Friday, January 10, 2014

How to Hack Your Sleep: The Art and Science of Sleeping

How to Hack Your Sleep: The Art and Science of Sleeping

How to Hack Your Sleep:
The Art and Science of Sleeping


Getting good sleep is both an art and a science – yet the overwhelming majority of people have trouble sleeping, even the very high performance people who come to me for Bulletproof coaching.  Even if you had time to sleep an entire 8 hours a night, would it be optimal, uninterrupted sleep?

Would you awake feeling 100% refreshed?

Either you don’t get enough hours of quality sleep, or you get too much sleep and still wake up feeling groggy and unrested.  Indeed, research shows it’s not the number of hours of sleep you get that matters the most – it’s the quality of the hours you are getting.  The largest sleep study ever conducted on 1.1 million people shows that it’s quality not quantity that matters most!

The Basics of Sleep That Don’t Cost Anything

Whether or not you currently have trouble sleeping, there are several key things you can easily do to improve your current sleep.  These are the most basic yet most critical hacks that will help you upgrade both the quality and quantity of sleep so you can optimize your rest every night.
  1. First, sleep in a pitch-black room. Make it as dark as you can possibly make it.  Block all the light sources you can, whether it’s a curtain or just pinning up fabric as needed. Seriously, if you live in a city, you need blackout curtains that don’t allow in all the light pollution. Cover LEDs with black electrical tape.
  2. Start winding down at least two hours before bed. This means less bright lighting at night, as well eliminating, or at least dimming, computer screens and TVs.
  3. Third, though it may seem obvious, caffeine is not a sleep aid – stop drinking it by 2:00 p.m. each day, or at least 8 hours prior to bedtime (earlier if you’re sensitive to it).
  4. Go to bed by 11:00 p.m. when possible because your body creates a cortisol surge after 11 p.m. to keep you awake.
  5. Don’t exercise within 2 hours of bedtime, unless it’s relaxing yoga or something similar.
David Aspery
These are basics that are easy to implement immediately at zero cost, and they ensure you’re starting off on the right foot – or right side of the bed, rather…

                          [Excerpt from The Bulletproof Executive]

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