Sleep Toolkit - Tools for Optimizing Sleep & Sleep-Wake Timing

Sleep is the foundation of all health: immune function, cognition, longevity, appearance

Sleep underpins mental health, physical health, immune function, wound healing, skin health, cognitive clarity, and lifespan.

"Well, put simply, sleep is the foundation of mental health, physical health, and performance of all kinds, cognitive performance, physical performance, et cetera."

Five forces control your sleep: light, temperature, food timing, exercise, and caffeine

Sleep and wake are governed by light/dark cycles, body temperature shifts, food timing, exercise, and neurochemical changes.

"If your body heats up by one to three degrees or so, you will wake up. So you've got light, dark, temperature, food, exercise."

Get sunlight within 30 min of waking, no sunglasses: this sets your circadian clock

Morning sunlight viewing without sunglasses activates melanopsin cells in the retina that set the circadian clock.

"Unless you have a very special light, the bright artificial lights in your home environment are not, I repeat, are not going to be sufficiently bright to turn on the relevant mechanisms."

Delay caffeine 90-120 min after waking to avoid the afternoon crash

Waiting 90 to 120 minutes after waking before drinking caffeine allows residual adenosine to clear naturally.

"If you delay caffeine intake until 90 to 120 minutes after waking, you will avoid this so-called afternoon crash."

NSDR and naps in early afternoon restore energy without disrupting nighttime sleep

Non-sleep deep rest or short naps in the early afternoon can restore cognitive and physical energy.

"First of all all be careful about ingesting too much caffeine throughout the middle of the day that's kind of an obvious one for the reasons that we talked about earlier second of all if you are a napper and i raise my hand now for those of you listening i'm raising my right hand because i love naps i've always loved naps nowadays i do nsdr or a reverie sleep hypnosis almost every day."

Afternoon sunlight viewing protects against the negative effects of evening artificial light

Getting 5-30 min of sunlight in late afternoon provides a second circadian anchor and buffers against bright light disruption.

"It also serves as a second anchor or reference point for your body and your brain to know where it is in time."

After 10pm, use only candlelight, moonlight, or very dim lights placed low

Overhead fluorescent lights are the worst for nighttime disruption. Candlelight, moonlight, and dimmed low-placed lights are safe.

"Candlelight is fine. Moonlight is fine. Dimming artificial lights is fine, provided they're dimmed way, way down. And again, try and avoid using overhead artificial lights."

Sleep supplement stack: magnesium threonate, apigenin, and theanine

The three core sleep supplements are magnesium threonate, apigenin, and theanine.

"There are supplements that for most people will greatly improve their ability to fall and stay asleep."

Inositol at 900mg improves sleep quality, especially for falling back asleep at 3am

Inositol at 900mg supports the serotonin system and helps people who wake in the middle of the night fall back asleep.

"But that sleep kit doesn't include some of the newer information that I've provided this episode, in particular, the information about inositol and what I'm finding to be the very beneficial use of inositol for the ability to fall back asleep after waking up in the middle of the night, which is something that a lot of people struggle with."