Morning people rise from their slumber with ungrudging ease. They’re at their most productive when the sun has barely got out of its starting blocks. It’s because their brains are most alert and their body clocks perfectly primed for being creative and industrious. And there’s plenty of scientific evidence to show that having a positive wake-up routine comes with a whole load of physical and mental health benefits. So, rise and shine – here’s how to become a morning person, according to the experts.

Looksmaxxing, the internet-speak definition for improving your looks, involves everything from building muscle in the gym to upping your skincare game to getting plastic surgery. More controversial terms include mewing (pushing your tongue against the roof of your mouth to apparently achieve a more defined jawline) and bone smashing, which involves hitting your jaw and cheekbones to make them grow back stronger, though there is no evidence this is anything more than a meme. The latest looksmaxxing trend? Shaving off your eyelashes. Why? To look more masculine, supposedly.

You’re out of office. In theory. Poolside in Puglia, an ice-cold beer glistening beside you; the sun is warm on your shoulders, the smell of SPF and sweat a constant reminder your summer vacation is officially here. And yet… your thumb is compulsively refreshing your inbox. Relaxing, it turns out, isn’t quite as effortless as we think. Modern rest isn’t passive – it’s a skill, and one most of us haven’t mastered. As the psychologist and fatigue specialist Professor Vincent Deary recently put it: “Work needs rest, and rest takes work. We need to allow ourselves to rest, to nap, to enjoy… and deliberately switch on to joy and nourishment.” And yet, for many, switching off feels unnatural. A disorienting void where productivity used to live. It’s not our fault. Between intense hustle culture, post-pandemic anxiety and the dopamine loops of our phones, even downtime is starting to look suspiciously like work. We plan holidays like military operations. We track our sleep like we’re training for the Olympics. We charge off on wellness weekends and return with emptier wallets and fuller inboxes. “I often see that rest doesn’t feel safe for many men,” says Dr Sophie Mort, a psychologist, bestselling author of <(Un)Stuck> [https://www.simonandschuster.co.uk/books/(Un)Stuck/Dr-Sophie-Mort/9781471197567] and mental health expert at Headspace. “It feels like weakness, or worse, failure. In therapy, men will often say, ‘I don’t know how to switch off,’ but what they often mean is, ‘I don’t know who I am without being productive.’” This is because, culturally, many men are still wired to value output, control and stoicism. So, when the laptop finally closes, what rises to the surface? Guilt, restlessness and even shame. It’s not a lack of willpower, it’s a nervous system primed to treat stillness as a threat. And with work now living in our pockets, every “ping” feels like a test of relevance.

When Sam Parker was researching his book about one of our most maligned emotions, time and time again, family, friends and colleagues would say the same thing: “I don’t really get angry”. It was, perhaps, an unsurprising response. Of all our emotions, anger has a singularly bad rep. The preserve of ranting politicians, faceless trolls and dustups on public transport that go viral. Little wonder the rest of us might want to distance ourselves from it.

Morning people rise from their slumber with ungrudging ease. They’re at their most productive when the sun has barely got out of its starting blocks. It’s because their brains are most alert and their body clocks perfectly primed for being creative and industrious. And there’s plenty of scientific evidence to show that having a positive wake-up routine comes with a whole load of physical and mental health benefits. So, rise and shine – here’s how to become a morning person, according to the experts.

Looksmaxxing, the internet-speak definition for improving your looks, involves everything from building muscle in the gym to upping your skincare game to getting plastic surgery. More controversial terms include mewing (pushing your tongue against the roof of your mouth to apparently achieve a more defined jawline) and bone smashing, which involves hitting your jaw and cheekbones to make them grow back stronger, though there is no evidence this is anything more than a meme. The latest looksmaxxing trend? Shaving off your eyelashes. Why? To look more masculine, supposedly.