The process of waking up is a biological one. First, the sense of smell kicks in; it could be the whiff of whatever your mother is whipping up in the kitchen. Then, motion sets in with the wriggling of hands or legs. Next, there is a taking in of all the sounds around, followed by opening the eyes. Now, imagine waking up to a jarring alarm that triggers your sense of hearing first, breaking this natural cycle. It pushes the brain right into a flight or fight first mode; messing with the body's internal clock.

This is something that stand-up comedian Rohan Joshi recently pointed out when he posted about opting for a softer alarm tune. "I changed the alarm on my phone from a loud, blaring sound to a soothing one. The earlier tune was so jarring and hostile that I would wake up startled, with my heart pounding, wondering what had exploded. And then I would just carry that racing pulse and pounding heart with me into the first few hours of my day," he said.