The Ultimate Sleep Challenge
I love challenges. I tackle all sorts of them, like reading 52 books in 52 weeks or limited term diets and lifestyle changes like Dry January, Whole30 or 75Hard and more. I just love trying new things, experimenting, and I find the challenges to be a fun way to get me excited about new approaches.
I get teased about my challenges. After all, as a neurobiologist I know that these things are essentially “tricks” to get me to change my behavior. But frankly, I’m ok with that. I want to trick myself into doing the new behaviors.
Let’s look at the key ingredients to how these kinds of challenges capture our interest and get us hooked:
There are clear and concrete goals to accomplish within a limited time. The limited time thing is so important. I can try anything for a short period of time. I can have willpower and say no to temptation if I know it isn’t forever.
There are rules to abide by. Even though I rebel against others telling me what to do in some facets of my life, I -like most humans- enjoy a certain sense of structure and predictability. Rules help us to stay on the road and avoid calamity. And when we learn strict rules, we can then figure out which rules are important to rigorously adhere to and which ones can be bent a little and still get the same outcomes.
It’s a little competitive. Even if we’re only competing with ourselves, competition keeps things exciting. Can I walk 10,000 steps a day and get the little virtual firework show on my watch? Can I drink 100 ounces of water a day? We set little short-term or daily goals and deadlines to keep the excitement up about meeting long-term objectives.
The science behind each of these ingredients to why a challenge works is fantastic. I’ll come back to these in future blogs to explore more about human behavior and how to inspire ourselves, and those around us, to accomplish goals. But for now, we’ve set the stage for a rule-based, limited time challenge to meet a larger objective. For some people, a challenge can completely change their behavior and life. For others, it’s just an interesting experiment. For any given challenge there are those who will find it easy, hard, or even impossible.
I recently blogged about the stress management benefits of a good night of sleep. So how do we achieve that? Well… I present to you, my all new ultimate sleep challenge. (Stay tuned for more sleep blogs as this concept is under construction!)
Here’s the ultimate sleep habit challenge: No devices in the bedroom for 60 days.
Scenario: You typically stay up late enjoying those evening hours to binge-watch shows, scroll social media, play games, finish items on your list, or just trying to wear yourself out enough to sleep well. Next morning you’re exhausted and drag through the day. To reward yourself for surviving, you stay up late playing. And the cycle continues.
Problem: You’re dragging through the day, not achieving everything you want, irritable and feeling terrible. Small problems seem bigger, your daily challenges seem insurmountable, and you’re living for the end of the evening when you can just quietly check out with your favorite device and distraction. Sleep deprivation is awful for you and you know it! Disrupted and disordered sleeping habits negatively affect your mind and body, leaving you feeling terrible.
Solution: Time to break the cycle and feel better every day!!
Challenge:
Set a bedtime and wake time, create a bedtime routine, and stick to it. Don’t stay up late… for any reason.
Do not engage with devices at bedtime or overnight. In fact, remove all digital devices from the bedroom.
Why does it work? (Part 1)
Lots of people stay up late scrolling social or watching shows, justifying to themselves that they aren’t quite tired yet. They’re trying to “wind down” or “wear out” so that they’ll sleep better. They click off the light but don’t fall asleep, so pick up the phone again to occupy their mind as they try to fall asleep.
But sleep doesn’t work that way.
Have you ever tried to put a kid down for bed and they resist? Even a kid that you know is absolutely exhausted will run wind sprints to and from the bathroom or jump on the bed to prove how not tired they are. In fact, it’s like the more tired they are, the more likely they are to stay up late and not settle. Instead of dozing off during story time they ask for extra stories, insisting they aren’t quite tired enough yet.
What’s up with that?
There are lots of things going on here, but let’s talk about just one of them today.
There’s a part of your brain that’s actually keeping you awake longer when you’re sleep deprived. Put your finger on your temple, then tap your noggin an inch or so above that. Underneath that part of your skull is the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC). That part of the brain is critical for executive functions (decision-making and management of your thoughts). In particular, the dlPFC is critical to your ability to direct attention and disengage from tasks. So the part of your brain in charge of telling you to focus is particularly sensitive to sleep deprivation.
What can happen, and what happens to me sometimes, is that I’ll be exhausted and then become obsessively absorbed in something - binge watching a TV show, watching TikToks, reading a novel, whatever - and then go to bed even later, wake up the next day tired, and repeat. My brain is literally tricking me into staying focused on something and not allowing me to disengage from it. That might be good if I’m working a night shift, but not so good if I need to get some sleep to be able to get up and deal with my day.
Having trouble quieting your brain at night?
It takes practice. Seems easy, but actually it will likely take weeks or even months to consciously, mindfully clear your mind and put it into a sleep-ready state. In fact, this is the heart of the challenge. To learn how to fall asleep and stay asleep when you want to. To quiet your mind and body and allow your brain to truly rest and recover from the work it has done. To give yourself real rest.
Find simple things to grab and hold your attention. Limit the things pulling at your attention to few or even just one thing that is pleasant and not very stimulating.
Digital solutions: White noise, rain sounds, melodic music, meditation routine, or boring audiobook (Hint: beware exciting books or any shows or podcasts that are new… as they’ll keep you awake!)
Non-digital solutions: turn on a fan for white noise, reread an old book, practice meditation or other visualization or relaxation exercises, and more. One exercise I’ve used a lot is visualize walking through an imaginary house with infinite rooms, decorating them in themes that would become more an more abstract as I drifted into sleep (walls of rain, ceiling of cloud, etc.). Another exercise is to sequentially relax each muscle of the body one-by-one.
The ideas here are to use your brain to focus on calm and peaceful things, allowing you to be in a sleep-ready state.
More tips for sleeping well… stay tuned for future blogs!
