Harness Your Inner 100 Year Old, Go To Sleep When You Are Tired, and Rethinking Leads to Happiness
Hi Folks! Connor and Nick here from Healthy Living With Nick and Connor. Thanks again for being on our email list, it means a lot, and we are excited to share our weekly email with you. We hope you enjoy it! Here is what we hope you take away from this one:
Harness your inner 100 year old. Slow your life down a little, do things that you enjoy, sit down for a nice meal, see your friends, and move that body of yours.
If you find yourself lying in bed awake at night, stay awake until you are actually tired, and then go to bed, and keep those screens out of your bed.
Start rethinking the life you have to guarantee you have the life you want.
Starter Mindset Tip: Think Like the People Who Live Until 100
What is a blue zone? It is a geographical area in the world where a larger than normal percentage of the population lives to be 100 years old. These blue zones are all separated by land, oceans, and different cultures, but in order to get into the mindset of these centenarians there are some commonalities that we can all learn from. Do things you enjoy, make time for your friends and family, sit down and slowly eat quality food together, go for walks, and move your body a little bit every day. There isn’t a secret hack, there isn’t a magic pill, what there is is a lifestyle that you can adopt that will make you happier, healthier, and live longer. Next time you are rushing through a meal, or saying no to seeing a friend, or putting off doing that thing that you enjoy, think about the people around the world that are living to 100 years old, and ask yourself what they would be doing. They make time for what makes them happy, what makes them healthy. They aren’t thinking about it as making them healthier, the things that they do are just a part of their lives. We all have more time now than we think. If we put off what we want to do because we think we will have more time tomorrow, then we are not being realistic with ourselves. Get back to creating a lifestyle that nurtures your interests, that allows you to slow down a little, that prioritizes the people that are important to you — get into the mind of a centenarian.
Health Recipe to Try Out: What To Do if You Find Yourself Lying Awake in Bed
Timing: Staying awake a little longer than usual
Level of Difficulty: Easy to stay awake, easier to fall asleep
Serving Size: Do this until you build back your confidence to fall asleep when you get in bed
Spice Level: Spicy to stay awake and get tired, but sweet once you can fall asleep quickly again
INGREDIENTS
Just yourself, a later bedtime, and a renewed skill of falling asleep again
REASONING AND BENEFITS
Alright, if you are here and you have already read the “Quieting the Mind” recipe, that means that you are still struggling with falling asleep. So what now? The goal now is to teach your brain that your bed is for sleeping when you are tired. Stay with us here. If you do other things in your bed such as check out your phone, watch TV, or do your finances, your brain will attach many different things to your bed instead of just sleeping. Stop doing those things in bed, and then do not go to bed until you are very tired. This will mean that you stay awake longer than usual. This may seem counterproductive to your goal of sleeping better, but, as we try to show your brain that your bed is only for sleeping, we need to get you in bed only when you are tired so that your body and brain have no choice but to fall asleep. When you stay awake longer than normal, your sleep pressure (adenosine) will build and build, making you more and more tired. While you let this sleep pressure build, instead of focusing on going to sleep, focus on seeing how long you can stay awake. We sometimes create sleep anxiety when we start worrying about if we are going to fall asleep or not, incapacitating us from being able to sleep. Focusing on staying awake will get rid of the sleep anxiety. Alright, it’s time to teach your body how to fall asleep again.
INSTRUCTIONS
If you have been struggling to fall asleep lately, and you find yourself stressing out about whether you are going to fall asleep or not then it is time to switch up your routine.
No TV and no phones in your bed, just keep your bed for sleeping.
Go to bed only when you are very tired, so your body has no choice but to fall asleep.
Stay awake later than usual to set yourself up for maybe a 6 hour sleep. This will build up your sleep pressure and get you ready for sleep.
Instead of worrying about whether you are going to fall asleep or not, think about how long you can stay awake to keep the sleep stress at bay.
If you are laying in bed awake for longer than 20 minutes, go to another room and do something relaxing until you are very tired again and try again.
Once you are feeling better about falling asleep quickly, and the sleep stress is going away, switch back to your normal bed time to give you 7-9 hours of sleep.
PRO TIP: I know it sounds strange to sleep less when you are having trouble falling asleep, but this is the key step to the process. You really need to feel very tired before you lay in bed. This will give yourself the best chance of falling asleep easily.
* Make sure to wake up at your normal wake up time even after going to sleep late because this will allow your sleep pressure to build up throughout the day to set yourself up for sleep that night as well.
** Stay away from naps while you are trying to fix your falling asleep game. Try a non sleep deep rest instead if you are feeling very tired during the day. (Search non sleep deep rest online and follow along)
*** Having trouble falling asleep is completely normal. The good news is that you can make small easy tweaks to get back to those easy sleeps that you take for granted when you are falling asleep well.
Dessert Quote:
“Our identities are open systems, and so are our lives. We don’t have to stay tethered to old images of where we want to go or who we want to be. The simplest way to start rethinking our options is to question what we do daily. It takes humility to reconsider our past commitments, doubt to question our present decisions, and curiosity to reimagine our future plans. Rethinking liberates us to do more than update our knowledge and opinions – it’s a tool for leading a more fulfilling life.” Adam Grant, Think Again, 243
Now we want to hear from YOU! Please let us know what you think of today’s newsletter, and send us an example of how you applied the health recipe to your life! We would love to share how you introduced this week’s recipe into your life’s unique menu. Thanks and have a great Sunday!
Sources:
Learn more about sleep:
Walker, M. (2017). Why we sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams. Simon and Schuster.
Learn more about rethinking your life and views:
Grant, A. (2021). Think again: The Power of Knowing What You Don’t Know. Random House.
