After I wake up in the morning and get out of bed to turn off my alarm, my first thought is about food. I do not function properly until I am nourished, so I always leave my bed in a disheveled state while I rush to the refrigerator. Throughout the morning, my bed only gets more unkempt, since I tend to throw a variety of clothes on it while I am getting dressed. In short, making my bed in the morning wastes valuable time that I could use to meet my priorities: looking good, feeling good, and being prepared for the school day. 

While all of my family members have different priorities in the morning, none of them make their beds—least of all my mother. Her reluctance to neaten the sheets stems from her experiences with the strict bed-making policy at the United States Coast Guard Academy, which she attended for two years. Coast Guard Academy cadets were expected to have a perfectly made bed with military corners every morning and would sleep on top of the sheets with blankets or sleeping bags in order to maintain the perfect bed appearance. After this formative experience, my mother never enforced a bed-making policy within my family, and even let us sleep European style (without a top sheet), if we preferred. 

 I know many successful people who religiously make their beds immediately after they awake. These get-up-and-go types tend to cite bed-making as an important reason for their energy and achievements. However, it is important to realize that motivation and drive come from different sources for different people, and that leaving the bed unmade does not signify laziness or slobbery, but rather a personal preference. Therefore, those who don’t gain satisfaction from straightening their sheets should create an individualized morning routine, like my own. I schedule my morning time to make sure I am well-dressed and well-fed, so I feel accomplished, energized and confident to begin my school day. Consequently, I have no plans to ever make my bed in the morning.