Do you really know how much you are sleeping lately? đ¤
This little chart is showing us how much sleep we really need. âŹ
I´m sure that you already know how important sleep is for maintaining our health, and many of us believe that we are sleeping for many hours of the night, but the reality is, that not all quality of sleep is equal. So, what does this mean? Well... âDifferent hours and times of our sleep cycles produce different reactions in the body and so this means that certain types of sleep have a greater effect on healing, our immune system activity, removal of the day´s toxic neuro waste from the brain, and general body and mind repair. For instance, the latest science now shows us that our metabolism speeds up slightly at around 10 pm - 1 am at night (relative to our own time zone and body clock), and it does this ready to maximize the removal of the neuro waste in our brain. If we are already sleeping when this happens, then we maximize the efficiency of this waste removal in our bodies and give ourselves the most effective and healing quality of sleep.
However, if we are still awake during this time, then we might often feel, sense or notice our metabolic rate rising, but we can mistakenly recognize this as a "second wind" and so we may push ourselves right through this time period, staying up later, eating more food or becoming socially active during this time, simply because we mistakenly interpret this feeling as a "burst of late energy".
When we do this, we not only miss out on the premium opportunity that our body is offering us to recharge our batteries to their fullest potential, but we also experience far less effective neuro waste removal out of our bodies as a result. (i.e. a much poorer quality of sleep) âDo you dream a lot?
Recent scientific studies now show that when we experience intense dreaming activity it often disturbs our sleep cycles, and this can even end up being one of the contributing factors to depression. A depression sufferer may often believe that they are sleeping much more than normal, but in reality, they may be having a much lower quality of sleep. When we dream more than normal, we may not spend enough time inside the necessary stages of sleep to remove sufficient neurotoxins from the brain. We need to remove these toxins, in order to be and feel able to function well the next day. The result can be waking up with low energy and low mood, going through the following day with excessive anxiety and rumination, which then causes an even greater neurotoxic build-up from this daytime struggle in the mind. (The greater the anxious thinking, the greater the neuron activity, which means more toxins are being produced than normal.) Excessive dreams can be a product of this excessive neuro waste in the brain that is left behind at night, and then this goes on to cause even more dream activity and sleep disturbances on the following night. đ This cycle can be self-perpetuating and without intervention can cause mild to serious health issues, as well as a possible continuous cycle of depression. âSo even if you do believe that you are having a full night of rest, it's always a good idea to fully assess yours and to keep on looking at the ways you might be able to increase your own quality of sleep, as well as ensuring that you are getting an adequate number of hours. To help you to assess, here are some warning signs that may indicate that you could be regularly suffering from low quality, disturbed, or insufficient sleep:
You already feel exhausted when you wake up in the morning
You might struggle to control your anxious thoughts and feelings during the day and evening
You feel over-emotional and may find yourself easily overreacting to things, later, you might often feel regretful of your actions
You just can´t seem to lose weight and have no energy to exercise or get going with healthy food prep
You might feel overwhelmed by the thoughts of having to do lots of things throughout the day
You may feel like you have no motivation or self-drive to take action and to deal with life´s humdrum events
You are snappy, irritable, impatient, or easily quick to anger others
You are worrying and overthinking about many things in the day and especially at night
You are struggling with immune system issues, like skin complaints, digestion problems, or other health concerns
You regularly sleep through your alarm and just can´t seem to get yourself up and out of bed early enough
Whilst some of these symptoms can be a result of other factors, besides lack of quality sleep, if any of this is sounding familiar, then it might be a good idea to take a closer look at your sleep patterns and to address any possible sleep issues as soon as you possibly can. Lack of sleep not only ages you more rapidly but can cause many other severe health issues as well. Without an adequate amount of regular quality sleep, you can run the risk of cancers, heart disease, depression, anxiety, diabetes, weight gain, memory loss, Alzheimer's, and even premature death. âClick here to receive your FREE sleep cheat sheet and action plan.
This has a summary of some very important points that you can physically and mentally check and address, in order to start to give yourself a better quality of sleep If you do struggle with getting sleep then do keep reading because this week´s Sunday Secrets focus on sharing some great techniques to help you get to sleep more easily. đ´
â¨Here Are Some Little Secrets To Falling Asleep Without Effort đ If you do struggle to get to sleep, very often the more you âtryâ, the harder it can just become. When your mind stops you from sleeping, and you find that it refuses to consciously switch off, then here are some little but powerful techniques you can begin to use to turn off your thoughts and really relax your body ready for quality sleep.𼰠A key part of falling asleep more easily is to understand that you cannot consciously âthinkâ your way out of âthoughtsâ. It is often necessary to use your senses and feelings or your imagination, to interrupt your busy thought stream and the "overthinking" activity that is occurring in your mind. đ âHere are three highly effective techniques for escaping your thoughts and dropping into a deep and pleasant sleep. Why not try one or all of these next time you need to fall asleep more easily? â¨If you can be disciplined with these techniques and focus on "doing" these rather than âtryingâ to sleep you may well find some quite surprising results. 1) Breathing visualizations. To practice switching on your rest and digest system instead of your stress system, you can use deep belly breathing and the counting of your breaths. (4 in, hold for 7, exhale for 8). Start by placing a hand on your stomach and feeling it rise and fall with each breath and then begin to take in several breaths to this 4,7,8 count. Then, after a while, engage your imagination to focus on breathing in "calm" and breathing out "stress" or breathing in "positive" and breathing out "negative" energy. You can give these sensations a color or imagine them actually flowing in and out of your body as you breathe. If your mind tries to pull you back into your thoughts, just notice this kindly and then place your attention right back onto your breathing. 2) Progressive body relaxation. Start with your right foot and imagine tensing for 5 seconds and then imagine relaxing it deeply. Each time you imagine releasing the tension, you can notice how that body part becomes even more relaxed than it was before. Work your way all the way up your right leg, then onto your left foot and left leg. Then while keeping both legs pleasantly relaxed, imagine tensing and relaxing one by one, your lower back muscles, then your stomach, then up to your chest, onto your upper back, and into your shoulders and arms, and your hands and fingers. Keep your entire body relaxed in your imagination and imagine tensing and relaxing your neck and jaw. Travel up your face, imagining that 5 seconds of tension and then releasing in each muscle in your face. If you allow yourself to fully focus on your body in this way, it will begin to activate "theta" brainwaves, which will slow down your mind and de-activate the stress chemicals that may have been keeping you too alert for sleep. Follow this with deep belly breathing to drift off into a pleasant slumber. 3) Practice using your imagination, not your will. Imagination ALWAYS triumphs over will. (Emile Coue) This is why you cannot make yourself salivate on demand, but you could vividly imagine eating a lemon, for example, and you would notice the saliva naturally appear, effortlessly inside of your mouth.
Both your body and unconscious mind respond well to your imagination. âWhen we watch someone else doing something or we imagine something, our brain lights up in the exact same area, as if we were actually physically doing that thing in reality. This is how we are able to create anxiety in our bodies from simply âimaginingâ things going wrong for us in the future. Even though we may be in the present and there is nothing really stressful in the room with us right there at that moment, simply imagining the problems will create a physical response in our body, and the anxiety chemicals of stress and cortisol, as if the threat is actually right there with us in reality. In fact, when we want to go to sleep, we climb into bed and we âpretendâ that we are already asleep. We close our eyes and lie still, and if our conscious mind allows it to happen, it cues our unconscious mind to take over. Bearing this in mind now, I want to ask you if you ever experienced that sensation when you begin to nod off, and as you are drifting off, you have bizarre images popping up randomly inside your mind? These are dreams beginning to occur as your brainwaves shift, just before you are fully asleep, this change of brain waves and activity is occurring whilst you are still slightly conscious. âSo, one of the best ways then to cue your unconscious and to engage your mind so that it cannot "drive you mad with thoughts", is to switch on your imagination instead.
You could imagine the last time you felt sleepy, fully imagining where you were and how it felt when your eyes were rolling and you were unable to keep them open. Remembering the experience of sleep works much more effectively than trying to sleep.
Or, you can start to deliberately imagine bizarre images in your mind, to stimulate the same process as REM sleep. (Like cats wearing hats, upside-down houses, purple clouds etc⌠the crazy stuff that usually pops up in your dreams)
Or you can engage your imagination to make up your own inner adventure. A daydream of a peaceful story or pleasant memory where you practice going into it your imagination more deeply inside of your mind.
Each of these tactics really works with just a little practice, but once you master these, you will never struggle with sleep again. đŞ I can personally vouch for this first hand, as insomnia used to be one of my own private struggles when I suffered from bad anxiety, some years ago. If you do want a bit (or a lot) of help I have many more amazing techniques and a special package of 4, online sessions - (90 minutes each), where we work together to focus solely on improving your sleep. đ´ This includes eliminating obstacles and overthinking habits that may currently prevent you from sleeping well, as well as the implementation of real and practical strategies to create a better sleep environment, building up your own inner calm, stilling your mind, and practicing powerful techniques together that you can apply between sessions to enjoy sleeping well each night. Just click the link below, to book a 90-minute sleep session with me and you can also ask me about my 4 session sleep package and its suitability for you.
Look forward to hearing from you very soon :)