Speaker 1: Hello everybody, and welcome back to the Psychology of Your Twenties,
Speaker 1: the podcast where we talk through some of the big
Speaker 1: life changes and transitions of our twenties and what they
Speaker 1: mean for our psychology. Hello everybody, well, welcome back to
Speaker 1: the show. Welcome back to the podcast, my lovely listeners,
Speaker 1: new and old. Wherever you are in the world, it
Speaker 1: is so great to have you here back for another episode.
Speaker 1: I hope you've been well. I hope you've been treating
Speaker 1: yourself nicely, pursuing something positive and exciting in your life.
Speaker 1: I've been chugging along. I'm in the planning stages for
Speaker 1: some pretty fun projects coming out soon that I am
Speaker 1: super excited to show with you all. I feel like
Speaker 1: some of you have already figured it out. But a
Speaker 1: little spoiler. If you're a big journaler or note taker,
Speaker 1: I feel like you'll be pretty pumped for what's coming,
Speaker 1: which I realize is actually literally a dead giveaway, but
Speaker 1: you know what, I can't keep a secret, so there
Speaker 1: you go. There's so much in the works at the moment,
Speaker 1: and just taking a little moment to say I'm so
Speaker 1: grateful for all the support you guys have shown me recently.
Speaker 1: In every capacity. The show is reaching so many new people.
Speaker 1: There are so many exciting projects in the works that
Speaker 1: wouldn't be possible without such amazing loyal listeners. So starting
Speaker 1: with a quick shout out to you guys who make
Speaker 1: this possible. But let's get into what we're actually talking
Speaker 1: about today. Okay, so we're doing a pretty science heavy
Speaker 1: episode one I am fascinated by, one I have wanted
Speaker 1: to do for ages, and today we're finally getting around
Speaker 1: to an old fashioned deep dive, A big deep dive
Speaker 1: into sleep. How often do we really think about sleep,
Speaker 1: to be honest, other than that it's this like eight hour,
Speaker 1: seven hour black hole in our days that we know
Speaker 1: we need, that we never feel like we have enough of,
Speaker 1: unless you're one of those insane people who can sleep
Speaker 1: for five hours. We are told that we should take
Speaker 1: magnesium if we want to sleep well, That we should
Speaker 1: have a silk eye mask, a nighttime routine, that melatonin
Speaker 1: is the key to rest, That we need to listen
Speaker 1: to the people who say to wake up at five am,
Speaker 1: don't use our phones before bed, lucid dream. You know,
Speaker 1: the world has a lot to say about sleep, because
Speaker 1: it is really how we spend a third of our lives,
Speaker 1: and it has become a huge wellness topic, for sure,
Speaker 1: But how much do we actually know you and I
Speaker 1: the average person? How much trivia would we have in
Speaker 1: our back pockets to do with sleep for something so
Speaker 1: vital and genuinely life giving. We're going to talk about
Speaker 1: that in a second. Sleep is seen as rather boring,
Speaker 1: you know, that's the whole cliche, to be like a snooze,
Speaker 1: to be a bore, to be like falling asleep at
Speaker 1: your desk at work. You know, I think that sleep
Speaker 1: I don't know not to say it gets a bad reputation,
Speaker 1: but I don't think we think about it enough. Why
Speaker 1: do we really care about the moments we're unconscious? That's
Speaker 1: the biggest reasons. You know, nothing's really happening in those hours.
Speaker 1: We literally can't remember anything other than our dreams, sometimes
Speaker 1: not even those, so it seems rather insignificant. Obviously, I
Speaker 1: don't believe that at all. I think that sleep is
Speaker 1: so misunderstood, and really it is the key to unlocking
Speaker 1: a lot about our life, about the fatigue that we experience,
Speaker 1: the motivational deficits we see in other areas of our lives.
Speaker 1: It's even linked to being a more kind person, a
Speaker 1: less irritable person, and a myriad of health outcomes. You
Speaker 1: may not even notice that you are functioning at less
Speaker 1: than one hundred percent as a direct result of poor sleep,
Speaker 1: especially in our twenties, when there is this whole culture
Speaker 1: or i would say expectation around sacrificing sleep and either
Speaker 1: overworking pushing ourselves to burn out, or trying to keep
Speaker 1: up with a big social schedule or social expectations, trying
Speaker 1: to do all the fun things that can't fit into
Speaker 1: our daytime hours, and pushing off sleep, hitting snooze as
Speaker 1: many times as possible. I'm not going to come out
Speaker 1: and say that that is a bad thing to do.
Speaker 1: That you need to get your eight hours, otherwise your
Speaker 1: world is going to fall apart. More so, just I
Speaker 1: want to explore how we can maximize good rest. The
Speaker 1: hidden world to do with sleep is so fascinating. So
Speaker 1: we're going to talk about why we need sleep, what
Speaker 1: happens in your brain as you fall asleep, the myth
Speaker 1: of the Russian sleep experiment. I've wanted to talk about
Speaker 1: this for ages and then some more kind of nuanced topics.
Speaker 1: Sleep as a form of self sabotage the concept of
Speaker 1: sleep debt and sleep hygiene. So much much to be
Speaker 1: sad about this topic, I think, without further ado, let's
Speaker 1: get into it. Okay, First off, let's cover our basics
Speaker 1: what actually happens in our brains and in our bodies
Speaker 1: when we fall asleep. I think we all hear about
Speaker 1: hitting our REM cycle. That's been everywhere recently, and that's
Speaker 1: only one part of it. Actually, when we fall asleep,
Speaker 1: when we are actively asleep, we can divide this state
Speaker 1: of mind into four stages. Three of those stages count
Speaker 1: as non rapid eye movement sleep or stages n our
Speaker 1: emmy for sure, and then we have REM sleep, which
Speaker 1: stands for rapid eye movement sleep. I don't think a
Speaker 1: lot of us know that that's what REM actually stands for,
Speaker 1: and it is as it describes. During this stage of sleep,
Speaker 1: our brain activity, our breathing, our heart rate, our blood
Speaker 1: pressure almost match what they would look like when we
Speaker 1: are awake, but we're not, and they all increase. We
Speaker 1: become almost temp, temporarily paralyzed, unable to move our arms
Speaker 1: or legs. It is not the most RESTful kind of sleep,
Speaker 1: which is another big myth and it usually occurs about
Speaker 1: ninety minutes after you fall asleep, so it's almost at
Speaker 1: the end of a sleep cycle. So a sleep cycle
Speaker 1: is where you go from being awake through all the
Speaker 1: non rapid eye movement stages of sleep, and then you
Speaker 1: end up in rem sleep, and that's where we often
Speaker 1: get the most intense dreams because we have the most
Speaker 1: brain activity going on, and it's during that stage that
Speaker 1: a lot of scientists and researchers believe that we process
Speaker 1: our emotions, we fall memories. If you want to learn
Speaker 1: about why it is that we dream in particular, especially
Speaker 1: in remsleep, we actually have a whole episode on that
Speaker 1: called the Psychology of Dreams. It's one of my favorite
Speaker 1: episodes ever. But most people assume that dreams are a
Speaker 1: product of memory formation, processing all of the thoughts, feelings, experiences,
Speaker 1: lashbacks that we haven't worked through during the day. We
Speaker 1: still aren't completely sure why some people have more vivid
Speaker 1: or memorable dreams than others, because it's so hard to
Speaker 1: measure something that we can't always remember, but some factors
Speaker 1: include having a greater imagination, also medications, sleep disruptions like
Speaker 1: if you're woken up during rem sleep, you'll probably have
Speaker 1: a greater recall of your dreams. And then things like
Speaker 1: stress and trauma, even grief, make us very vivid dreamers.
Speaker 1: We have a lot going on emotionally and mentally during
Speaker 1: our waking hours within our lives, and we can't or
Speaker 1: we don't always have the brain space to deal with that,
Speaker 1: to find a place for those memories and those experiences
Speaker 1: in our brain. So it's when we are asleep that
Speaker 1: our mind kind of gets to work filtering through all
Speaker 1: of that, and uvoila, that is why we dream. Okay,
Speaker 1: so we're kind of starting back to front here because
Speaker 1: RAM sleep, as I said, is actually the last stage
Speaker 1: of sleep, and it occurs after we pass through what
Speaker 1: we now know as NR M sleep. So we have
Speaker 1: three stages. We have N one sleep, this is the
Speaker 1: transition between wakefulness and sleeping. It's characterized by slowed eeve movements,
Speaker 1: reduced muscle activity, our heart rate is dropping. Then we
Speaker 1: get to end two sleep, there's a further decline in
Speaker 1: brain activity, temperature, heart rate, all the things that indicate wakefulness.
Speaker 1: And then we have N three sleep. So this is
Speaker 1: also known as deep sleep, and this is where our
Speaker 1: body really undergoes a lot of the restorative processes for
Speaker 1: fixing up everything that's happened within our mind and our
Speaker 1: bodies during the day. So the N three sleep, the
Speaker 1: one we just spoke about, that is deep sleep. As
Speaker 1: we fall asleep, our brain actually remains quite active even
Speaker 1: in that final stage, processing information, consolidating memories, keeping us breathing.
Speaker 1: Areas like our amygdala and our hippocampus they show the
Speaker 1: most amount of activity, and they are the parts of
Speaker 1: our brain that help in the creation and storage of
Speaker 1: episodic memories, but they also tend to help with core
Speaker 1: functions like ensuring we are still alive even though we
Speaker 1: are unconscious. So let's talk about why we need sleep.
Speaker 1: Wouldn't it be great if we could be operating at
Speaker 1: all hours of the day. Imagine how productive we would be,
Speaker 1: how much more of the world could be explored, how
Speaker 1: many more stories we would have to tell. It is
Speaker 1: a nice fantasy, but it is also not how the
Speaker 1: human body works, because our body and our mind need
Speaker 1: a break. There is not an endless energy reserve that
Speaker 1: we can infinitely pull from. Sleep as a biological necessity
Speaker 1: is still kind of a mystery, and for something that
Speaker 1: every single creature does it's interesting because we don't really
Speaker 1: have a consensus as to why we need it. There
Speaker 1: are a few theories floating around. Let's talk about them.
Speaker 1: The first one is the energy conservation theory. So this
Speaker 1: theory suggests that the main purpose of a good night's
Speaker 1: sleep is to reduce our energy use during the times
Speaker 1: of the day, the nighttime, when it would have been
Speaker 1: inconvenient and less efficient to hunt for food. We need
Speaker 1: to shut down at some point in the day to
Speaker 1: save energy for when we are awake. And because our
Speaker 1: brain is the biggest use of energy in our body,
Speaker 1: turning it off for a set period of the day
Speaker 1: saves us a lot of calories. It doesn't mean that
Speaker 1: sleeping less burns more calories. In fact, you're more likely
Speaker 1: to hold on to calories if you are not sleeping enough,
Speaker 1: because essentially what happened is your metabolism slows down and says, hey, wait,
Speaker 1: we're used to having this whole shutdown period where the
Speaker 1: brain is doing nothing and we can just kind of
Speaker 1: do our thing. Now the brain is staying awake, it's
Speaker 1: using so much more energy. Let's slow down. How we
Speaker 1: use calories, how we use fat, how we use glucose,
Speaker 1: whatever energy store it's pulling from, because we're going to
Speaker 1: need more of that because the brain doesn't want to
Speaker 1: go anywhere. The brain doesn't want to shut off. So
Speaker 1: that's the energy restoration theory. Basically, we conserve energy by
Speaker 1: not using our brain all hours of the day. The
Speaker 1: other theory is cellular restoration theory, which is the one
Speaker 1: I believe most in, I would say, although I'm sure
Speaker 1: it's a combination. The cellular restoration theory says that our
Speaker 1: body needs sleep in order to repair and regross cells
Speaker 1: throughout the body that have been exhausted or stretched during
Speaker 1: the day. It kind of also relates to brain plasticity
Speaker 1: as well, and there's a theory around that brain plasticity
Speaker 1: theory which says that sleep occurs primarily for our brains
Speaker 1: to reorganize our neurons and our nerve cells. When you sleep,
Speaker 1: your brain's waste clearance system is high. You know, is
Speaker 1: well at work there clearing out waste from the central
Speaker 1: nervous system and making sure that everything is like almost
Speaker 1: doing like a deep clean, like doing like a refresh
Speaker 1: before we wake up for the next day. It's getting
Speaker 1: rid of all of the excess glucose cortisol neurotransmitters that
Speaker 1: haven't been reabsorbed, which build up throughout the day, so
Speaker 1: we can wake up with a clean slate and do
Speaker 1: it all over again. So research suggests that sleep contributes
Speaker 1: to memory function as well by converting short term memories
Speaker 1: into long term memories. Now, this is a process that
Speaker 1: we call memory consolidation. It's not just about making new memories,
Speaker 1: but also clearing out erasing unneeded information that might otherwise
Speaker 1: take up space in our minds. So the saying and
Speaker 1: the feeling is is that almost all of our memories
Speaker 1: are consolidated during sleep. I remember being in high school
Speaker 1: and people saying that if you read your notes right
Speaker 1: before bed, you would remember them better in the morning.
Speaker 1: And this kind of like myth is based off of
Speaker 1: this theory that sleep is where we form long term memories.
Speaker 1: So if information is processed closer to when we fall asleep,
Speaker 1: they'll be processed better. Not exactly correct, but really nice try.
Speaker 1: It's more so that our brain receives a whole lot
Speaker 1: of information throughout the day, more than it can process
Speaker 1: because whilst we are awake, we're also actively filtering through
Speaker 1: stimuli in our environment, trying to problem solve. So we
Speaker 1: use sleep as basically, you know, as a way to say, okay, enough,
Speaker 1: let's shut down. We need some time, we need some
Speaker 1: quiet time to do our memory admin It's why our
Speaker 1: memory seems to decline or become a lot more difficult,
Speaker 1: why we become more forgetful. If you haven't been sleeping
Speaker 1: particularly well. Without sleep, our brain health declines significantly, as
Speaker 1: does our cognitive and mental and even social functioning during
Speaker 1: the day. Sleep also helps us with emotional regulation. I
Speaker 1: think we all know that if you've ever had a
Speaker 1: really terrible night's sleep and like snapped at somebody, this
Speaker 1: explains it. It's the same reason why they tell you
Speaker 1: to sleep on something if you're angry, if you're angry
Speaker 1: at a partner, at a friend, at a coworker, whatever
Speaker 1: it may be. The less sleep you get, the harder
Speaker 1: it is to control your emotional state, and the more
Speaker 1: irritable you'll become, the more likely you're going to say
Speaker 1: things that you don't mean. So let's actually dive into
Speaker 1: this further. What is going to happen to you and
Speaker 1: I if we don't get enough sleep, well, a whole
Speaker 1: range of things. Most importantly, what's going to happen is
Speaker 1: we're going to find ourselves in sleep debt. Sleep debt
Speaker 1: is when you sleep fewer hours than your body need.
Speaker 1: It's basically it it's like you overdraw your bank account.
Speaker 1: You're overdrawing the amount of rest that your body needs
Speaker 1: to function. Sleep debt is cumulative, meaning that if you
Speaker 1: regularly get less sleep than you should, you're going to
Speaker 1: have more sleep debt. Here is the scary thing. So
Speaker 1: there's an article written by Harvard Health about a recent
Speaker 1: paper that was published in the Current Biology Journal, and
Speaker 1: it said that we actually can't recover that debt. We
Speaker 1: cannot make up our sleep debt for over a weekend
Speaker 1: or by sleeping in because what we have done is
Speaker 1: disturbed our body's rhythm and given it less than it required.
Speaker 1: And it's not very forgiving or understanding of that. That's
Speaker 1: especially hard for people who may suffer from things like insomnia,
Speaker 1: right they're constantly in sleep debt. Insomnia is this type
Speaker 1: of sleep disorder where it's really difficult for people to
Speaker 1: fall asleep or stay asleep. And obviously it makes sense
Speaker 1: that people who are experiencing this not only are they
Speaker 1: super frustrated, because it is a vital human biological bodily
Speaker 1: need to rest. But it means that they are increasing
Speaker 1: their emotional sensitivity. They're more likely to experience poorer concentration, irritability.
Speaker 1: It can even increase our risk factor of things like
Speaker 1: chronic diseases like diabetes, like hypertension, like heart disease. I
Speaker 1: want to go back there and just correct myself. It's
Speaker 1: not that they're choosing this right, It's not that they
Speaker 1: are deliberately increasing their susceptibility. It's just that a failure
Speaker 1: to sleep has a lot of secondary consequences. It even
Speaker 1: contributes to hallucinations or an increase in what we call microsleeps.
Speaker 1: So if you've seen any road safety billboards recently, I
Speaker 1: think you'll be familiar with this idea, whereby our brain
Speaker 1: can flip very rapidly between being asleep and being awake
Speaker 1: in a matter of seconds, but that lapse can kind
Speaker 1: of be life or death. Our body will start to
Speaker 1: shut down when we don't sleep, and it will force
Speaker 1: us into a place of unconsciousness because it desperately needs
Speaker 1: time to build back up those energy stores, to restore
Speaker 1: cells and neural connections, and to just be a functioning organism.
Speaker 1: So this kind of brings me to the infamous Russian
Speaker 1: sleep experiment. Now, this sleep experiment is very famous, very
Speaker 1: well known, I think, but it's also probably not true.
Speaker 1: It probably didn't happen. Very sorry to burst the bubble
Speaker 1: of my fellow dark history lovers, But despite that, I
Speaker 1: do love talking about this urban myth because whoever came
Speaker 1: up with it got some things very right about sleep. So,
Speaker 1: if you don't know the story, the story goes that
Speaker 1: Soviet era scientists created this stimulant which they believed would
Speaker 1: enable soldiers to not require sleep for up to thirty
Speaker 1: days a month. Let's just pause. Who thinks that that
Speaker 1: is possible? That's ridiculous. But, as the urban myth goes,
Speaker 1: they tried to test this new gas on five political
Speaker 1: prisoners that they had, and they promised that these prisoners
Speaker 1: would go free if they survived. They locked these five
Speaker 1: men in a little chamber and they started pumping in
Speaker 1: this stimulant in gas form. Within a few days, the
Speaker 1: men were exhibiting the kind of paranoia and psychosis that
Speaker 1: is very typical of sleep deprivation. But as time went on,
Speaker 1: they began to act even more strangely. And once the
Speaker 1: scientists went in. They found that a couple of them
Speaker 1: had died, and the remaining of them exhibited very violent behavior,
Speaker 1: had these strange energy bursts hallucinations, and then as soon
Speaker 1: as they did fall asleep, they died. Let's just be
Speaker 1: clear this did not actually happen, because it would be
Speaker 1: physically impossible to stay awake for more than ten days. Actually,
Speaker 1: the world record for how long someone has stayed awake
Speaker 1: was back in the sixties. It was set by this
Speaker 1: man named Randy Gardner. And I think he only lasted like,
Speaker 1: I think it was six hundred hours. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I think it was like, yeah, maybe, I don't know
Speaker 1: how many days it was. Let me, I'll put it
Speaker 1: in the notes, because I think it was around six
Speaker 1: hundred hours. I think it was like fourteen days. Hi,
Speaker 1: this is future Jemma coming back to say it was
Speaker 1: actually two hundred and sixty four hours. Let's continue. But
Speaker 1: whilst he was doing that, he experienced some insane behavior
Speaker 1: and cognitive changes. Now I will say he was being
Speaker 1: like heavily supervised by doctors and scientists from Stanford University.
Speaker 1: But as time went on, they started asking him to
Speaker 1: do these small cognitive tests and each day, they would
Speaker 1: ask him to do the same one. So one of
Speaker 1: these tests was to start at one hundred and subtract
Speaker 1: seven until he got to zero. The first few days
Speaker 1: he could do it, he started to slow down. By
Speaker 1: the last day, he couldn't make it past sixty five
Speaker 1: before he stopped. And when they asked him, they were like, hey,
Speaker 1: why did you stop counting? He was like, what are
Speaker 1: you asking? What are you telling me? I like, I
Speaker 1: don't even know what I meant to be doing right now.
Speaker 1: He also forgot his name, he forgot his age, He
Speaker 1: even forgot his race. Randy was Caucasian. By the end
Speaker 1: of this period, he was claiming that he was African
Speaker 1: American and he truly believed it. All of this sounds
Speaker 1: like insane, but it did happen. And it's really scary
Speaker 1: to me to think about how much we can mentally
Speaker 1: decline because of sleep deprivation. For me, I don't think
Speaker 1: I can last more than two days. Good job, Brandy.
Speaker 1: However many days he did it. It was definitely more than me.
Speaker 1: When I flew to New York last year, I'm so
Speaker 1: bad at sleeping on planes, so I was awake for
Speaker 1: over twenty four hours I couldn't my eyes couldn't focus,
Speaker 1: got like a terrible blood nose, the first I've ever
Speaker 1: had in my life. I was so irritable. I couldn't
Speaker 1: make sense of my surroundings. I was like, didn't know
Speaker 1: what I needed to do. Eventually, I fell asleep on
Speaker 1: this couch that I found in a shopping center before
Speaker 1: I could check into my hotel. So I think that
Speaker 1: that really highlights the dangers here, right, you know, And
Speaker 1: a couple of days where we get six seven hours,
Speaker 1: it's not going to kill you. You will be in
Speaker 1: sleep debt. But when we consistently pursue sleep deprivation, we
Speaker 1: are going to see very real physical, emotional, cognitive, and
Speaker 1: mental consequences. So that's one side of an extreme spectrum
Speaker 1: ultimate sleep deprivation from our friend Randy and our Russian friends.
Speaker 1: Maybe maybe not. But we can also oversleep, which has
Speaker 1: its own set of health risks. There is a nice
Speaker 1: sweet spot for how much sleep we should be getting,
Speaker 1: and like anything, sleep can be used as a form
Speaker 1: of not self harm, but self sabotage. So I want
Speaker 1: to talk about that after this break, as well as
Speaker 1: kind of getting into the interactions between sleep and mental health.
Speaker 1: We'll be back in just a second. The interactions between
Speaker 1: sleep and mental health are a endless and be very
Speaker 1: well documented. They are also multidirectional, meaning that sleep impacts
Speaker 1: our mental well being and our mental well being impacts
Speaker 1: our sleep. Sleep plays a crucial role in maintaining mental health.
Speaker 1: It's not to say that it is a cure. More
Speaker 1: so that just the quality and duration of sleep directly
Speaker 1: impacts our emotional regulation. As we've spoken about our cognitive
Speaker 1: functions and our ability to filter through our thoughts. So
Speaker 1: research indicates that consistent, insufficient or poor quality sleep can
Speaker 1: actually contribute to more intense mental health stemactoms. This is
Speaker 1: particularly when it comes to things like depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder.
Speaker 1: These kinds of conditions seem to really suffer when we
Speaker 1: have less mental energy, i would say, or less restorative
Speaker 1: time to allow us to function at our best and
Speaker 1: to manage the ways that our emotions are more complex
Speaker 1: because of these conditions. Additionally, it's interesting because if you
Speaker 1: do have one of those mental health conditions, you're also
Speaker 1: more likely to experience disruptions in sleep patterns, so you're
Speaker 1: kind of locked into this like terrible cycle. Insomnia was
Speaker 1: something we spoke about before, and insomnia can be a
Speaker 1: symptom of anxiety, even depression. Oversleeping can be a sign
Speaker 1: of the extreme fatigue that we also see with depressive
Speaker 1: episodes or symptoms. We can also use sleep as a
Speaker 1: form of self sabotage. So self sabotage refers to an
Speaker 1: intentional action that kind of undermines our ability to accomplish
Speaker 1: our goals. Now, these are goals that we want to accomplish.
Speaker 1: There is just some part of us that maybe doesn't
Speaker 1: think that we're worthy, That maybe is scared of what
Speaker 1: would happen if we did that, maybe is procrastinating or
Speaker 1: getting weighed down by insecurity, perfectionism, self doubt. When we
Speaker 1: decide to sleep in stay in bed, you know, indulge
Speaker 1: in a dysregulated sleeping habits and sleeping pattern, this might
Speaker 1: indicate that there are other areas of our life that
Speaker 1: we are dissatisfied with, and so sleep becomes a way
Speaker 1: of allowing us to switch off and allowing us to
Speaker 1: almost get in our own way in a sense. So basically,
Speaker 1: what I'm trying to say is sleep is a way
Speaker 1: for us to feel like we're doing something productive. Right,
Speaker 1: we feel like we're resting our body. Sometimes we really
Speaker 1: do need that if we're burnt out right and we
Speaker 1: have been chasing a goal for a long time. But
Speaker 1: on the other end of the spectrum, it can also
Speaker 1: be this way of self sabotaging, of being almost self destructive.
Speaker 1: So if you want a good but non scientific book
Speaker 1: about this, there is one that went particularly viral on
Speaker 1: TikTok recently, and it was called My Year of Rest
Speaker 1: and Relaxation. I read this quite recently. It basically tells
Speaker 1: the story of this woman. I would say she's a
Speaker 1: very unlikeable as protagonist, but she believes that if she
Speaker 1: sleeps for a whole year, she'll somehow fix everything in
Speaker 1: her life. But she also believes that she'll be able
Speaker 1: to ignore her problems. This book is great, and it's
Speaker 1: not obviously about sleep. It's about the things that happen
Speaker 1: in the moments that she is awake that contribute to
Speaker 1: her wanting to rest. But I think that things are
Speaker 1: a lot easier when we are unconscious, right, No wonder
Speaker 1: we use sleep as a form of avoidance from the
Speaker 1: problems that we face when we're awake. There is an
Speaker 1: the concept I want to talk about here called revenge
Speaker 1: bedtime procrastination. This is a Chinese concept whereby when we
Speaker 1: don't have much control over our daytime life, we refuse
Speaker 1: to prioritize sleep in order to regain some sense of
Speaker 1: freedom during those late night hours. So this is actually
Speaker 1: quite common amongst high schoolers, for example, who have to
Speaker 1: go to school for a set period of every day,
Speaker 1: but also people in their twenties and their thirties who
Speaker 1: are working really long, exhausting corporate jobs, service jobs, sacrificing
Speaker 1: their personal lives for their careers and for a service
Speaker 1: to others, and they kind of quote unquote get back
Speaker 1: at the system in the evenings to steal some of
Speaker 1: that personal time. Now, this idea of procrastination makes it
Speaker 1: sounds like we are doing things we have perhaps put off,
Speaker 1: and doing them when we should be sleeping. Not always
Speaker 1: this not always the case. Sometimes we are just doing
Speaker 1: things simply for our pleasure and we feel like we
Speaker 1: need to do them right, Like rearranging your bookshelf at
Speaker 1: like three am online shopping, cleaning out all your bathroom
Speaker 1: cabinets spontaneously, doing like an extravagant makeup look before you
Speaker 1: fall asleep. All of this is taking from our sleep,
Speaker 1: but it's depositing time back in our leisure bank, which
Speaker 1: we may be you know, gravely missing because of how
Speaker 1: much our waking hours are taken up by work or
Speaker 1: other responsibilities. It's interesting because this is being reported more
Speaker 1: and more, especially as studies are showing that around sixty
Speaker 1: percent of us are getting less than the recommended seven
Speaker 1: to eight hours. We're averaging about six hours at the moment.
Speaker 1: Averaging means that there are a lot of us who
Speaker 1: are getting less than that, And the biggest contributors to
Speaker 1: this lack of sleep that we are enduring as a
Speaker 1: society are stress, busy work schedules and school schedules. People
Speaker 1: are spending more time at work, more time studying, more
Speaker 1: time working than ever before. Then also things like pollution, noise, pollution,
Speaker 1: sleeping environment, and responsibilities that just come with life. You know,
Speaker 1: our lives are increasingly busy and we are overstretched. We
Speaker 1: need to juggle work, life, friends, relationships, family, fitness, well being,
Speaker 1: eating three meals a day, keeping our houses clean, just
Speaker 1: keeping up with our own needs. And I think in
Speaker 1: a world that is steering more towards the glorification of
Speaker 1: hustle culture, sleep is seen as a luxury, even sometimes
Speaker 1: as a point of laziness. This whole narrative that to
Speaker 1: rest is to not be self disciplined, to not be
Speaker 1: committed to your job, to school, or to your life.
Speaker 1: I think it emits a huge part of the narrative,
Speaker 1: which is that sleep gives life, and rest is truly,
Speaker 1: truly important for us to restore connections, restore our energy levels,
Speaker 1: restore our celves, and actually function optimally. So that brings
Speaker 1: me to this concept of sleep hygiene and how we
Speaker 1: can get more from our sleep, how we can avoid
Speaker 1: those nights when you desperately want some shut eye, like
Speaker 1: you crave it, and you just won't stop tossing and turning.
Speaker 1: Our quality of sleep does have a lot to do
Speaker 1: with our choices and behaviors, from consuming caffeine too close
Speaker 1: to our bedtime, even exercising in the evenings, or breaching
Speaker 1: a point of exhaustion that is so extreme that our
Speaker 1: body actually starts to go in the opposite direction. It
Speaker 1: starts to pump us with adrenaline and cortisol to keep
Speaker 1: us awake so that when it's time to sleep, we actually,
Speaker 1: like physically can't. But the biggest devil of all of
Speaker 1: them in the discussion at the moment is our phones
Speaker 1: and using our phones before bed, our phones, social media, websites,
Speaker 1: whatever you are on literally floods our brains within information
Speaker 1: and bright lights, sounds, activity, and of course, as a result,
Speaker 1: it floods our brains with neurotransmitters, which keep our mind
Speaker 1: active when we want them to be winding down. The
Speaker 1: reason this happens is because screens emit blue light, which
Speaker 1: can interfere with our body's natural production and release of melatonin. Melatonin,
Speaker 1: of course, is the hormone responsible for regulating our sleep
Speaker 1: wake cycle. Blue light is particularly bad in this situation
Speaker 1: because it tricks our brain into thinking that it's still daytime,
Speaker 1: so we should be awake, we should be alert, we
Speaker 1: should be ready to go. Exposure to screens before bed
Speaker 1: suppresses the release of melatonin, so it makes it more
Speaker 1: difficult to fall asleep, But then it bumps off our
Speaker 1: sleep wake cycle, so we wake up later as well.
Speaker 1: So this really disrupts our body's circadian rhythm. It leads
Speaker 1: to sleep disturbances, it leads to revenge sleep sleep debt,
Speaker 1: and it just impacts our overall ability to sustainably function
Speaker 1: in our lives, in our relationships, in every facet of
Speaker 1: what we do. So if you want better sleep, your
Speaker 1: first step is to create a screen free bedroom or
Speaker 1: space for yourself. So, according to the Sleep Health Foundation,
Speaker 1: it's really important to actually train your brain to link
Speaker 1: your bed with sleep and sleep only, So if possible,
Speaker 1: you want to avoid bringing anything into your bedroom that
Speaker 1: makes you feel like you are not resting. So that
Speaker 1: doesn't mean that you can't be on your phone or
Speaker 1: your laptop in your room. You know. I know a
Speaker 1: lot of us live in sharehouses or live with our parents,
Speaker 1: and we don't necessarily want to be doing everything that
Speaker 1: we do on our laptops and our phones and our iPads,
Speaker 1: like in the living room or in the dining room,
Speaker 1: but try and keep it out of your bed. That
Speaker 1: is the space you want to associate with rest, not
Speaker 1: with alertness. So I started doing this recently. Oh my goodness,
Speaker 1: it's like lights out for me as soon as I'm
Speaker 1: in my bed, because that is a space now that
Speaker 1: I only use for one activity, and that association means
Speaker 1: I'm better able to just switch off. My brain. Is
Speaker 1: cute to knowing that this is the time to sleep.
Speaker 1: If you feel like you hate going from like being
Speaker 1: immediately on in your life to like immediately off and
Speaker 1: having to go into bed, turn the lights off, and
Speaker 1: just like lie there and pretend to be asleep before
Speaker 1: you actually fall asleep. You can present yourself with alternatives.
Speaker 1: I think reading before bed is amazing obviously, but also
Speaker 1: sleep podcasts are a great help. There is one show
Speaker 1: that does this so well called what's it called? Okay?
Speaker 1: It's called Quiet Bedtime Stories and Meditations, and they have
Speaker 1: this episode called King Kojata. I don't know when I
Speaker 1: found this show, but oh I found this episode. This
Speaker 1: episode is amazing, but it honestly lulls me into such
Speaker 1: like peaceful rest. I'm gonna be honest, I've never made
Speaker 1: it past like the first ten minutes. And it's a
Speaker 1: really great thing to add to your routine when you
Speaker 1: aren't someone who can immediately relax as soon as your
Speaker 1: head hits the pillow. So let's talk about some other tips. Firstly,
Speaker 1: I love this one. Create an environment you actually want
Speaker 1: to be in, one that is cool, one that is dark,
Speaker 1: one that is quiet, one that is comfortable. I will
Speaker 1: never understand people who can sleep in like a boiling
Speaker 1: hot room, you know, I need it to be like
Speaker 1: fifteen degrees celsius in order for me to fall asleep.
Speaker 1: I like to have one too many blankets. I like
Speaker 1: to cocoon myself into like a little burrito. It also
Speaker 1: really makes the difference to like get nice bed sheets,
Speaker 1: because you want your brain to be like, this is
Speaker 1: a comforting, cozy, peaceful space. I enjoy being here. You know,
Speaker 1: you're stained white bed sheets from your first year of UNI,
Speaker 1: which are like weirdly itchy. They might be the economic choice,
Speaker 1: but I don't think they're conducive to restfulness. This is
Speaker 1: such like an adult thing to say. But honestly, I
Speaker 1: think I turned twenty four and I immediately have like
Speaker 1: a sheet preference and a mattress preference. And now if
Speaker 1: I'm on a firm mattress, it's not happening. You know,
Speaker 1: I get it. It's really giving Princess and the pea,
Speaker 1: But honestly, sleep is an investment, and as is your mattress,
Speaker 1: your memory from pillow, your cotton sheets. My mum always said, like,
Speaker 1: sleep is not about being cheap, and I didn't really
Speaker 1: understand that when I was younger and broke, but now
Speaker 1: I do, And it doesn't mean that you need to
Speaker 1: spend like an insane amount of money that is out
Speaker 1: of your budget. You can get secondhand really good mattresses,
Speaker 1: you can find really good sheets that are on sale,
Speaker 1: or I just think it's an important thing. You'll have
Speaker 1: it for a long time and it will contribute to
Speaker 1: you just feeling more alive and your waking life. So
Speaker 1: also try and be consistent with your sleep schedule. I
Speaker 1: know this is really hard, especially in our twenties, but
Speaker 1: at least doing it during the week is important. Your
Speaker 1: body circadian rhythm functions. They're set on a loop and
Speaker 1: typically they align with sunrise and sunset, or when you
Speaker 1: tell your body to switch off and then seven eight
Speaker 1: hours after that point. Being consistent with when you fall
Speaker 1: asleep during the week, even on weekends, if you can
Speaker 1: helps kind of train your brain into being like, all right,
Speaker 1: this is the time when we switch off, same time
Speaker 1: every day, no surprises. It's really very valuable. There was
Speaker 1: a study published in the National Library of Medicine from
Speaker 1: two thousand and nine. It highlights that irregular sleep patterns
Speaker 1: can alter our levels of melatonin. It can alter the
Speaker 1: signals that are telling our brain to sleep, and what
Speaker 1: that will mean is that no matter how hard you try,
Speaker 1: you're not going to get to sleep unless you're melatonin
Speaker 1: has been released and is present in your body because
Speaker 1: you can't physically shut down. You can take a supplement,
Speaker 1: but you can also produce it naturally. So I think
Speaker 1: it may just be the case that your melatonin release
Speaker 1: is being delayed by poor sleep habits and routine, and
Speaker 1: you can get back onto a normal sleep routine by
Speaker 1: remaining consistent. So even if you get to bed by nine,
Speaker 1: nine so early, maybe it's not for some of you.
Speaker 1: Let's say ten, put it in even ten, you're in
Speaker 1: bed by ten, but you find yourself like tossing and
Speaker 1: turning till twelve. Good, stay in bed, don't go on
Speaker 1: your phone. Sooner or later, your body is going to
Speaker 1: get trained to be like, no, this is our bedtime. Now,
Speaker 1: this is when we're hitting the hay. On that note,
Speaker 1: try and expose yourself to sunlight or the outdoors immediately
Speaker 1: after waking, normally within the first hour, because again, this
Speaker 1: is going to help your body clock, switch off production
Speaker 1: of melatonin and reset you to a regular pattern. You know,
Speaker 1: humans are meant to be outdoor creatures, not indoor creatures.
Speaker 1: We used to live our lives and our waking hours
Speaker 1: by the sun until Thomas Edison invented the light bulb.
Speaker 1: Not just kidding me, like, in all seriousness, I think
Speaker 1: the best way to do anything for your health is
Speaker 1: to do it the way that has been done for
Speaker 1: generations and generations, meaning that the best way to get
Speaker 1: quality sleep is to align your body to how evolutionarily
Speaker 1: and biologically you were kind of evolving and developed to
Speaker 1: seek rest. I think it comes a lot easier when
Speaker 1: we do that. Another tip, exercise more, but try not
Speaker 1: to do anything intense before bed. I think it's a
Speaker 1: double edge sword exercise. Obviously increases exhaustion, but it also,
Speaker 1: you know, means that our bodies kind of are flooded
Speaker 1: with a lot of activity, a lot of adrenaline or
Speaker 1: a penephroa, and a lot of dopamine that can keep
Speaker 1: us awake for longer. Now, there has been studies into this,
Speaker 1: and there was one by Harvard Health published a few
Speaker 1: years back. And your average evening workout is not going
Speaker 1: to hurt you too much. But if you're doing a
Speaker 1: full on, heavy cardio hit workout burning hundreds thousands of
Speaker 1: calories an hour, like thirty minutes before bed, coming home, showering,
Speaker 1: and expecting yourself to fall asleep. I don't think that
Speaker 1: you're going to get to that level of deep sleep
Speaker 1: that we need for restoration any quicker. So it's important
Speaker 1: to make exercise a component to you know, actually use
Speaker 1: the energy stores that your body wants you to use
Speaker 1: throughout the day, but try not to do it too
Speaker 1: close to when you really want to like be asleep,
Speaker 1: be dreaming, be counting sheep. Final tip, try and avoid alcohol.
Speaker 1: I know that alcohol helps us fall asleep quicker, So
Speaker 1: if you are someone who is dealing with insomnia, there
Speaker 1: is a huge urge just like have a nightcap. But
Speaker 1: alcohol is an inhibitor or a downer. That's what causes
Speaker 1: us to feel sleepy because it increases GABBA, which slows
Speaker 1: down the specific signals in our central nervous system. But
Speaker 1: as the alcohol is metabolized and processed, it causes an
Speaker 1: additional spike in glutamate. Now, glutamate is an excitatory neurotransmitter,
Speaker 1: so your brain is basically switching back on as the
Speaker 1: alcohol wears off at like three four am in the morning.
Speaker 1: This may be why you might notice, like after a
Speaker 1: heavy night of drinking. All you want to do is
Speaker 1: have a sleep in and you're waking up at seven
Speaker 1: am kind of cursing the sun, can't get back asleep.
Speaker 1: It's because your brain is trying to level out the
Speaker 1: gabba that it received from processing and metabolizing alcohol by
Speaker 1: spiking the glutamate to get that balance back to kind
Speaker 1: of a nice homeo point of hay rohomeostas is a
Speaker 1: point of normalcy. Alcohol, caffeine, nicotine, those are our big
Speaker 1: sleep no nos. I also just want to say, don't
Speaker 1: get too caught up and worrying about when you'll fall asleep.
Speaker 1: Just stay kind of focused on being present in your
Speaker 1: body and relaxing. I know it can be stressful, and
Speaker 1: yes I've spoken a lot about the harms of not
Speaker 1: getting a good night's sleep. Don't let that become an
Speaker 1: anxiety for you. Don't let that become a point of fixation.
Speaker 1: Your body will do what it needs to do naturally
Speaker 1: unless you do have a sleep disorder. So if you
Speaker 1: are consistently experiencing terrible sleep, you're waking up in the
Speaker 1: middle of the night, that is your opportunity to go
Speaker 1: and see a doctor. But eventually you will fall asleep.
Speaker 1: Eventually your eyes will close, Eventually your brain will shut down.
Speaker 1: We spoke about those experiments before, right, our bodies cannot
Speaker 1: stay alert and functioning at all hours of the day.
Speaker 1: So it's going to do what it needs to do
Speaker 1: biologically and evolutionarily, and just like forward survival, and it
Speaker 1: will make you fall asleep. There's no need to stress.
Speaker 1: There's no need to stress. You're going to be okay this.
Speaker 1: You cannot stay awake forever, I promise. I really hope
Speaker 1: that you enjoyed this episode. It's a bit different, definitely.
Speaker 1: It was science heavy, but we've never spoken about it before,
Speaker 1: so I thought it deserved a spot on the podcast
Speaker 1: feed if you want to come back and listen, If
Speaker 1: you want to check out our episode on dreams, it's
Speaker 1: literally the Psychology of Dreams by the Psychology of your twenties.
Speaker 1: It's a great companion episode to this one, again, one
Speaker 1: of my favorite episodes that we've ever done. Make sure
Speaker 1: that you share this with someone who you think might
Speaker 1: need it. We all have that friend who's up till
Speaker 1: three am and then is up again at seven am.
Speaker 1: Don't shame them, but maybe give them a little nudge
Speaker 1: in the Sleepiness Direction. If you want to see more
Speaker 1: behind the scenes, you want to follow along with the
Speaker 1: podcast along with me, you can follow us at that
Speaker 1: Psychology podcast. You can also send episodes suggestions over there.
Speaker 1: We read every single one even if we can't get
Speaker 1: back to you, and we definitely take on board your suggestions.
Speaker 1: I love seeing our community grow over there, so get
Speaker 1: in touch, say hi, We would love to see you.
Speaker 1: Make sure you're following along on Spotify or Apple podcasts
Speaker 1: wherever you are listening right now, and give us a
Speaker 1: five star review if you're feeling it, if you're feeling
Speaker 1: especially generous. All right, we're going to head off, but
Speaker 1: until next time, sleep tight and be kind and gentle
Speaker 1: with yourselves.