That said, there’s a very big difference between doesn’t work and can’t work. Humans are pretty adaptable given the right circumstances, so I’d wager we’re talking mostly about the doesn’t category. Your comment totally reminds me of many conversations I’ve heard and read about weight loss where someone says “just consume fewer calories”, as if it’s somehow simple. Other person, annoyed, says “I’ve tried that, it doesn’t work for me” or “studies have shown that doesn’t work for most people”. It’s true that it generally doesn’t work for most people, I believe the failure rates are even higher than 50%, and yet it’s guaranteed that it can work, it’s physics. It’s not because people actually eat fewer calories and it fails, it’s because people generally aren’t able to reduce their calorie intake permanently, they revert. And trying to will yourself to overcome hunger tends to backfire, just like trying to will yourself to ‘just get up early’ tends to backfire. It doesn’t work because they don’t really know how to change their habits; habits are really hard to break, behavior is really hard to change. A lot of people fail to appreciate how hard it is, especially when some people do seem to be able to do it.
I’ve gone through long periods where I was unable to be a morning person and, maybe like you, I could have bopped someone lightly on the nose for saying to me ‘just get up early’. But changes in my life have made it easier; my job changed, my kids turned into teenagers, my exercise changed, my outlook on life has change, my evening activities have changed. I also have a better idea of how to wake up early, and it doesn’t need to involve setting alarms and trying to force myself, it’s much more about how to spend the time, much more about what I want to get done, and much less about when.
