Я стараюсь не прогуливать лекции, даже если утром хочется спать.

Стараюсь is the 1st person singular present-tense form of стараться.

So:

• я стараюсь = I try / I make an effort
• dictionary form: стараться

This verb often means not just attempting something once, but making a consistent effort. In this sentence, it suggests a habit or general intention: the speaker is trying to be disciplined.

Because стараться commonly takes an infinitive to say to try to do something.

Pattern:

• стараться + infinitive

Here:

• стараюсь не прогуливать

Literally, this is I try not to skip.

This works much like English try to do or try not to do.

Because the speaker is saying I try not to skip lectures, not I do not try to skip lectures.

Compare:

• Я стараюсь не прогуливать лекции = I try not to skip lectures
• Я не стараюсь прогуливать лекции = I am not trying to skip lectures

So the negation belongs to the action прогуливать, not to the verb стараюсь.

This is about aspect.

• прогуливать = imperfective
• прогулять = perfective

The imperfective is used here because the sentence is about a general habit / repeated situation, not one completed event.

So:

• не прогуливать лекции = not to skip lectures in general / as a habit

If you used прогулять, it would sound more like to skip a lecture once / to miss a specific lecture.

Прогуливать лекции means to skip lectures, to cut classes, or to miss classes on purpose.

This is important: прогуливать usually suggests deliberately not going, not simply being absent for some neutral reason.

So it is closer to:

• skip lectures
• cut class

than to a neutral miss lectures.

Лекции here is accusative plural of лекция.

The verb прогуливать takes a direct object, so lectures must be in the accusative case.

Why does it look like nominative plural? Because лекция is an inanimate noun, and in Russian the accusative plural of inanimate nouns is the same as the nominative plural.

So:

• singular: лекция
• plural nominative: лекции
• plural accusative: лекции

That is why the form is лекции.

Даже если means even if.

• если = if
• даже если = even if

Adding даже makes the idea more concessive: the action in the main clause still happens despite that condition.

So the meaning is roughly:

• I try not to skip lectures, even if I feel sleepy in the morning

Using just если would be more neutral and would lose that stronger even if / despite that feeling.

Утром is the noun утро in the instrumental singular, but here it functions as an adverbial time expression meaning in the morning.

This is a very common Russian pattern:

• утром = in the morning
• вечером = in the evening
• днём = during the day
• ночью = at night

So although it comes from a noun form, you should learn утром as a standard way to say in the morning.

Both are possible, but they are not exactly the same.

• я хочу спать = I want to sleep
• мне хочется спать / хочется спать = I feel sleepy / I feel like sleeping

The form хочется is more impersonal and often sounds more like a physical or emotional state that comes over you, rather than a direct, deliberate wish.

In this sentence, утром хочется спать sounds very natural because it describes a common feeling: in the morning, you feel sleepy.

In full form, you could say:

• мне хочется спать = I feel like sleeping / I feel sleepy

But in this sentence, мне is omitted because the person is already clear from the context: the sentence begins with Я стараюсь.

So Russian can leave it understood:

• Я стараюсь не прогуливать лекции, даже если утром хочется спать.

The understood meaning is still about the speaker: even if I feel sleepy in the morning.

Because даже если утром хочется спать is a subordinate clause.

Russian normally separates subordinate clauses with commas, just as English often does.

So the sentence has:

• main clause: Я стараюсь не прогуливать лекции
• subordinate clause: даже если утром хочется спать

That is why the comma is required.