By Steve Baric
In professional bodybuilding there’s a mantra: Eat. Train. Sleep.
This mantra isn’t just a collection of words. It actually represents the three most important elements in a bodybuilder’s daily schedule, more or less in order of execution. Of course these elite athletes have to train hard, and they need a lot of energy to fuel those workouts. But…sleep?
It might surprise you to learn that sleep is actually one of the most vital components to a professional athlete’s training plan. Sleep isn’t just a time to take a break (you can do that with Netflix and a cat). It’s the body’s natural charging station. It’s when everything happens. Muscle growth. Recovery. Learning. Cognition. Memory. All of it happens during the hours you’re asleep.
The old paradigm for entrepreneurs suggests that sleep is somehow a missed opportunity; that, if you’re sleeping, you’re not hustling. And while this might ring true for some, the reality is most of us can’t give our full attention and energy to our projects — or our clients — if we’re not properly rested.
The myth of the 100-hour work week is dying. We’ve come to realize now that rest and recovery are key components of an active, healthy lifestyle. If we’re going to be working in an optimal state, we need to have a full battery every time we hit the ground.
…or the keyboard.
In order to get the best available sleep for your needs, it’s helpful to have a few tips on hand. Here are five “hacks” that you can implement right away to help you get the most out of your Z’s.
1. Be Consistent
Consistency is one of the hardest things for entrepreneurs (adults, really) to work around. We’re great at it when it comes to our task list, but kind of not so great when it comes to self-care. We like to “take breaks” from our hustle and do things like stay up later on weekends to blow off a little steam, and then sleep in in the mornings.
The trouble with that is sleep isn’t a bank. You don’t just get to top up on extra rest when you skip rest earlier. Your body craves homeostasis, because that’s an environment in which it can operate efficiently. When you disrupt your weekly sleep patterns it can be difficult to get back into pattern, and that can compound sleep challenges.
For the next week (including the weekend), try setting your alarm for the same time every day, without exception. On the opposite end, try getting to bed at the same time every night. Trust me, late night TV will be just fine without you for a few days. You’re in this for YOUR benefit!
2. Segment Your Space
Make sure that your bedroom is used only for sleep. I know it’s hard right now with so many people working from home, but keeping your bedroom available as a home office, sleep space, and home gym trains your mind to give that space too many options for things to do.
If it’s unavoidable, then try to use the “studio apartment” approach by keeping clearly delineated zones of activity. To the extent it’s possible, you do not want a running computer (or worse, a TV) in your bedroom. Shut it down. Keep your exercise equipment in a different area. And keep work-related non-fiction books, notes, and devices away from your bed and off your nightstand.
3. Tune Out the World
Even when we think our house is quiet, noises can still creep in and distract us. We sleep through cycles of about 90 minutes, during which we enter and exit deeper states of sleep. Those deepest states (like the famous REM cycle) are where we do our big recovery and change. But in the lighter phases of sleep, it’s pretty easy to wake up with even a tiny bit of noise or light.
Your room should be absolutely dark. This is often hard to achieve, as there are always little lights on chargers, bathroom outlets, and of course your phone (which you’re keeping in another room, right?). You want to be in a space that is dark and quiet. In order to achieve this, you can use a sleep mask (like this one https://amzn.to/3h6erQM) to block out light.
If security (or parenting) isn’t a concern, consider getting some earplugs as well. I’ve tried a few in combination with white noise, and the ones I really like are Mack’s Pillow Soft silicone earplugs (https://amzn.to/3zZAVvt). These ones don’t actually fill the ear canal, but rather cover the opening so they’re safer and more comfortable.
4. Empty Your Mind
If you’re anything like me, your mind probably races a mile a minute with ideas and solutions, as well as all the craziness in the news. I’ve taken the habit of only checking the headlines around lunch time just to stay current. But for the idea factory, it can be hard to get restful sleep when your mind is buzzing!
The solution to this is to train yourself to leave the ideas on the table — literally. Whatever ideas you have in your head tonight can be handled in the morning. Grab a pen and paper, and dump your mind out. Ideas. Problems. Worries. Random thoughts. Get them out and on paper. Once they’re written down you’ll be surprised at how clear your head is, and how much easier it is to not worry about them. In fact, I find it comforting knowing that I won’t forget that important thing I had in my mind, because I took a minute to jot it down.
Experts recommend at this point that you grab a novel and read for 20 to 30 minutes. Non-fiction books are nice, but they’re idea generators. Fiction, on the other hand, gives your imagination an opportunity to flex its muscles, which distracts you from other thoughts. This is what you want…a clear mind that’s not buzzing, and an imagination that will help you relax and drift off to sleep.
5. Get Off The Phone!!
I get it. We’re a device-addicted culture. It’s hard to slow that down just for the sake of sleep, and for many of us the phone is also our emergency line and our alarm clock. But LCD and LED screens from laptops and handheld devices that give us those brilliant, crisp images do so by way of a backlight that’s in the blue light spectrum. And blue light has become notorious for disrupting brain wave and sleep patterns. Not good stuff.
It’s recommended that you get off all devices at least two hours before bed. Yes, that can be tricky. So to work around this, consider adding a filter.
For your laptop, there’s a great filter called f.lux (https://justgetflux.com/). This filter overlays on your screen to block out that blue light, and it does so by automatically adjusting filter density and brightness based on the sunrise and sunset in your area, which is super cool. It’s available for Windows and Mac.
On your phone, you can search your app store for blue light filters as well. I actually run two on my Android phone: Twilight, which I’ve set to work the same as f.lux so it’s automated, and Bluelight Filter, which I use manually to really darken the screen right before bed so it’s basically black. I do use my phone for emergency contact and my alarm (although I rarely need an alarm these days), so it’s important that I optimize it for my sleep needs as well.
These five tips are obviously not a comprehensive program in sleep design. However, they’re easy to implement and can be done with a very minimal amount of adjustment. It’s really all about habits, and making sure that your habits are serving you so that you can serve your clients and customers.
Guest Contributor