Continuing our (second!) trip through Sleep Optimizing, let’s talk about some important curfews.
Remember our Top 10 Sleep Kryptonites?
Well, several them can be resolved with some pretty straight forward curfews.
We briefly touched on some of them in that recent +1, but these are some super-important, potentially easy Optimizing wins so let’s chat about them real-quick, shall we?
We’ll focus on curfews for these five things: Caffeine + Exercise + Eating + Screens + Work.
Caffeine. As we’ve discussed, caffeine works by masking your fatigue. It basically plugs up the little connectors where adenosine usually tells your brain that you’re tired. BOOM!!! Borrowed energy. It also has a half-life of 5 to 6 hours. So… HALF of that cup of coffee you have at 4:00 PM is still bouncing around in your brain at 10:00 pm.
⃗ Enter: Caffeine curfew: Have your last jolt of caffeine no later than 2:00 pm or noon for the ambitious.
Exercise. Exercise is, of course, A W E S O M E. But… If we work out too late we drive our core temperature up which makes it harder for us to get the deep, restorative sleep we’re looking for. (PLUS: Very importantly, we miss out on the 12-hour mood boost we could be getting if we worked out earlier in the day so…)
⃗ Enter: Exercise curfew: Work out at least 3 hours before you want to go to bed.
Eating. Eating is pretty important, too. lol. But… If your body is digesting a jumbo meal when it should be doing its cleanup thing, our sleep will take a hit.
⃗ Enter: Eating curfew: Have your last meal AT LEAST 2 hours before bedtime. I’m still SHOCKED by how much my sleep has improved by testing out the whole glymph-stimulating 4-hour before bedtime eating plan.
Screens. Have I mentioned 90% of people use their electronic gadgets within an hour of going to sleep? I have? Great. You still acting like everyone else? lol. DIGITAL SUNSET, people!! 🤓
⃗ Enter: Screen curfew: Turn off your electronics AT LEAST an hour before bedtime. Give your brain a chance to chill out. (2+ hours for the ambitious Heroes among us!)
Work. Too many of us work all.the.time. One more time: We need a good ‘ol “Shut-Down Complete!”
⃗ Enter: Work curfew. You tell ME when it’d be great to shutdown. It’s 5:00 pm for me. Done. You?
Sleep Curfews.
Five of them.
Anything jump out at you as an obvious, “Oh, yah! That needs work. I can do THIS” kinda thing?
Fantastic.
What’ll you do TODAY to make TONIGHT even more restorative so TOMORROW is even more awesome?!
High fives.
Moon walks.
Etc.
✋🌝🚶
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