focus for the morning. Your mental acuity will be at its sharpest before 10:00 AM, so the earlier you can schedule important business meetings and make client phone calls, the better. Save your routine tasks for the afternoon when you’re depleted. 

The pre-dawn quiet before others have been rousted by their alarms is a perfect time for a 20-minute meditation to clear the mind and sharpen your hunting instincts. A high-protein breakfast — go light on the carbs! — and an early workout will take advantage of that AM lion vitality and get your heart pumping for a day of chasing gazelles (and/or promotions). 

Since breakfast will have been hours behind by midmorning, bolster your energy reserves with a protein bar, a handful of nuts or similar high-energy snack.

Lions experience a slump in the late afternoon and coast through the evening, feeling utterly drained by 9:00. Having lunch before noon, followed by a 20- to 30-minute nap at around 1:00 PM, will help to keep your roar powerful. 

While a late-afternoon dose of caffeine to keep you going until bedtime may be tempting, this decision could come back to bite you when you turn in for the night. 

Instead, have a balanced dinner early and reach for a high-energy snack in the evening: trail mix, banana slices with peanut butter, cereal-topped yogurt, edamame or a boiled egg. 

The US Army’s slogan of “We get more done by 9:00 a.m. than most people do all day” was undoubtedly written by a lion. Jobs that start at zero-dark-thirty, such as baker, personal trainer, morning radio DJ, pilot, stocker or mail carrier, are ideally suited to the lion chronotype schedule.  

Lions typically operate best with a sleep schedule of 10:00 p.m. - 5:30 a.m.

Former night owls, this is your group. 

Wolves like to stay up late to howl. The party doesn’t even get started until midnight, and it’s going to keep going like an LMFAO video. Members of this chronotype are the ones hosting 3:00 a.m. art galleries, attending after-after-parties and keeping all-night diners in business.

Mornings are especially brutal for this chronotype, who would prefer to only see 8:00 as a p.m. hour. If you wake to an alarm, set it so that you can hit snooze a couple of times for a more gradual start to your day. As soon as you rise, throw back the curtains to expose yourself to as much sunlight as possible to kickstart your brain.

People with a wolf chronotype schedule don’t hit their stride until early afternoon, with a more significant peak late in the evening. These are the best times for you to channel that wolf creativity and problem-solving intellect. Stick to mundane tasks and busy work earlier in the day as your energy builds. 

A nap as your afternoon burst of energy wanes can ensure you’ve got the stamina for your late-night escapades, and an evening cardio routine can help burn off that late-in-the-day restlessness.  

As it’s your natural inclination to stay up late, be sure to power down electronics in the evening to prevent them from keeping your brain stimulated (and you from going down the many online rabbit-holes of tantalizing information). 

The key personality traits of this chronotype are impulsivity, creativity, pessimism and moodiness (oh well, at least the creative part is positive). 

Since wolves are often introverted artists — writers, photographers, musicians, coders — freelancers of this chronotype can capitalize on that nocturnal energy to get a great deal of work done in the distraction-free peaceful hours when the other chronotypes are slumbering (except for perhaps the dolphins — they’ve got it tough). 

It’s also a perfect fit for night work: ER staff, air traffic controllers, bar staff, taxi drivers, security guards, emergency service personnel and other positions that work when most of the world is fast asleep.     

If your lifestyle permits it, the best sleep schedule for the wolf chronotype is from

5:00 a.m. until noon. However, since obligations may prevent this, coordinate waking as late as possible by getting everything you can ready the evening prior when you’re at your peak.

No need to worry about hibernation: members of the bear chronotype typically get a solid 8 hours of slumber, with little problem falling asleep at the day’s end. If you don’t get those 8 hours, though, you tend to spend the day lethargic and cranky.

Mornings can be beastly — despite getting a full night of sleep, bears rarely wake up feeling refreshed and raring to go. In short, if you have a bear chronotype schedule, you’re likely not a morning person. But a slow morning start (that first cup of coffee is more golden than a whole pot of honey) you’re ready to face a day of gathering food and socializing. 

The first thing a bear will do after exiting its cave in the morning is to have a good stretch. This is an excellent hack for this chronotype. A 10-minute a.m. stretch routine soon after rising will oxygenate the muscles and help to clear the brain fog from the bear’s deep slumber.

Bears are at their most productive later in the morning once they’ve built up some momentum. As you gradually gain speed, use the time to plan out your day. Afterward, a late-morning workout will take advantage of that mounting energy and help burn off the breakfast’s calories. 

Though energy levels stay pretty consistent all day long, bears experience a post-lunch dip between 2:00 and 4:00 PM. A late-morning snack after your workout can help counter this; just be sure to keep it healthy, as bears tend to forage and feast out of boredom. 

Giving in to that mid-afternoon urge to nap will keep energy levels strong through the evening. After your nap, weather permitting, spend a little time outdoors. The sunlight will help boost melatonin production and keep your steady circadian rhythm running smoothly. 

Members of the bear chronotype will often try to catch up on lost sleep during the weekend, but it’s best to maintain your weekday schedule so as not to disrupt that stable sleep routine.  

Bears do well with the standard 9-to-5 positions: something that starts late enough to overcome the morning grogginess and ends shortly after the afternoon slump. If your workplace is flexible, you may find a 10-to-6 schedule fits well with your natural bear energy levels. 

Personality-wise, bears are commonly cautious, extroverted, friendly and open-minded. The ability to get along so well with others makes this chronotype well suited to office management, politics, event planning and other positions that heavily involve interacting with the public. 

The ideal sleep schedule for bears is from 11:00 PM - 7:00 AM.

“Always sleep with one eye open” is the motto of the dolphin kingdom, and they take it quite literally: dolphins snooze with only half their brain at a time to be alert for danger (and opportunities for mischief). 

Dolphins’ brains are also constantly active, making this chronotype an undersea home for the overthinkers. You know all too well how ruminating over the day’s conversations and running mental simulations of upcoming events can keep you awake. 

Cautiousness, introversion and intelligence are the hallmark personality traits of this chronotype. (Along with, we hesitate to mention, neuroticism.) 

Dolphins are typically very — sometimes overly — detail-oriented and averse to taking risks. But they’re also quite mindful and excellent listeners: think Guinan from Star Trek: The Next Generation. 

Dolphins suffer irregular, frequently interrupted sleep patterns, leading to days filled with fatigue and difficulty concentrating. 

If you have a dolphin chronotype schedule, you’ll want to skip the snooze button, as that’s just going to reinforce your erratic sleep patterns. A cardio workout first thing in the morning will get the blood circulating and give you a physical and mental boost to face the day. A jog outside will also expose you to sunlight, helping you to become more alert. 

Your energy peak will hit between 10:00 AM and 1:00 PM (usually with another burst in the evening), so use the time prior to plan out your day and the time afterward for routine work. A 30-minute post-lunch nap is essential to supplement your lost sleep.

An evening stretching or yoga routine will help you make it to bedtime. (But make sure that it’s not too high intensity, or it could affect your sleep.) Follow this with a light, melatonin-rich snack like almonds or cherries. As getting to sleep is already a challenge, be sure to avoid caffeine after noon and alcohol within four hours before going to bed. 

Taming the overactive dolphin mind before turning in can help with those sketchy sleep patterns. A bedtime meditation regimen can help calm intrusive thoughts, as can practicing mindfulness throughout the day.

As anxiety is often behind dolphins’ insomnia, speaking to a medical professional could prove very helpful. Talk therapy is excellent, but even putting words to anxious thoughts can put things into perspective and help you sort your feelings, so consider journaling if you don’t already.  

Jotting down a to-do list before heading to bed will help to keep upcoming tasks from burdening your mind while you try to sleep. Reaching for a book instead of the TV remote will keep your brain occupied while avoiding electronics’ disruption of your already-shaky sleep patterns. 

Dolphins can channel the inherent perfectionism that accompanies this chronotype into detail-oriented professions: editors, musicians, auditors, surgeons, analysts, engineers, astrophysicists and careers that use advanced mathematics. 

Though sleeping on a schedule can be especially tricky for this chronotype, shoot for 11:30 p.m. - 6:30 a.m. Don’t be hard on yourself if you can’t sleep; blame it on the tides. If you’re awake for more than 15 minutes during the night, get up and do some light activity until you’re ready to try sleeping again.