Finding Mastery with Dr. Michael Gervais - The Recipe For Great Sleep - How To Get Your Best Rest | Dr. Aric Prather

Episode Date: August 9, 2023

Sleep is fundamental to our survival. It’s kind of like oxygen, yet most of us don’t view these essential functions through the same lens. In order to perform at our best, live long & healthy lives, and to explore our potential… we have to put the same value on sleeping that we do breathing. Lucky for us, our guest today does exactly that - Dr. Aric Prather is a renowned professor, sleep scientist, clinical psychologist, and head of one of the world’s most successful sleep clinics at University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). Aric’s expertise lies in the fascinating world of sleep and its effects on our health and emotions.In his latest book, "The Sleep Prescription: Seven Days to Unlocking Your Best Rest," Aric offers a simple yet powerful plan to transform your sleep in just one week. Beyond the typical solutions, he shares surprisingly simple yet deeply effective techniques that will guide you in embracing the magic of restorative sleep.In this conversation, you’ll hear about why sleep starts the moment you wake up; how sex plays a role in the quality of your sleep; the psychology of building habits around sleep; the ideal length for a nap; and so much more. Whether you are someone for whom sleep seems elusive or you’re just trying to fine tune your sleep from “good” to “great”, Aric’s insights will guide you to that restful state where your body effortlessly does what it was built to do: sleep well._________________Subscribe to our Youtube Channel for more powerful conversations at the intersection of high performance, leadership, and meaning: https://www.youtube.com/c/FindingMasteryGet exclusive discounts and support our amazing sponsors! Go to: https://findingmastery.com/sponsors/Subscribe to the Finding Mastery newsletter for weekly high performance insights: https://www.findingmastery.com/newsletter Download Dr. Mike's Morning Mindset Routine! https://www.findingmastery.com/morningmindsetFollow us on Instagram, LinkedIn, and X.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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stay present and engaged with my thinking and writing. If you wanna slow down, if you wanna work smarter, I highly encourage you to check them out. Visit remarkable.com to learn more and grab your paper pro today. You don't get to choose when you fall asleep, right? Like sleep isn't something that you make happen. Sleep is something that happens to you. Okay. Welcome back or welcome to the Finding Mastery podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Michael Gervais, by trade and training a high-performance psychologist. And I'm stoked to welcome Dr. Eric Prather to the podcast for this week's conversation. Sleep is fundamental, fundamental to our survival. It's kind of like oxygen, yet

most of us don't view these essential functions through the same lens. In order to perform at our best, to live long and healthy lives, to explore our potential, we have to put the same value on sleeping that we do on breathing. Lucky for us, our guest today does exactly that. Dr. Prather is all about sharing the research-driven techniques and solutions that make restorative sleep a reality. As a renowned sleep scientist, a clinical psychologist, and head of one of the world's most successful sleep clinics at UCSF, Eric is changing the game for so many people, and I hope after listening to his insights,

you'll understand why. In this conversation, you'll hear about why sleep starts the moment you wake up, how sex plays a role in the quality of your sleep, the psychology of building habits around sleep, the ideal length for a nap, and so much more. With that, let's dive right into this week's conversation with Dr. Eric Prather. Eric, how are you? I'm great. Great. I'm so happy to be here. Sleep is really important for me personally and obviously for our community. So we're really

excited to have you here. But before we jump in, like, how did you sleep last night? You know, I actually slept, you know, pretty well. It was, you know, a typical night. I live in San Francisco, so I slept with like our sliding glass door open to get some of that cool fog air. But there's something about the fog horn that goes on during the night that I find so soothing. So for me, it was pretty good. All right. So the sleep prescription. For me, it was pretty good. All right. So The Sleep Prescription. It's a nice little compact, small read that has all the essentials in sleep in there.

And so sleep is obviously foundational for living a good life. And why did you want to write this book now? You know, my job, I do most of it is research on how sleep affects health and kind of what impacts our sleep. But I also, you know, help run a clinic at the University of California, San Francisco, where we treat people with insomnia. And our wait list is just really, really long. There are not enough providers. Unlike a lot of things in the behavioral space, in the psychological space, we've worked out, you know, fairly consistently, like, how sleep works. I mean, there's so much to be discovered, for sure. But, like, how to improve sleep behaviorally without medicines, you know, there's a lot of strong empirical research to support what we do, which is cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia. And so the

goal of this book was to really try to scale that, to kind of distill it for the public, kind of the principles that we know regulate sleep so that more people can get the sleep that they need. Okay, awesome. So sleep is, like I said, a game changer when you get it right. And when you don't have it right, the, the compromises for health, wellbeing, performance, overall, just kind of zest for life is real. I'll start with a framework for me. It's like, I, I, I compete within myself to my best abilities to organize my day, to get my sleep right. And so sleep is really important for me and my family. And so that's why I'm excited to have this conversation with you. And I would also say that I struggle a bit with sleep. And so hopefully like we can have a little bit of personal coaching in

here as well. So, but let me go, let me go up one more level. Why now? Like what is happening now that sleep has a waiting list in your laboratory? Yeah, you know, I think, so we know from kind of the population level data that there's a lot of people just struggling to get to sleep and to stay asleep. There was a huge uptick in this during the pandemic. I think, though, I would argue that over the last decade that I've been doing this and people around the country have been doing this kind of work, you know, there's become this thirst for understanding sleep. People are beginning to kind of take notice, kind of wake up to the importance of sleep. And so that's really exciting. But, you know, there's still a lot of

need. I mean, I think the stressors of daily life, the way in which we manage our time, oftentimes sleep takes a backseat to that, right? There's a cost to kind of some of the things that we do in our life and trying to squeeze every moment out of it, which, of course, you know, as a, as people that like to compete, like kind of want to kind of be as successful as possible, that takes time. But oftentimes, I think people don't recognize that the investment that you put in sleep actually puts you in a better position the following day, and puts you in a better position to kind of do all the things that you really want to accomplish. And, and some people just need some help and kind of do all the things that you really want to accomplish. And some people just need some help in kind of figuring out how to get that done. Okay. So let's go big

picture one more time before we drill into some practical, because the hope through this conversation is that we'll have some very clear practical takeaways. However, if we can be precise with practical takeaways for the general population, then practical takeaways for people that might have onset insomnia, some people that might have, you know, they intermittently wake throughout the night, and maybe some people that just wake up too early. But if we start in a big order for a moment is what are the big groupings of sleep disorders and how do you characterize them? How should we be thinking about them? From a diagnostic perspective, right, the big two of sleep disorders are people with insomnia, and people with obstructive sleep apnea, right? So insomnia is the kind of inability to fall asleep or stay asleep, despite kind of having having adequate opportunity to do so. And, you know, insomnia disorder is, you know, it happens at least three times a week for three months.

And it causes you kind of daytime dysfunction. Obstructive sleep apnea is very different in that it's kind of a respiratory problem where you kind of cease breathing during the night. You know, there's an occlusion of the airway. And, you know, this causes you to wake up because your body is reacting to that, right? You kind of, you know, it increases your sympathetic drive and arousal system and can cause kind of hypoxia. And then kind of another bin that, you know, we certainly see in our clinic are folks that have circadian rhythm

disorders, right? So this is kind of the idea that some people are just built to be a night owl or to be kind of what we call people that go to bed early and get up early, a morning lark. And that causes challenges for them because the world isn't set up for them, right? And so it's kind of this mismatch of your kind of endogenous rhythm and kind of the time on the wall and when things open up and when they close. But I mean, I think if we were just kind of distilled to the two biggest drivers of sleep challenges in the United States, certainly it's insomnia and obstructive sleep apnea.

And then there's kind of people that get insufficient amounts of sleep, right? These are people that are just short, not getting the sleep they need. And in some cases, that's due to insomnia or due to a clinical sleep disorder. Other times, it's due to kind of opportunity, right? We know across the population that sleep opportunity is not evenly distributed, right? There are segments of the population that don't have an option to sleep as well as they could. They have to be night shift workers. Their jobs require that they keep these short hours, or they have so many obligations and stressors in their lives that sleep kind of takes a back seat, and they would get more if they could,

right? And so, you know, I think that really seems to cover kind of the broader perspective of what sleep health and sleep health challenges look like across the population. I'm going to pause the conversation here for just a few minutes to talk about our sponsors. Finding Mastery is brought to you by LinkedIn Sales Solutions.

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And a few of our teammates here at Finding Mastery have been loving the fudge brownie and peanut butter. I know, Stuart, you're still listening here. So getting enough protein matters. And that can't be understated, not just for strength, but for energy and focus, recovery, for longevity. And I love that David is making that easier. So if you're trying to hit your daily

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Are they doing great? Like where's that 70%? Because I want to speak to both populations on how to think about getting better, unless you wave it off and say, no, that 70%, they got it. They nailed it. And I'm, and if that's the case, I'm a little deflated because I work my ass off and I don't feel like I don't, I'm not in that 30%. I don't think like, like maybe we'll we'll be a little smarter at the end of this conversation about my disorders here. But like, no, yeah, no, I mean, that's it's a really it's a really good point. Right. I mean, and I think in in in this book and I think just the way that I think about sleep is, you know, there's a lot of variability. Like there's a lot of night to night differences that happen. And each night, you know, maybe there's an opportunity to try to

kind of do a little bit better. Right. And, and, you know, I think it, but, but, you know, I kind of temper that with, you know, kind of the focusing on each individual night. And, you know, what you said in the beginning, where you kind of put a lot of time and thinking, you know, trying to structure your day to ensure the sleep that you get the sleep you need. For some people, people that maybe carry a bit of anxiety, a little bit of perfectionism, that actually can spin out into insomnia, right? People start to really worry and spend a lot of mental effort to get to sleep. And so, you know, that's something that, you know, I'm always kind of on guard about. But I do think, and I think, you know, you talk to your neighbors, you talk to

your friends, they maybe say, you know, get a good amount of sleep that they feel like is kind of within these recommendations. But, you know, they don't maybe feel their best. The principles that we use for, you know, treating people with insomnia behaviorally really do apply to everyone, right? It's just, it's because they're kind of foundational in how sleep is regulated. And so, you know, those are things that you can layer on into your life to see if it can make a meaningful difference. Now, in some cases, it's not about sleep at all, right?

Like it can be about things that happen in your day that maybe kind of show up in your sleep, but are not kind of sleep specific things. Like, you know, we know that there are a few things that can enhance deep sleep, right? So deep sleep measured in the laboratory is kind of the amount of slow wave oscillations in what is called N3 sleep. And, you know, in the population, it's, you know, for a healthy person, you know, it's somewhere, it ranges, but like 10 to 20% of the night, maybe a little bit more on some nights. But, you know, how do you move that around? How do you enhance that? Which we think is this really restorative aspect of sleep. And it turns out that one of the things that we know can improve it or

enhance it is physical activity, right? So like particularly kind of high intensity exercise has been shown to enhance deep sleep. So now that's not really something that you think about as like a sleep specific thing that you're working on. But you know, they feed each other so so importantly, that, you know, there are lots of things that people can do to try to kind of optimize their sleep through through these means. Okay, so let's start with some of those. And, and I if I heard you clearly, you said, the same best practices for somebody that might have one of the insomnia disorders are the same best practices behaviorally maybe cognitively for folks that are doing pretty well but would like to do better and is that yeah is that accurate

okay and then um before we drill down i'll just give you some context is that i so this is where it gets tricky for me personally and i bet there's other people like me is that I care about sleep. So that's what I mean. I'm competing about it. I don't run anxious about it, but I'm, I'm thoughtful about making sure that I'm doing my very best, but not, I don't need to be perfect. Like last night I had some, some colleagues in town. I had one, there was a moment. So we had two glasses, I had two glasses of wine and I'm like, ah, this is going to get my sleep. And then we looked at each other like, want one more? I knew it was going to fuck my sleep up, you know? And, and, and it did like, so I woke up and I did not feel restored. I, I think we all know this feeling.

And my deep sleep was 3%. And so that was the uniqueness of last night. But on a regular basis, my deep sleep, even though I have a high-intensity interval training program, and fitness matters to me, I struggle like to get 10%. And so constantly when I look at like the wearables and I've got the aura ring that I bought into that, you know, it's hard for me to get it. And so I'll look for a little tweaks in possibly deep sleep optimization. But let's let's not start with the alcohol and the shaming moment, although I think I think it is probably there's some good learnings there. But where do you want to go from the bit of a narrative I just shared with you?

First of all, I completely agree with your perspective, though my bread and butter is like talking about sleep and how important it is and like making sure the message gets out. Like I also am like not the fun police. Like I think there's like so much more to life. And I think I start from the perspective that, you know, we're kind of built for sleeping. And what I mean by that is, you know, your body will compensate, right? So like your sleep was, you know, a little bit worse than it is usually, right? And, you know, the trade-off was there. You knew the information. You knew what would probably happen.

And you made a decision. And that's fine. The good news is that tonight, you know, assuming that you, you know, you don't drink the same amount of alcohol, you'll likely be sleepy a little bit earlier. Your sleep will be more restorative or deeper. It'll be certainly likely more consolidated. And there is this kind of recovery mechanism that our body will do. Now, that doesn't mean that you can kind of go weeks and weeks and weeks of kind of restricted

sleep and just assume you can make that up because we're, you know, we're starting to learn that there is this cost biologically of kind of shorting yourself on sleep, right? And that's where we get into kind of all the population level data around, you know, people who get insufficient amounts of sleep are at increased risk for cardiovascular disease, cardiometabolic conditions, kind of growing evidence that it might be related to neurodegenerative diseases, things like that. And a lot of what we do is around like infectious illness. And we know that, you know, people who don't get enough sleep and then they're exposed to a virus are more likely to get sick from it. And so, you know, all of those things are true. But, you know, if you narrow it down in kind of a day-to-day basis, you know, we're flexible, we're dynamic. And, you know, sleep is so fundamental to our being as a human

or as a species and kind of written into our genetic code in such a way that we can rebound back. And so that's, I think that's really important. I think that's really important for people to know about their sleep because I do get a lot of people come into my clinic, you know, with their aura data or with, you know, with this issue of like, you know, I didn't get enough sleep. Like, am I going to get Alzheimer's, you know, and those sorts of things. And it's not as kind of clear cut as that. Thankfully, it really starts with kind of as soon as you wake up, right? Like, they're like, I think of kind of our day and night, it's kind of part of this 24 hour tapestry. And, and, you know, there are moments where we can really begin to increase

the likelihood that we're going to have a better night of sleep on average. And so whenever people are trying to improve their sleep, the first thing that I always recommend is that they kind of regulate their wake-up time and try to keep it together seven days a week to keep it stable. Now, not everybody reacts well to that, right? Like people love sleeping in on the weekends and kind of cherishing that extra time, right? And that can be really nourishing that those hours. I think that's totally fine if you're not trying to work on your sleep.

Like if your sleep's well-regulated and you're not worried about it, like that's fine. I mean, if you're sleeping in kind of like dramatically number of hours, like two extra hours on the weekend in the morning, you maybe wanna take a look at like what's going on in the week because that's really probably a sign of like

not getting enough sleep during the week that's kind of accrued over time. And then your body is trying to make that up, this recovery mechanism. But, you know, we know that regulating your wake up time, you know, really sets in line two things, the two things that regulate our sleep, the two primary biological drivers. The first is our circadian rhythm. So kind of our endogenous internal rhythm. And that is, you know, largely entrained by sunlight. But, you know, keeps kind of your internal, you know, there's a master clock that kind of regulates the different, you know, clocks in your organs and

your cells. And the more that that can be stabilized, kind of the better just things work. Like our body is just more efficient. It's more optimized for performance when that's regulated. And then the second thing that waking up at the same time does is it starts what is like our homeostatic sleep drive. So our sleep drive is just kind of this very simple idea that like the longer you're awake, the sleepier you get. You don't get to choose when you fall asleep, right? Like sleep isn't something that you make happen. Sleep is something that happens to you.

And when people have insomnia and they're told to go to bed, well, you know, the sleep doctor said go to bed at 11 o'clock. You know, if we set a bedtime instead of a stable wake-up time, that really can create a lot of anxiety. And so, but if you maintain a stable wake-up time, people tend to kind of use the same amount of energy throughout the day, and then your bedtime will get more, you know, predictable. So when I read your insight that good sleep starts when you wake up, I was like, that's on it. Like that's, it's a very applied right down the lane of CBT as an approach strategy. And so the first thing that you're saying is that good sleep starts with when you wake up, meaning being consistent with your wake up time and how, so I'll do six days, like five days, my schedule's pretty structured

in my wake up. And then on the sixth day, Saturday, I slide into the same wake up time. And then if I don't, and I don't set my alarm on the weekends and then Sunday though, I'll find that I'm like, I'll wake up about an hour later. And so I know that I know your position and I know the research, but it feels good. And I know it's like I'm changing a time zone, right? So, so it does feel good. Yeah. So what would you say not my be a little bit more disciplined or would you say, okay, well, you know, like how you do it on, and I'm, I'm getting between seven and eight hours on a regular basis. Would you say be more disciplined in the week or enjoy that Saturday or that Sunday extra 45 minutes to an hour? Yeah. So, I mean, I think in that example and for someone who's not kind of worried about their

sleep, like that's probably fine. I think that would be one option to see if you wanted to try to do a behavioral experiment, that could be something that you could add on, right? To see. But if it ends up being a trade-off to like, well, and now I'm grumpy all day because I didn't get like this, like nice morning, you know, behavior that you were doing, then, you know, maybe it's not worth doing. I mean, I think- It would not be that. You know, your point is well taken. It would not be a grumpiness if I woke up early. It would just, it's like a bit more discipline and like, you know, so I'm going to, I like what you just said.

It's a behavioral experiment. And maybe for folks that are new to that thought, you can open that up a little because that's, it's a really nice thought. And I also want to get some of the other wake up goals that you have, like, you know, starting your sleep routine as soon as you wake up. Like, I think, in a lot of these things, there are a number of potential actions that people can take to try to improve their sleep. Now, my typical stance is that, you know, the things that are outlined in this book and, you know, any kind of like CBT for insomnia type course, if someone or someone trying to treat insomnia is that, you know,

it's more like a recipe than a menu, right? Like they kind of build on each other to kind of enhance someone's sleep experience and undo the things that have come up that can really impact people's sleep. I mean, another good example of a behavioral experiment is around alcohol. I mean, you know, like if you regularly have like a nightcap or a couple of glasses of wine close to bedtime, go two weeks without it and see if that changes your sleep. In most cases, after a week or two, people really do notice a difference. And in some cases, it's sneaky. It's like, I didn't even know my sleep was that bad.

And then all of a sudden, you're like, gosh, I didn't need that extra cup of coffee in the morning. I don't know what's going on. I just didn't feel like having it. I think one of the things that is beautiful about this wearable technologies and things of that like is that we can begin to track it, right? We can get like lots of really insightful data, at least on the realm of, you know, total sleep time and how fragmented someone's sleep is. And you can track it over time. And you know, when you started the experiment, and you can see the progression in the data. And I think,

you know, there's this opportunity for individuals to do that in a way that, you know, wasn't as easily accessible. And I think that's really exciting for the sleep science, for sure. I ditto that as well. And on this building of your day to have great sleep at night, you know, there was in a New York Times article that you said, reward yourself for getting out of bed. It's a great, this is a great idea. That could be, you know, there was in a New York Times article that you said, reward yourself for getting out of bed. It's a great, this is a great idea. That could be, you know, heading to your favorite coffee shop or like what else would you insert after that? Like, I love this idea.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, you know, like I think particularly when you're trying to build a habit, you know, you sometimes you need a carrot, right? Like it's and ideally, and ideally it's something that's meaningful for you. And, and, you know, so I, so I like think about myself, like, you know, I have an 11 year old and a seven year old and they're kind of, you know, great to be around, but like not all the time. And so I love that, like, you know, hour before they wake up or, you know, I'm like a big sunrise guy. So I like, I like that kind of stuff. And so, you know, I mean, I can imagine for me, you know, like, you know, get, you know, stabilize my wake time, getting a cup of coffee and like

watching the local news or like, you know, be, you know, being out by myself, like not being on as, as, as the, like in, in dad mode. But, you know, I, I've worked with lots of patients that have, you know, come up with creative lots of patients that have, you know, come up with creative things like I had, you know, because we live in San Francisco, you know, some people that I've worked with, you know, they live near enough to the ocean. And so they got into this habit of like, okay, well, I need to get up at, you know, seven or eight every morning, six every morning. And they got up, you know, and then immediately got outside, kind of did this walk on the beach that they didn't do

otherwise. And it was just like a great moment for them to kind of get some clarity, get themselves together. And, you know, it became this routine that, you know, we also know that like social connections are so critical for people. And so I've had instances where people will go to a coffee shop and kind of begin, you know, if you notice, if you go to a coffee shop enough times in a row in the morning, you'll see that there's like the same people there every time they like, it's like a community that you build. And for this individual, it became like really part of like a, you know, an extension of his family. And it was, you know, and they could, they had kind of conversations, inside jokes, things that kept them going. I've had other people that like, we'll get up and like call a loved one, you know, ideally, especially if there's someone in like different time zones and make that a

routine and things that, you know, are, you know, intrinsic. And, you know, just part of kind of the social makeup of, you know, how what things that we find important going outside and walking, you've taken a walk, or, you know, if you have a pet doing the dog walk, getting that sunlight in your eyes, it's just has a biological imprint, it shuts, if you have a pet doing the dog walk, getting that sunlight in your eyes is just has a biological imprint. It shuts down your melatonin production and it helps in train your your kind of endogenous biological clock such that, you know, it becomes kind of more predictable. And and so all of those things will make the habit building a little bit easier. OK, quick pause here to share some

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how we can create the conditions for high performance. How do we protect our ability to focus, to recover, to be present? And one of the biggest challenges we face today is our sheer amount of screen time. It messes with our sleep, our clarity, even our mood. And that's why I've been using Felix Grey glasses. What I appreciate most about Felix Grey is that they're just not another wellness product. They're rooted in real science. Developed alongside leading researchers and ophthalmologists, they've demonstrated these types of glasses boost melatonin, help you fall asleep faster, and hit deeper stages of rest. When I'm on the road and bouncing around between time zones, slipping on my Felix Grays in the evening, it's a simple way to cue my body just to wind down. And when I'm locked into deep work,

they also help me stay focused for longer without digital fatigue creeping in. Plus, they look great. Clean, clear, no funky color distortion. Just good design, great science. And if you're ready to feel the difference for yourself, Felix Gray is offering all Finding Mastery listeners 20% off. Just head to felixgray.com and use the code findingmastery20 at checkout. Again, that's felixgray. You spell it F-E-L-I-X-G-R-A-Y.com and use the code findingmastery20 at felixgray.com for 20% off. And with that, let's jump right back into our conversation. You know what I appreciate about this, your thoughtfulness here is that you're grounding your approach in good science. And the science here, just to be specific, is if when you're starting a new habit, when you want to build a habit, make sure that you're celebrating around it.

Make sure that there's a reward that comes with it that you can quickly pair. Pavlov's dog, you know, is the example many people know, but it's really clever. And so I'll give you a fun analogy in a second or comparison in a minute. But this is like, if we just extract out from sleep for a minute, that science is really important, is if you want to build something new, including sleep, is to start with in the morning. I find that building habits is easier in the morning because there's more available energy or willpower, you know, quote, unquote. And then I celebrate like a wild person when, you know, and then that celebration will wean, you know, but it's like, I've got to have my back. I've got to have some fun around the things that I'm trying to get better at. And so I really like your cleverness around the reward structure, but also like it's

intrinsic, meaning that it's, you're calling somebody on, on maybe on the East coast or it's your favorite coffee shop or being social, whatever. This is really nice, you know, as a, as a connection in relationships and a connection to yourself. So I just want to pause and say, in many respects, this might be the good life. And Dr. Robert Waldinger from the Classic Harvard study was on the podcast earlier, and he talked about that is the good life, relationships. And so now you're pairing good science with good habit formation with sound, oh, I don't know, best practices to get good sleep. So so i just want

to pause and say i see your science and i really appreciate it but if there's a cleverness to it that i really appreciate well thank you thank you yeah so nice of you to say yeah for sure okay so um slight slight pivot here so you've hit on a few times of this idea of chronotype and like the get up in the morning type of person. And, you know, there's some literature around from Michael Bruce, who's also done a bunch of work on sleep, and he's got four chronotypes. I don't know if you're familiar with them or how you describe the chronotypes, but he talks about the lion early to bed, early to rise. He talks about the bear, which is the most common, which is, you know, people are more productive before noon. And then, you know, they, they kind of cycle aligned with the sun, meaning that they start to get tired when the sun goes down. The wolf late night, late morning, which is like fun to

think about. And the dolphin, they have trouble finding consistent sleep schedules because, you know, there's like the, the way that they, they breach twice, you know, throughout the day. And so do you, do you like those four? Do you have a different type of chronotyping that, that you help, you know, people think through? And then I've got a super applied question right on the heels of that. Yeah. I mean, I, I I'll admit, I mean, I know who Michael Bruce is for sure, but I, I, I wasn't aware of these chronotypes, but I, I like them. I mean, I have nothing to say bad about them. Uh, I mean, you know, I like, I think in the literature and in kind of the research literature, it's, you know, we focus primarily on the extremes, but you know, I think he's, there's a good kind of middle group there

that maybe could be broken up this, this bear and dolphin. I mean, there's a good kind of middle group there that maybe could be broken up, this bear and dolphin. I mean, there's certainly people that have kind of this kind of almost like free running like chronotype where they just like kind of cycle through, you know, beyond a 24 hour day. What we run into the most is our people that have kind of delayed sleep phase syndrome. So these are people that are these night owls, or, I guess, the wolf, and the wolf, the wolf. And, and, you know, that can be challenging, because, you know, obviously, they end up getting kind of short amounts of sleep, right? Because like, they're usually they don't have the same autonomy in their wake up time. Also, you know, they often maybe misdiagnosed as having insomnia. Yeah, right. That, you know, because they become really worried about the fact that they like can't fall asleep. But, you know, there's, there's,

there's, you know, some good evidence that, you know, certainly for like these like lifelong experiences, it's, you know, it's genetically driven, right? There are familial cases of kind of delayed sleep phase and advanced sleep phase. And, and in those cases, I mean, we do have these behavioral techniques of like melatonin supplementation and light exposure to try to shift people. But it's, it's kind of like swimming upstream forever, right? And so, because it's, you know, it's so genetically driven. And that can be challenging for people. And I certainly have had cases where, you know, people have set up their lives to accommodate this. And, but then they then they get a new manager. And they're like, Oh, well, now we now we have to have 8am meetings and like kind of

their whole life falls apart, because they're because they're just like biologically not built for that type of environment. And people usually end up getting a new job or something to begin to accommodate that. So, I mean, it's true that most of us are in the middle. It does change as we age. You know, certainly when we're teenagers, we're more likely to show a delayed sleep phase phenotype, which can be further reinforced nowadays by social media and opportunities to do things late at night. And then as we get older, there is some evidence to suggest that we move closer to a more advanced phase.

If you think about your grandparents that all of a sudden started getting up at 4 in the morning and going to bed at 7 p.m., things like that. And that's thought to be potentially, for some people, part of the life course course but most of us are kind of in the in the middle yep cool and mine has changed over time like i think i was a wolf like in college you know like yeah and um i i know i'm not a lion i i i married a lion and um you know so this was the super practical and mine has changed um i'm not a dolphin. I'm more of the bear, which is like I'm more productive before noon. And then I'm starting to get a little sleepier around, you know, the sundown.

But then but then I turn the lights on and I want to do some other stuff like I don't want to fall asleep. So that like when I say I got to compete, it's like I need to listen to my body more. And so so I'll pause there, but I'm married. This is the super applied side is I married a lion. She loves to get up early, early, early to bed, early to rise. And so I want to like have conversations and do stuff like post dinner and whatever. And she's like, I'm starting to get tired. Like, so the applied bit is like, like respect your partner's cycle. Like it's really, we've been married 35 years and I now know respect your partner's cycle. And so I don't

want her to impose her cycle on me and I don't want to impose my cycle on her. So, um, I don't know. I don't know if you have any thoughts about that, but. I mean, this comes up all the time, as you might imagine, because, you know, a majority of, you know, adults kind of share the bed with another person. And, you know, as we age, you know, our sleep can change, our preferences can change. And, you know, I always, and my experience has been, you know, people that have severe insomnia, they like strangely have paired themselves with someone who's like, sleeps like a rock, right? So like now every night they're like wide awake and they're like looking at their partner who has been, you know, sleeping like the dead. But, you know, and I always

think, you know, I always raise that like, you know, like the good news is that we don't typically choose a mate based on their sleeping preferences. Like presumably there are other things that you, you know, attracted you to them and we just need to kind of figure out how to, how to make this work. And, you know, you really want to keep the bed for sleep. Like it's like a shrine to sleep, right? Like I said, we say like sleep and sex and like otherwise, you know, because the bed

plays such an important environmental trigger role in like bringing on the feeling of sleepiness. But, you know, people do lots of other things in bed. Like they read, they watch TV, whatever. Like they have these moments together as couples that are like really nourishing to their relationship. And in some cases when I've met with people, they're like, it's a deal breaker. They're like, no, we're not going to not do that. And they're like, and I'm like, okay, like we'll get as far as we can. But, you know, again, this is like a recipe, not a menu. And, you know, maybe it just won't cook. It won't bake the same way.

And we'll see where we're at because like it's about trade-offs. And some of it is just like people aren't aware of the things that they might be doing wrong or that might be causing challenges in their sleep. And then, you know, it's a decision of whether you want to kind of enact those things. And I think there are a lot of things that are about relationships and kind of that experience with one another that might trump kind of like a bad night of sleep, right? Like it's like, and that's okay.

It's just kind of knowing where you're making the decision to do this versus that versus, you know, you know, people that have insomnia, it's like, they feel like their sleep is broken, like something's happening to them. And oftentimes it's like, we're in our own way. And so it's just kind of letting people know that and providing alternatives, but you know, you don't want to cause a divorce over it. I mean, yeah, right. Okay. So you bring up sleep and sex and you have, there's like, as a, as just thinking about behavioral psychology for just a minute, I get that we want to pair our pillow with sleep. Like that's a really good, so it was a game changer for me when I first came across that research. I was like, Oh, don't read in bed so i read in a chair and in in the bedroom and it was a game changer for

for me and so let's talk about sex for just a minute is that as like thinking through behavioral lenses if the idea is to pair your pillow with sleepiness and then also your bed with sex, like sex is a stimulant. And then, so tell me how like those two square other than convenience. You know, it, yeah, you know, like, so, I mean, one would make the, you know, potentially make the argument that, you know, sex may have sleep benefits, right? Like, so that, that is like what people have suggested. Okay, tell me more, tell me more. And particularly orgasm, right? Like, so that is like what people have. Okay, tell me more, tell me more. And particularly orgasm, right? So, you know, the notion is that

some of the neurochemical effects of orgasm can, you know, provide kind of a relaxation response and help people sleep better. And there are kind of research studies to, you know, not as rigorous as maybe you'd want, but to suggest that, you know, when people have sex, they may sleep better that night than if they didn't. But, you know, is that because of HRV? Like, it's not the actual orgasm? Is it the parasympathetic activation or the sympathetic rebound? Like what's happening there?

So, I mean, I think the mechanism is not as, you know, as clear cut. You know, certainly, you know, the rebound in parasympathetic nervous system, kind of that kind of vagal rebound is certainly important for facilitating sleep, for sleep onset. You know, there are thoughts that like oxytocin release may have a neurochemical effect and kind of helping to facilitate sleep. Meaning that you feel bonded to your partner and there's a safety that comes with that? Or is it just the oxytocin in and of itself? I think the idea is that it might just be the oxytocin. Because I think the idea is that, you know, people could potentially masturbate and help sleep, right? And it would be like, you know, something like that.

Okay. to pair the two between like masturbation or self-sex and sex with a partner is that I was talking to one of the scientists at one of the technologies, the wearable technologies, and they said, oh, I think we can tell when somebody is masturbating versus having sex. And I thought that was interesting bit of research. And I asked for the data and they didn't send it. It was like, you know, maybe it was a cheeky comment, but at the same time, where they were going with the research, and this is six years ago, where they're going with their internal research was that self-sex or masturbation does not increase sleep, but sex with partner might be increasing sleep. So can you square that up a little bit with some of your research and wave it off if you say, hmm, I haven't seen it. Yeah, I know. I mean, you know, like it's super interesting.

I mean, we have done a little bit of research in this space. You know, I think it's not quite published yet. But where we, you know, do find by self-report, you know, when we were doing this work and I was doing this with my colleague, Wendy Barry-Mendez here at UCSF. And we're like, well, what we need is like a randomized trial, like, you know, like to all these different conditions. And like, how fun would that be to try to get it through the institutional review board? Exactly. And of course, we wouldn't have any problem, you know, recruiting people.

It's so in line with us trying to understand the sleep experience. And you bring up something around the feeling of safety. And gosh, isn't sleep really about safety? Yeah, that's why I wanted to kind of pull on that a bit. Yeah, I know. I mean, it's such a great point. I mean, like if you, if you take a step back and think about sleep, it's like, it's a pretty risky proposition, right? To like be away from the world. And if you meet people that have experienced trauma, you know, their sleep, their hypervigilance is, is often through the roof. And it's really about this inability to let go. Right. And that's what you need to do. And for some people, you know, they can only sleep with, with a loved one in near them or

in the, even in the house, you know, I remember my wife's. Oh, sorry. Can I interrupt here? Cause this is actually, this shows up with athletes more than you might think. And so, I mean, they're humans. Yeah. But this idea that like, I've got like when I'm on the road and it's hard, so it's hard to sleep for me, it's harder to sleep on the road when I was young. I'm sorry. Not when I was young, when I had, you know, my son was young, two years old or whatever. And he was, or one years old and it was like crying. Like it was just a reprieve to be on the road, you know, to get good sleep. But so athletes will report on a pretty regular basis that when on the road, it's hard to sleep. And when I double click, like, is it the bed? Is it the new surroundings?

They're like, yeah, but it's actually like, I don't have my partner with me. And so it does kick up this idea that they're not feeling safe, but they're not going to, they don't say it like that. So could you, could you give a couple deep practices that people that when they're traveling or their partners travels, like in that, that feeling that I've got somebody else with me to increase that sense of safety? Like how do we square that when that person is alone? So it's, you know, a really common experience. I mean, it's, you know, it's basically known as like the first night effect. It happens in the laboratory. It happens in a hotel.

Like any, for most people when they sleep, unless they're like very sleep deprived or they're like so excited about kind of this, even if they are, I mean, it's just this new environment. It's really hard to turn all the way off, right? It's kind of like this idea of sleeping with one eye open or one ear open because you're in this new environment and it's really adaptive to be able to kind of have this mixed kind of crappy sleep for safety purposes. And so then the question is like, what can you do to counteract that um i mean i it's a lot of this isn't is it honestly hasn't been well researched though you know this conversation is like dang we should look into this yeah um you know is is you know i

can imagine and people certainly do this where they bring kind of like uh i guess it would count like a social safety signal with them right so like something that can substitute bring kind of like, I guess it would count like a social safety signal with them, right? So like something that can substitute or kind of serve as a reminder of safety, right? So like whether it's like something, you know, bringing, I mean, this happens when people bring their own pillow with them, right? Like this is a good example. Or pillowcase. Or even their pillowcase. Anything that, you know, people think of it as a comfort, but it probably serves as like this important environmental social safety signal, right? Like, and it's, you know, where it allows people just get a little bit deeper, right? It's unlikely that it's going to make up the same, but it is a way forward for sure.

So let's talk about, you just kind of of hit on it which is the one i open so when you go to a new setting where there's a you know hotel or whatever that idea that like i don't know my surroundings so intellectually it's like look it's a hotel i've double locked the door i'm good and you know it's more rare probably that someone's going to try to fish underneath your door to you know know, get the unlock, then the fear response would indicate. But so intellectually, we know we're good, but it's a new bed, it's new light switches, like it's a new environment. So it's natural to say, okay, I'm not sure how safe this is. So the one eye open thing.

So what, is that what you're talking about? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I mean, I think of it as like, you know, hypervigilance is sort of the enemy of sleep, right? Yeah, that's nice. Your brain can't be active and listening and alert and be sleeping. And so I think of it as, you know, the volume of vigilance is like turned up a little bit

more than it would otherwise be if you were at home. Okay. So one of the things that I have found valuable and I'd like, I'd like your help on this is that, um, so I don't have problem falling asleep at my house. Um, but so falling asleep is not my problem. It's, it's not getting enough deep sleep and it's intermittently, it's like a two 30 wake up or a four 30 wake up. It's like, Oh damn, not yet. And so getting back to sleep is kind of what I'm working through right now.

Okay. So pause that for a minute. So we have a lot of light, a lot of windows in our house. We've got the blackout shades, but there's still more light than I would like. I don't like to close the door cause I don't know. I don't. And so there's a lot of light that comes in. So I use, I started using a sleep mask and I would like. I don't like to close the door because I don't know. I don't. And so there's a lot of light that comes in. So I started using a sleep mask and I love it. I really love it

because now when I go to a new sleep environment on the road, I've got a sleep mask that is paired with good sleep at home. And so I bring it on the road and it's like this trigger, like, oh, right. And so a little bit like the sleep, the pillowcase or whatever. And so can you just talk about the science that's happening there and give me some best practices and everybody listening that when they wake up at two thirty or four thirty or whatever that moment is, some strategies to fall back asleep. Yeah. So, I mean, you know, the the idea of the pillowcase, the idea of the sleep mask and having used it and had good sleep in the environment you are, uh, that you usually are is just classical

conditioning, right? Like it's basically this Pavlov dog of like pairing the experience of sleep with an item in the same way that, you know, so, you know, people who don't have sleep problems, um, they, when they get in bed, like they may feel sleepy before they get in bed. When they get in bed, it's like a hammer coming down on them. Like it's like the bed itself is just telling you like, oh my God, like let go. It's time for sleep. And it turns out that like there is so much in our environment that is telling our body what to do next. Like it is, like it's imperceptible to us, but it makes so much sense because our brain is, you know,

basically a predicting machine. Like it's just trying to like take in all this information from the environment to tell us, tell your body how to use metabolic resources to keep us alive, keep us procreating, all those sorts of things. And, you know, we can't make all those calculations kind of on our own. You know, there are't make all those calculations kind of on our own.

You know, there are kind of all of these environmental factors that kind of help on the back end that are creating these things. And so, you know, an example is like I used to, a non-sleep example is I used to, when I would come home from the office, you know, before everything moved so much remote, I would like touch the doorknob to my apartment and I would immediately feel hungry. Right. Because I had so often had a snack when I got home that like, now my body's like, even if I just eat and it's like, oh my God, okay. Like, let's start making insulin. Like, let's, let's get this ready because we know what's going to happen next. And, you know, that was, that was the, that was, you know, another example. But I mean, I think, you know, when, if, when if you pair sleepiness with an item,

it will eventually begin to kind of facilitate that experience of sleepiness. And I mean, the opposite happens when people have insomnia, right? Like they tend to like get in bed and it's like their brain wakes up. And this is because they've spent so much time kind of laying in bed, tossing and turning, worrying about the fact they're not sleeping, that the bed itself or the pillow or the eye mask or what have you has become a trigger for kind of that arousal. And so, you know, but by kind of, you know, tightly increasing that relationship between whatever item, in this case, a sleep mask, you can then transfer that to a new environment and it can help facilitate the experience of sleepiness because you have that strong

conditioned response to that item. And now one final word from our sponsors. Finding Mastery is brought to you by Cozy Earth. Over the years, I've learned that recovery doesn't just happen when we sleep. It starts with how we transition and wind down. And that's why I've built intentional routines into the way that I close my day. And Cozy Earth has become a new part of that. Their bedding, it's incredibly soft, like next level soft. And what surprised me the most is how much it actually helps regulate temperature. I tend to run warm at night and these sheets have helped me sleep cooler and more consistently, which has made a meaningful difference in how I show up the next day for myself, my family, and our team here at Finding Mastery. It's become part of my nightly routine. Throw on their lounge

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If you're looking for high-quality personal care products that elevate your routine without complicating it, I'd love for you to check them out. Head to calderalab.com slash finding mastery and use the code finding mastery at checkout for 20% off your first order. That's calderalab, C-A-L-D-E-R-L-A-B.com slash finding mastery. Let's jump right back into the conversation. If you're in that zone, it's not the hammer, like I hit the pillow and bang, I'm out. zone it's not the hammer like i hit the pillow and bang i'm out and it's not like extreme anxiousness like am i gonna fall asleep am i gonna fall asleep but you've got

something you know that you're cranked on a deadline it's 11 30 you've got to get a 6 30 wake up and you're like damn man i gotta get good sleep and so you're you're sleepy and then your head hits the pillow and you kind of wake up a little bit. It's not bad. What is your threshold? And I'll give you mine that I think is the best practice, but what is your threshold for getting out of bed to restart the cycle? So you're not just laying and churning and the hamster wheel is running like, oh my God, checking the clock, checking the clock, worry, worry, worry, check the clock. So do you have a threshold for how many minutes that you would suggest somebody get out of bed? And what I ask them to do, or even for myself, is start over and just brush your teeth without toothbrush.

Don't turn on the lights, but brush your teeth without toothpaste. Sorry. And because like how many times have I or you or everyone, you know, participate in this conversation, like brush their teeth and been getting ready for sleep? Like it's a trigger. So what is your threshold for time? Yeah, absolutely. So, I mean, our typical rule of thumb is like 15 to 20 minutes. That's usually gives people like a chance.

Research-based or intuition? I mean, I think it's – I'm sure it is just industry standard, I guess. That's what everyone learns. I don't know if it's – I mean, you know, I think on average it takes people about 15 minutes to fall asleep. Like that's like within kind of normal – so like, you know, using that information, it would be like, it would make sense to kind of at least give someone that amount of time. Cause you don't want people to just kind of be like, okay, two minutes, I'm, I gotta get up. Right. Yeah. You know, I think that, you know, the, the caveat is, you know, some people like, it's immediately obvious that they're not going to fall back to sleep. They're not going to fall asleep. Or like they wake up in the middle of the night and they're just like very certain they're

not going to fall back to sleep. Then there's no reason to wait 20 minutes, right? Like there's no, like you're awake, like you should, you know, should try, try again. And I, I love, I love that idea of doing the teeth brushing and it's something that like I've thought about and we see it in the data all the time is like sleep is so ritualized. Like there are so many rituals that people do and it almost doesn't even matter what they are as long as you do them consistently. Like it's like your body is just craves the predictability of it all, right? And it's like most people have kind of similar ones. But like in theory, as long as they're not like too arousing, like they could be anything.

As long as you paired them with sleepiness and continue to do them all the time, they should probably have the same effect. And it's just such a, it's such an important point that like, you know, the thing about the sleep transition, and I mean, I think it's really important to kind of build that in, but it's, it's the rituals. Like we do a lot of work on like, you know, measuring people's stress during the day and how it affects their sleep and then measuring their sleep and see how it affects how they respond to stress and that kind of stuff. And we and many other sleep groups find that like, you know, people, when people get bad sleep, they're much more sensitive to stressors during the day, but it doesn't always work the other way. Like people can have all these things happen to them during the day and their sleep is fine. And I think it's because,

you know, there are so many behavioral like rituals that protect us against kind of the daily experiences that help us sleep. Now, there are, of course, caveats like when something really terrible happens, you know, and it's this ongoing stressor. Or if it's something that happens really close to bedtime, then all bets are off. But in general, like the daily slings and arrows don't really feed into our nights as much as we might think because of these rituals. Yeah, that's really strong is to invest in some practice. Like practicing is permanent, you know, is a loosely interesting idea to me because just not everything's permanent, but practice does groove behaviors. And so like, I love that idea.

And so, you know, have some sort of routine or practice getting ready for sleep and the consistency on that is awesome. If you can get it right. And can you speak, can you put an arrow right in the heart of what happens? I know everybody knows this. Do not jump on your in bed and pop on your phone. Do not wake up at the first thing in the morning and check your, you know, the, the noise of the world on your phone. Like, can you tell us why put some research rigor behind it other than, you know, like, well, it's obvious it's a blue light. Is

it white light? Is it just the psychological noise that you're tuning into what's actually happening? Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, the first thing that people always gravitate towards is the blue light exposure, right? Like, you know, we know that that spectrum of light can impact the melatonin system, shut it down. And melatonin, you know, released from the pineal gland, you know, it doesn't put you to sleep, but it kind of sets the table for you. I actually think it's, you know, a much stronger case can be made for it being kind of arousing and kind of activating that reward pathway in your brain, right? Like your brain, it's like a hit of dopamine that you get when you engage in social media, when you engage in kind of those, you know, games, whatever. Those are rewarding. They're

developed to be rewarding, right? They're developed to keep you coming back. And that kind of draw, it makes it really hard to kind of shut down and let go, right? Like your brain begins to like crave it in sort of a way. And I think that that is much more problematic. You know, like, I get it. Like, I, it's not like, I don't necessarily always leave my phone outside of my bedroom. But, you know, I know that if I start engaging in it, like, it's not something that I'm just gonna be able to turn off. And I have to plan for that and not freak out about the fact that I'm not sleeping, because I know what it can do.

And so, you know, I think people need to be wise about that. It's certainly problematic when we think about youth and, you know, this tendency already towards a delayed sleep phase. That is the primary driver of the arousal system that ends up keeping people awake in addition to blue light in some cases. OK, so check, check, check, have your phones like not be part of your fall sleep routine or your wake up routine. And then my son's school did a funny little thing. They thought they were, they were being smart and they decided to have to move back the sleep, the start time for their

school. And I was like, right on. And then the schedule came out and as they, they moved back to start time only one day a week. I was like, Oh God, that's actually worse. Right. So now like, because it's principle number one that we talked about was like, have some consistency on wake up time. And so like, am I, is my assumption right that it's worse or, and if you could wave a magic wand, when would you want our schools to start? I think that's a, that's a really interesting, I mean, based on kind of the principles that we talked about, you know, it's important to maintain consistency for regulating your sleep. But then, you know, that's a little bit tempered by this idea that,

you know, maybe that recovery sleep is really important, like this opportunity to sleep in. And so, you know, I think it's an interesting empirical question that, you know, hopefully could, you know, certainly be looked at like on a county to county level or something like that to see. And there have been studies of that, at least in kind of moving school start times later. You know, potentially the recommendation was, you know, for secondary schooling, no earlier than like 845, maybe 830 is like a as a as a as a goal. I know in California, I know they just moved my kids school to 845. And California has been certainly one of the places where they've, you know, started enacting this at a statewide level. Yeah, one of the odd challenges on sleep start time is, is the sport industry. So sport and after school activities tend to start around a certain time. And if you move back the school block, it kind of throws all these independent contractors off. So it was sport, oddly enough, that was the driving

factor for like, how do we do this? Because we need enough, they need enough quality time in school. Yes, it'd be great to get the brains right. But this whole industry that is decentralized and not part of the school system is like thrown into great chaos. I mean, I'm sure the same is true for, you know, trying to daylight savings considerations, right? Like I'm sure sports industries, right? So the sun's out later, people can do more sports and under daylight savings times. And so I'm sure that's part of it. I had not heard of this model.

And, you know, I think it will be interesting to see how it plays out, I think. And it will probably matter about how delayed a kid is, right? So, like, not everybody has the same kind of circadian rhythm and it's not as severe. I mean, for kids that, you know, endogenously like are having a really hard time getting a sufficient amount of sleep, you know, if the day that is longer is in the middle of the week, then, you know, you have weekend days to make up and you get an extra day in the weekday to kind of make up some of that sleep loss. And I think that might be meaningful for some kids. So you talked about makeup sleep, and I'm confused on that a little bit because I want to make up sleep on the weekends, like on Sunday, right, is like my day. But then I also hear you say consistent wake up time.

So where are you hedging for a best practice? Yeah, no, I mean, and I think this is really getting at the heart of these principles that we enact to kind of get people sleep back on track when it's severely affected, right? And then kind of basic principles that everyone can use. If someone has insomnia, like oftentimes what happens is they have, you know, dramatic swings in when they sleep in or not sleep in, right? Like it's like people have terrible nights of sleep and to compensate understandably in the moment, they'll be like, I'm gonna sleep in an extra hour to try to make that up.

And that throws off your circadian rhythm. For people who don't have sleep problems, it's a good idea to try to stabilize your sleep window. But because you don't have sleep problems, like it's not as, you know, it's not as dire, you know, like the recommendation isn't as severe as like, look, like this is where you start to try to fix your sleep because you're telling me that your sleep is really bad. If you are sleeping in several hours on the weekend days, it really is likely a symptom of what's happening in

the week. And it gives you an opportunity to be like, okay, now, like, I heard that this maybe isn't the best thing and my body clearly needs it. So what other opportunities might there be during the week so that I don't feel this need during the weekend, right? And so, you know, get an extra hour, you know, enjoying your life, great. Like, but if you find yourself like, you know, I need that extra hour now and I also need that nap, you know, get an extra hour, you know, enjoying your life. Great. Like, but if you find yourself like, you know, I need that extra hour now and I also need that nap, you know, and like, gosh, I need that nap on Sunday too. And gosh, why am I, you know, why does it take me till two in the morning to fall asleep

on Sunday night? Is it because I'm anxious about my work or is it because like, honestly, we can only make so much sleep. We make it and so the expectation should never be that you can make more than you need. You bring up napping and, you know, like I'm always saying, like if your sleep is pretty good and everything's rolling, but you feel a little sleepy, be inconsistent with your nap time and keep it under 30 minutes, ideally 24. And I can't remember why I say that number. So I have the opportunity to say, where did I read that? Where did that come from? And then if you're feeling like you need longer sleep and like 90 minutes, maybe you're going to slip into

some deep or REM sleep or whatever, that as long as it doesn't screw up your sleep later, you're probably okay. So what do you think about those principles? Yeah. I mean, I think, you know, napping, there's nothing inherently wrong with napping. Certainly culturally, it varies from place to place. You know, napping can be really effective in increasing alertness in the short term.

You know, it's been shown to be effective to help with learning and memory even, you know, and consolidation of information. Yeah, absolutely. And so, you know, I mean, I think that's okay. I do think, you know, you want to keep it shorter, you know, than longer. And so, you know, we say like 20 minutes, 20 to 30 minutes, you just don't want to run the risk of drip dropping into deep sleep because then you experience that sleep inertia, right? When you wake up, you feel worse than you did before. There is, is some concern potentially that like what, if you do take a nap and it's, you know, for a longer period of time, your sleep, you know, you may, it may be harder to get to sleep, but also your sleep may be kind of lighter in general. Like it kind of like pulls, pulls it apart a little bit. So there might be a little

bit more fragmentation, but you know, like we honestly wake up a lot of times during the night that we don't even recognize. And so, you know, as long as you're not getting distressed about it, you kind of know what you're in for, you know, and know that your body will take care of you. It's, it's totally fine. And, you know, certainly for athletes and like recovery and all the, all the things that go on with that, you know, sleep plays such a critical role in kind of, you know, all, all the restorative functions that we need. And so, you know, it, in some cases those can also be scheduled, um, you know, for people. And I like the inconsistency because I've, I found when I, you know, for athletes that always fall asleep, so let's say their nap time is at two o'clock or whatever, that then even if

they're not sleepy, two o'clock rolls around much like your, your doorknob. Like I get hungry when I touch the doorknob, two o'clock rolls around, they're sleepy, but they don't really need it. They've just programmed their biological kind of rhythm to, so I like the inconsistency, like maybe it's 1.30, maybe it's 3.30, maybe it's two o'clock. It's, and so just kind of have some variance in that. Yeah. I mean, yeah. Like I think that's,.30, maybe it's 2 o'clock. And so just kind of have some variance in that. Yeah. I mean, yeah. Like I think that's, I mean, you're right. Like napping can become a habit. That's right. Yeah, for sure. And so that is absolutely, you know, something to be on guard about. And so keeping it inconsistent can help with that. Also, maybe it's something about like

listening to your body and feeling, you know, really checking in to see if you are feeling sleepy. You know, I don't think every single day requires a nap if you're not using the same amount of energy or like, you know, those sorts of things. But, you know, it can be certainly restorative and, you know, one of the nice parts of life for sure. I think there is a need to kind of rethink at a societal level how we value sleep. I think there still is this badge of honor that comes with going around and being successful despite lack of sleep.

Let's hit that, Eric. This hustle hard mentality, I'll sleep when I die. You got to get after it before AM club or whatever that thing is. And it's like it's not new. Early bird gets the worm is something that my grandfather used to say. And like, but can you help me understand how to square with that? The capitalistic kind of framework of capitalism is one in which you try to squeeze every dollar out of people's available work opportunity. And the incentive structure is such where people can't, I mean, we can go without sleep. We can live on shortened amounts of sleep. And the incentives are such that, you know, people choose, you know, do that. And many

people don't, you know, it's not a choice, right? It's like, there are people that choose to do that. And then there are people that are obligated to do it, because they need to put food on the table. Right. And they're, you know, I, I, I appreciate, you know, your perspective and, and I, you know, I, I hold a similar one, but like, I feel like I sit in a fairly privileged position to kind of make those types of choices around, around sleep. And, you know, it's not like the idea is to like, well, we've got to burn it down and like rebuild it. But I mean, I think, you know, that is, is something where, you know, policies can and should be put in place to protect the sleep of individuals. You know, this is true in people that have shift work. This is true in people that have to kind of, you know, have multiple jobs, you know, kind of like the kind of their communities, knowing that it's an all likelihood their employees will become kind of better, more efficient, more productive

workers. I mean, all of the literature that we have on sleep seems to show that, you know, when people get the sleep they need, we're kind of the best versions of ourselves, right? We're more creative, we're more productive, we're better leaders, we're more empathetic, we're better parents, we're better partners, we're more capable in kind of regulating our emotions and dealing with the stressors of the day. All of those things are net positive if people could get the sleep they needed. Right.

And, you know, I think, you know, talking to you, writing books, doing research is all about kind of getting that message out that sleep, the opportunity for sleep for me is like a social justice issue. It's a right. And it's unfortunately not a right that everybody gets to access all the time. But, you know, because we know that sleep is such a fundamental pillar of health, it's something that as a country and as a world we could invest in. Yeah, that's really thoughtful. That's really thoughtful. That's really thoughtful. Finding Mastery is brought to you by iRestore. When it comes to my health, I try to approach things with a proactive mindset. It's not about avoiding poor health.

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of high performance. There's no arguing that. And when we have great sleep consistently and deeply, we give ourselves the best chance to operate at our best physically, cognitively, emotionally, sleep affects it all. That's why I care about the environment that I sleep in so much. And of course, a great mattress, it matters. One of our teammates here at Finding Mastery has been sleeping on a Lisa mattress for over a year now, and it's made a noticeable difference. They specifically chose one from their Chill Collection because they sleep hot,

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They've donated over 41,000 mattresses to people in need. I love that. So right now you can get 25% off all mattresses at lisa.com plus an extra $50 off when you use the code finding mastery at checkout that's lisa l-e-e-s-a dot com the promo code is finding mastery for 25 off and then plus an extra fifty dollars on us because quality sleep is just too important to leave to chance what about dreaming i've got just two more questions for you one of of them is about dreaming. And it's a little bit of a mystery, you know. And I know that there's some recent research about what potentially sleep might be doing. I'm sorry, what dreaming might be doing. But what is your best estimate, research-based and if not research, you know, intuitive about what's happening for dreaming?

You know, dreaming is such an interesting thing. And, you know, you know, especially clinically, you know, there's a, there's a treatment, a behavioral treatment for nightmares. So I've kind of gotten into this space called imagery, imagery rehearsal therapy, where we kind of like replay the, the nightmare, but within with a different ending. And, you know, just that like, building that muscle seems to help for many cases to help people, you know, cope and have fewer nightmares. I mean, you know, REM sleep specifically, which is when, you know, most dreams occur, is, you know, is critical for learning and emotional memory and things like that. And so, you know, it's possible that dreaming, you know, is involved in that.

It's been, you know, very challenging to empirically test most of the kind of theories around dreaming. And so, you know, it is kind of an area that I think is compelling and, you know, very relatable and kind of, you know, inherently just interesting because of, you know, what it is. You know, we just, we don't have a good handle on what the function is. I mean, it certainly likely plays some kind of psychological functioning, right? Like of, of kind of trying to make sense of, uh, of the world and our experience. And, you know, certainly when people have traumas, the nightmares and the re re-experiencing in dreams is, is, you know, is palpable, um, and

probably functional in some way. But, you know, I, we have not as a science been able to crack kind of what the clear function is. And there might be multiple. And it's, yeah, but it's definitely a really interesting area. Yeah. So I, I mean, I like the idea of like, you know, interpreting dreams, but it's more fun than it is anything else. Oh, totally. Yeah. So it's always like crazy that people have had like similar ones, right? Like, I mean, it's like what I was on like a radio show one time where there was like a dream interpreter person and like he named off all these different dreams. I was like, I've had those dreams. Like that's so bizarre. Like how does that even happen? I don't, I don't know.

Yeah, I know. I mean, I think it is fun, but I, I was hoping that you were going to say, Oh, we've, we figured it out from a neuroscience perspective, like da-da-da. But okay. Next time. Yeah, next time. Here we go. You know, it's coming, obviously.

Okay, sleep aids. Melatonin, CBD, THC. Like, what are some thoughts on those three before we get to medication? And, you know, there's a bit of controversy around sleep medication. And I think you'll have a sharp point of view about that. But just hit melatonin, CBD, and THC for just a minute. So melatonin, used very frequently by so many people to help them sleep. We use kind of randomized clinical trials as like the highest level of empirical evidence

to support the use of them. And it turns out that melatonin, at least to treat insomnia or to help like sleep onset, sleep maintenance, is kind of mixed. Like it's not super compelling compared to placebo. And I think part of it is, you know, the placebo effect in sleep trials is so strong because it is about this letting go experience. Now, melatonin does seem to be effective in things like jet lag or trying to shift somebody's circadian rhythm. But it's usually delivered at a much lower dose than people take it and then many hours earlier than they would typically take it.

And so there is this timing and dosing that is important for that. THC and CBD, it's a similar thing, except it's that we just have so little data. Historically, most of the research that we do is supported by the federal government, so NIH. And because of regulations at the federal level, there haven't been kind of a bunch of studies that have like looked at the impact of THC, for instance, because of the FDA regulations of these substances. Now there was a paper that came out a couple of years ago where it was a combination of THC and CBD compared to placebo

control in people with insomnia and did show some benefit relative to control, like to the placebo. However, you know, like it was one small, very small study. And what happens because it's, because it's of the way that the funding happens for these studies is it ends up being a specific formulation that was done in the study and it's not clear like if that would transfer to other formulations. There's no regulations on how – like the quality of these things. And so even if we found that this was effective, I mean, as a psychologist, I wouldn't, you know, wouldn't suggest that that's like the first line, a thing that you should do anyway. But, you know, like, we don't know, like, okay, we found this study on this very specific formulation, now go out to your local dispensary and get something that you think is close to it,

right? Like, it's like, that's just not, that's not how things should be done. And so hopefully, as regulatory things change, maybe we'll be able to do that research. Because, you know, certainly people at currently, they're just not informed, right? Like, people are just going out and being kind of an N of one trial, and trying a bunch of different things. And I, you know, for sometimes they say that it works. And I don't know, I mean, you know, I, I trust people that like for them, it seems like it's helpful, but we just don't have the kind of the empirical evidence to make any recommendations. Yeah. That's great. Which is frustrating. It is frustrating. And you know, it's like the, the market is leading, um, before the science here because there's so many different variants or variables. I mean, that's not so different than like every other supplement on the, on the market. Like it's, there's just not, you know, and also like there,

I find I've got a weird now dependency on my sleep mask. Like I was, I was in Europe the other day and I forgot mine, my sleep mask. And I was, I called my wife. I was like, damn it. I forgot it. And she's like, you'll be fine. I was like, yeah, but it's light out till 11 years in Sweden. And so like there can be dependencies too that we should at least mention that like sometimes not having, I don't know, dependencies, certainly with melatonin. I think it's really important to like mix the cycle up a little bit. So we don't find ourselves dependent on things like there are two really important things that you said so like the dependency thing is real and like many you mean whether it's um you know medication prescription

medications uh some of them you know there's no evidence of physiologic addiction you know dependence related to it but all of them become psychologically dependent. Like, you know, have a dependency with them. Like, I, that is new to me because I thought that sleep medication was highly addictive. You don't necessarily build tolerance to some of them and they don't have like a physiologic addiction to it. Like, meaning that like, you know, it, you know, there's like no neurochemical things that happen that it's very challenging to get a heart off of. That's not, and so those are things like benzodiazepines like Xanax and Ativan. And those, those, those are, you know, can be really challenging because you do have

this kind of, this physiologic dependency that can build up. But, but they're all, they all create like a psychological dependency. I mean, melatonin does, like sleep masks do. Like anything, like I used to have a patient that I was working with that she, she used a weighted blanket and she carried it everywhere. And you know, it got so bad that like when they went on trips with their friends, like the friends would like take turns paying for the extra luggage to carry this giant heavy blanket. Cause she couldn't go anywhere without it. Like, and I was like, you know, there's nothing wrong with a weighted blanket

until something like that. And it's hard not to be like, clearly we need to work on this. You can't go around with a weighted blanket for the rest of your life. Maybe you can, but it seemed challenging. You know, what is something our community can do tonight? And if you had a magic wand

and could build, you know, everyone, the most ideal bedroom sleep environment, like what would that look like? Let's bring this thing home a bit. Okay. So, you know, the sleep environment is so critical, right? I mean, like, you know, and this is, you know, this really gets into like sleep hygiene things, but, and so all the other principles that help regulate your sleep are important, but like, if you don't do kind of the basic things, you know, it's, it can throw everything off kilter. So, you know, I mean, you always want to try to keep your bedroom dark, quiet, and cool. You know, we know that, you know, there is kind of a need for your core body temperature to drop during sleep. And so,

you know, certainly if it's too hot and, you know, around a lot of places in the country, it's really hard to manage right now. But, you know, trying to keep it as cool as possible, you know, something in like the 65, 67 degrees can be a good middle ground there for that. Yeah. I use, instead of an air conditioner or some type of unit like that, we've got a mattress and the mattress cools it and it's amazing. Like that technology, do you like it? Like what you're seeing on some of those products? Yeah.

I mean, people, I mean, it's great in principle. And I think for some people it's like a game changer. I can't say that I have one, but like it's, uh, uh, but I mean, in, in theory it should be really helpful for people, especially if they run hot or especially if the beds where they can kind of modify the temperatures on each side. I think that's just like a great comfort thing, particularly as for women, as they go through the menopausal transition, which is, you know, which is a big challenge for sleep. And so those, the cooling mattresses can be helpful in that way. Okay. So, so, you know, quiet, cool, and dark. You want to make sure that your bedroom feels safe, right? Like getting back

to the safety piece. One thing that I think is fundamental for people to put themselves in the best position for a good night's sleep is to really, you know, create a robust transition, right? Like I think a lot of times people, what gets in the way is people think that they act like they're computers where they can just kind of shut down. And, but our bodies aren't set up for that. And so it's really important to be able to, you know, build in some me time to allow you to transition and kind of build in those rituals that we were talking about earlier. And so, you know, we suggest like, you know, two hours before bedtime, you know, really closing up, closing the book on like whatever the day was, right? So like stop replying to that email, stop engaging in things that are going to be arousing for your brain. And that doesn't mean, okay, now you need to sit in quiet and meditate for two hours though, you know, for some people that might work great. But for many of us, like, you know, it's like things like relaxing, things that we enjoy doing,

like, you know, it's totally fine to like watch TV and like be with your loved ones. And but, you know, we're really trying to hit the sweet spot of like low arousal, slightly positive things for you, right? And so, you know, one thing that people often ask about are like, well, you know, I was told I can't use any devices of any kind and I need to like, you know, shut myself off from the world. And I don't think that that doesn't necessarily make so much sense to me. The bed, right?

Like the bed, as I said before, for sleep and sex, you know, you don't want to do other things in your bedroom that like confuse your body, right? And if you don't have sleep problems, like, and you've been sleeping, you know, going to bed with the TV on, like, okay, like you're maybe not the person that we're trying to fix because it seems like your sleep is fine. Now, the question is like, can you sleep somewhere where there's not a TV? Like, then if that's a problem, you're like, well, I don't have my TV. I can't sleep.

Okay. Well, like, maybe we should work on this then because, you know, that's another dependency, right? It's probably not a great idea to, like, start binge watching some kind of show that's going to keep another dependency, right? It's probably not a great idea to like start binge watching some kind of show that's going to keep you up, right? Like, and that gets into like the high arousal, slightly positive thing. But, you know, like I always suggest like, you know, watch something that maybe you've seen before, right?

Like where you don't need to know what happens. Like that'll help you wind down. You like it. Great. And then when you begin to feel sleepy get in bed um and and see how it goes uh you know and like do those rituals and i think but just kind of building in sleep and the sleep transition as a priority um as you would for exercise as you would for kind of trying to get your diet on track as you would for kind of other obligations in your life will actually create a much better whole of like your experience, like your day

and night experience than it would otherwise. Because it really has this feed forward effect and kind of setting you up for a better day and a better week and a better month and a better year. All right. Before you go, people who get their sleep dialed in are? Happier and healthier. That's pretty good. Is that research-based?

Yeah. I mean, we have good evidence that when people get better sleep than, you know, on a night where they get better sleep, they tend to experience more positive emotion in the morning and more positive affect across the day. Population level data suggests that people who get sufficient amounts of sleep tend to report higher well-being. And then the health thing is indisputable. Like people who get better sleep are more likely to have better health habits around nutrition, around physical activity. And it seems to, you know, compound and have gains in kind of physical health outcomes like heart disease, metabolic conditions, and, you know, the undisputed king of health outcomes,

mortality. If you were to build a program, how would you invest? And this is like a vibrance, a zest for life, a high performance slash wellness program. Would you invest in sleep or how would you invest sleep? And it can't be a yes to everything. Okay. Sleep, exercise, fitness, nutrition, and psychology. If you had those four variables, what's the big rock to get in the container first? Sleep is the linchpin. I know. I mean, sleep is the glue that holds our life together. And I think when people experience chronically bad sleep, that becomes obvious.

Well done. Eric, I want to say thank you for your expertise. Thank you for writing a short book. Thank you for writing something that, you know, is really crisp. And I've really enjoyed this conversation. And I think that we as a community, the Finding Mastery community, will be better because of this conversation. So thank you. Awesome. It was so great to talk about this. All right. So where do you want to drive people? That book is probably available everywhere. Books are sold. I love if just people kind of become interested in their sleep. And if you have problems with your sleep,

definitely check out this book. Check out other books about sleep. If you think you have a real sleep problem and the books don't get you where you need to go, please talk to your primary care physician about the possibility of getting your sleep assessed because there are things that we can do. I mean I think that's one of the most amazing things about sleep and sleep health is that like, we know what to do. Like we can, there are very few things that like we have clear things that if we do these things, like it will improve. And the gains that are made when you give someone their sleep back are incredible. Like it's like, it like makes everything else in their life a little bit better. And it's just a shame that there's so many people out there that are walking around like zombies, not getting the sleep that they crave when it could be different. The book is The Sleep Prescription, Seven Days to Unlocking Your Best Rest.

This was awesome. And you know what we didn't do? We didn't talk about alcohol. It takes me 90 minutes to kind of at least give myself a chance per glass. And, you know, I only have a drink socially, you know, once every couple of weeks, like it's not a big deal for me, but what is it for you? Is it like, maybe you don't drink alcohol, but is it like, I don't drink after dinner. Like I'm, I'm, it doesn't seem to like, I, you know, this, I, this is actually a great place

where like, you know, wearable data is so interesting. Cause like it's immediately, I can tell, like, I can tell it subjectively, but like it shows up in the data because of, it's like this within person, like serial, you know, time series of data that you collect night after night. Um, and I think that's, this is where like behavioral experiments are so interesting. Cause like because even if the absolute numbers aren't accurate in wearable data, because it's within person, the percent difference is probably meaningful. And I found that with alcohol, if I don't drink for two hours before I go to bed, it

doesn't seem to make a big difference in at least the sleep metrics that I experienced. I mean, I'm sure quality and quantity prior to that matter, but in general for me. But yeah, if it's closer than that, like it's like my heart rate is higher. Like my heart rate variability is, you know, takes a hit. And then kind of the quality of my sleep is impacted. So Eric, again, thank you. And wish uh, yeah, the best success. Yeah, this was fun. And, um, yeah, hopefully our paths cross at some point here. I would, I would love that. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Awesome. Okay.

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