Speaker 1: Good everyone, Sam here. I am back and great to
Speaker 1: be back. I mean this sincerely. I think as much
Speaker 1: on New York was incredible, amazing. I'm not saying New
Speaker 1: York was terrible by any stretch. It was great. But
Speaker 1: I really do love coming home and it sometimes takes
Speaker 1: an overseas trip for us to realize how lucky we
Speaker 1: are to have such a beautiful country here and a
Speaker 1: beautiful life here in Australia. I've been thinking about that
Speaker 1: a lot over the last sort of twenty four hours
Speaker 1: since I've been back, literally only been back for thirty
Speaker 1: six hours. So you forgive me if I'm a little
Speaker 1: bit a little bit sleepy, and we'll talk about that
Speaker 1: a little bit more because we are going to talk
Speaker 1: sleep today with someone who is an absolute sleep expert,
Speaker 1: has worked one on one with clients as a psychologist
Speaker 1: in the specific sleep field for nearly a decade, So
Speaker 1: match sure you hang around for that could be a
Speaker 1: total life changer if that is an area you struggling.
Speaker 1: Then We've got a really interesting question from one of
Speaker 1: our Woodlife listeners.
Speaker 2: My question is around getting back into a healthy routine
Speaker 2: after the loss of people you love. I've recently lost
Speaker 2: both my parents within the space a couple of months,
Speaker 2: and I'm struggling to get back into a healthy routine
Speaker 2: of eating and fitness, even though that's something I've always
Speaker 2: enjoyed doing. Just wondering if you have any suggestions on
Speaker 2: what I can do to help get that back on track.
Speaker 1: That's all coming up next.
Speaker 3: Welcome back to the WOODLFE.
Speaker 1: The timing couldn't be better because I've just done thirty
Speaker 1: nine hour flight back from the US. I was thirty
Speaker 1: nine hours total travel, not on the plane, but total
Speaker 1: travel with the levy. So I'm a little bit weary.
Speaker 1: But we've got just the guest to fix that. Doctor
Speaker 1: day Ashworth is a clinical psychologist. He's done a lot
Speaker 1: of work in the sleep space. In fact, he works
Speaker 1: specifically with sleep clients for over eight years, and he's
Speaker 1: just released a book called Deliberately Better Sleep. Damon. Welcome
Speaker 1: to the WOODLFE and thanks for joining us, and hopefully
Speaker 1: I don't not off. Thanks for having me on snares.
Speaker 1: My wife and I the one thing we fight about
Speaker 1: is not money. It's not about the kids, it's not
Speaker 1: about I don't know, not spending enough time with each other.
Speaker 1: It is about sleep. Because we genuinely argue about the
Speaker 1: fact that she doesn't get enough sleep, and I say
Speaker 1: to her, you need to sleep better and our relationship
Speaker 1: be better too, because it's not only her not getting
Speaker 1: enough sleep. We're mismatching. Was it a disconnecting I'm trying
Speaker 1: to go to a bed a bit earlier and she
Speaker 1: doesn't want to. And how many people struggle with sleep?
Speaker 1: And do you see that with couples?
Speaker 4: Yeah, definitely. I think it's probably about thirty percent of
Speaker 4: people struggle with sleep on any given night, right, So
Speaker 4: it really can. Yeah, it can impact a lot of people.
Speaker 4: And there's something called chronotypes, which is someone's body clock
Speaker 4: or preference, and it's pretty understandable that people have different preferences.
Speaker 3: Yea.
Speaker 4: You know, some people might be more of a morning person,
Speaker 4: some people might be an evening person. And generally that's
Speaker 4: not the first thing that we're looking at when we're
Speaker 4: choosing a partner.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that wasn't a question I asked on The Bachelor.
Speaker 1: What's sleep kind of type? It's something you do find
Speaker 1: out once you're in the relationship. You know, we've got
Speaker 1: three young kids, so sleep's been very disrupted for the
Speaker 1: last five years. Literally almost. Yes, she is nocturnal and
Speaker 1: likes to go a bit late, but she's still getting
Speaker 1: up early. Okay.
Speaker 4: So would you say, is it is because of her
Speaker 4: body clock type or she just doesn't prioritize.
Speaker 1: She'd say it is. I've never sort of tested that theory.
Speaker 1: But I mean, there's what chronotype you are, and then
Speaker 1: there's the reality of your life situation too, and I
Speaker 1: mean she's just not getting enough. How much is the
Speaker 1: magic number? I'd love to know what your what your
Speaker 1: magic number is.
Speaker 4: I'd say there probably isn't a magic right, Okay, Okay,
Speaker 4: we're looking at the recommendations from the government level. People
Speaker 4: will say anywhere between seven to nine hours is healthy
Speaker 4: amount for an adult. But I would say each person
Speaker 4: is slightly different. So there are some people if they
Speaker 4: get by on five or six hours a night, that's
Speaker 4: enough for them, and then other people might need that
Speaker 4: nine to ten hours a night, So it can vary
Speaker 4: from person to person.
Speaker 1: So my concern is the people that are saying they
Speaker 1: only need inverted commas five to six, how do they
Speaker 1: know that that's actually true? And are there many of
Speaker 1: them in your opinion that actually they do need more,
Speaker 1: but they sort of hide behind set of saying that
Speaker 1: I won't mention my wife one more time after this,
Speaker 1: I promise, she tells me, I'm fine. I know her
Speaker 1: very well. I can see that she's tired, probably more
Speaker 1: mentally than physically, you know, like she's forgetting things and
Speaker 1: she's I can see that it's definitely impacting her.
Speaker 4: I think that's the key thing what you're talking about there,
Speaker 4: with the impact. If someone is getting six hours of
Speaker 4: sleep at night, and they're sleeping really well, and they're
Speaker 4: waking up refreshed, and they're feeling great during the day,
Speaker 4: maybe they don't need more, right, But if they are
Speaker 4: finding it hard to pay attention and work, or they're
Speaker 4: finding it hard to do all the things that they
Speaker 4: want to do in their life, to exercise as much
Speaker 4: as they'd like or eat healthy, then there's probably a
Speaker 4: something that they're not sleeping as much, and by increasing
Speaker 4: a little bit more over the next week, see half
Speaker 4: an hour at night, they might notice that they start
Speaker 4: to feel a lot better.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so that's good advice, isn't it. Don't you don't
Speaker 1: have to jump to eight just for a month, get
Speaker 1: half an hour extra night. See if it does make
Speaker 1: a positive impact and then you know, maybe go again
Speaker 1: or find the sweet spot for you. I really liked that.
Speaker 1: I saw a great quote on social media the other
Speaker 1: day and it was, you know, there's all of this
Speaker 1: ice bath and infrared sauna stuff going on, and it
Speaker 1: was someone who I really admire on social media, super
Speaker 1: smart guy that I follow, and he's like, got nothing
Speaker 1: against infrared saunas and ice baths, but the amount of
Speaker 1: dickheads that are fixating on these things and they just
Speaker 1: don't get an sleep and they're they're not doing the
Speaker 1: eighty percent and they're fixating on the two percenters of
Speaker 1: the three percent is like, this is going to be
Speaker 1: the savior to all of their recovery and recuperation and
Speaker 1: mental sharpness and all this kind of stuff. He was
Speaker 1: just saying, you've got to go back to basics.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I read Outlive by doctor Peter Tire. Oh yeah, yeah,
Speaker 4: and he said there's really only five things we need
Speaker 4: to think about, and the fifth one he didn't even
Speaker 4: go into. So the fifth one, there's certain supplements that
Speaker 4: you can take, but the main four of the pillars
Speaker 4: of health, which is exercise, nutrition, and sleep, they're the three,
Speaker 4: and then the fourth is emotional health. And it really
Speaker 4: does bring it back to unless you're doing these basics right,
Speaker 4: then you don't necessarily want to focus on that extra
Speaker 4: one to two percent.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I like that. So we've spoken about the number
Speaker 1: and that can vary. Your book is called Deliberately Better
Speaker 1: Sleep because it's not just about the amount, it's about
Speaker 1: the quality. What are some tips from your book or
Speaker 1: from all of this experience you've had working with people
Speaker 1: to help improve the quality of your sleep that you
Speaker 1: think are the I guess, the best bang for your
Speaker 1: buck bits of advice that you give people. Yeah.
Speaker 4: I think it's about understanding what leads to sleep difficulties
Speaker 4: and what we can do about it.
Speaker 1: Yep.
Speaker 4: So I do bring it back to the underlying mechanisms.
Speaker 4: And not a lot of people that talk about sleep
Speaker 4: necessarily talk about these things.
Speaker 1: Okay, So explain that a little bit. Yeah.
Speaker 4: So they'll say what we need to do, but they
Speaker 4: won't necessarily say why.
Speaker 1: Okay, So I'll.
Speaker 4: Talk to people about sleep pressure and how it's important
Speaker 4: to make sure that that's high enough when we go
Speaker 4: to bed at night time.
Speaker 1: So what does that mean?
Speaker 4: Explain that to that sleep pressure is a homeostatic drive
Speaker 4: so it's something that builds up in our brain. It's
Speaker 4: a dentisceine and essentially the longer we're awake for the
Speaker 4: higher that pressure gets. So we want it to be
Speaker 4: nice and high when we go to bed at night.
Speaker 4: And if someone needs eight hours of sleep, ideally we
Speaker 4: want them to be out of bed for about fifteen
Speaker 4: and a half hours at least, right.
Speaker 1: So you can go to bed too early and you
Speaker 1: can not build that pressure up enough so that when
Speaker 1: you go to bed you're not tired enough to get
Speaker 1: a quality not sleep.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and that can be especially problematic on say a Sunday,
Speaker 4: in that someone goes out late Saturday night, they sleep
Speaker 4: in till say eleven a m. Sunday, and then they
Speaker 4: try to go to bed at nine nine pm that night.
Speaker 4: That pressure is just not going to be high enough.
Speaker 4: And that would bring to the second point, which is
Speaker 4: around circadian rhythms or body clock yep, in that the
Speaker 4: more consistent our sleep is from day to day, the
Speaker 4: better it's going to be. And if we're going to
Speaker 4: bed at the right times for ourselves as better as well.
Speaker 4: So you've just come back from New York, that's going
Speaker 4: to produce jet lag, which is essentially when our body
Speaker 4: clock or our circadian rhythms out of line with the
Speaker 4: environment that we're in.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, it's funny. Yesterday I was telling you when
Speaker 1: half final wasn't today, and hit me at I thought
Speaker 1: I'd baiting it.
Speaker 3: I was wearing a real hero for having my chairs.
Speaker 1: I'm I'm fine, I'm back at work, and then today
Speaker 1: my leads feel about one hundred kilos ech. So, yeah,
Speaker 1: you're timing. You couldn't be better with that one. It
Speaker 1: really has got me. If people are feeling like their
Speaker 1: pressure isn't high enough, what should they do?
Speaker 4: Well, it could be just making sure that they're up
Speaker 4: enough time during the day.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I think a good night sleep does start from the
Speaker 4: morning before, right, you know, if you want to sleep
Speaker 4: at say ten pm, then definitely try not to sleep
Speaker 4: in much later than say six or seven that morning. Well,
Speaker 4: ensure that you're able to have.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's going to be a carryover from the day before. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And what about exercise and actually physically wearing yourself out.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that can increase our pressure a little bit too.
Speaker 4: But for someone if they had insomnia, I wouldn't say
Speaker 4: go out and exercise four hours in the day, and
Speaker 4: I think you sleep problems abound, that's definitely, But it's
Speaker 4: about getting into that consistent routine. If we're exercising regularly,
Speaker 4: we are going to sleep better over time.
Speaker 1: Okay, so we've got pressure getting it as high as
Speaker 1: we can for our head hits the pillow. Yeah, Cicadian rhythm,
Speaker 1: nice consistency. Yeah, probably get little asterix next to the
Speaker 1: jet lag. What else should people be doing?
Speaker 4: Yeah, So in terms of the Cicadian rhythm, I think
Speaker 4: getting some morning sunlight can be really good. Oh okay, yeah,
Speaker 4: so even twenty minutes of sunlight in those first few
Speaker 4: hours is going to help you wake up for the
Speaker 4: day as well as help you feel tired at the
Speaker 4: right times at nighttime. And then the third is all
Speaker 4: about arousal. So often, especially with people with insomnia, the
Speaker 4: main f actors house stress. They are how much they
Speaker 4: can't calm down their body or switch off the mind.
Speaker 4: So it's doing things to wind down before bed, but
Speaker 4: also doing things to manage stress during the day. And
Speaker 4: then if they're in bed and they're getting stressed out,
Speaker 4: what can they focus on or what can they do
Speaker 4: to keep that low?
Speaker 1: So I promised I wouldn't bring my wife up again,
Speaker 1: but I'm going to. She likes to be busy, she
Speaker 1: likes to be active, she likes to be doing things.
Speaker 1: But I give advice like hallroom, darkroom, no screens and phones,
Speaker 1: you know, let's wind down properly. She gets almost tense
Speaker 1: by the thought of all of those things. And so
Speaker 1: her argument to me, and probably pretty fair, is that
Speaker 1: doesn't relax me. In fact, it does the opposite. So
Speaker 1: she'll say to me, let's watch some crappy series on
Speaker 1: Netflix or whatever. She falls asleep on my chest in
Speaker 1: about four seconds. What are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think you're spot on. So arousal plays a
Speaker 4: huge impact on our sleep, and if we're too stressed
Speaker 4: out or our mind's too active, we're not going to
Speaker 4: sleep well. And so whatever we can do to lower it,
Speaker 4: it doesn't matter what it is. If it works for
Speaker 4: that person, then stick with that. Yeah, okay, And so
Speaker 4: it might be that meditation helps some people, but for
Speaker 4: others it does stress them out or it makes it worse.
Speaker 4: And if it does that, then I wouldn't recommend that
Speaker 4: as a strategy for them.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've been a little bit too rigid. I think
Speaker 1: what about going to bed too close to exercise? I mean,
Speaker 1: is that something that does spike arousal for a lot
Speaker 1: of people and they don't have the proper wine down.
Speaker 4: So if we're again thinking in terms of what's ideal,
Speaker 4: we'd probably not want to do too much to exercise
Speaker 4: in that last two to three hours before bed.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Okay, there are some more recent studies that's safe. For
Speaker 4: some people it doesn't matter so much, and that they're
Speaker 4: able to exercise pretty close to bedtime, it's still sleep
Speaker 4: pretty well. But for the average person, I'd say if
Speaker 4: they're trying to sleep at ten thirty, if they can
Speaker 4: stop by seven thirty or eight, then it's not going
Speaker 4: to have too much of a negative impact and it
Speaker 4: should be more of a net positive yea.
Speaker 1: And what about food digestion and eating or snacking too
Speaker 1: close to bedtill?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I do think that is important. I have an
Speaker 4: or ring which tracks a lot of different variables from
Speaker 4: my health, and what I've noticed is on those nights
Speaker 4: where I eat a heavy meal, especially too late or
Speaker 4: too close to bedtime, my resting heart rate is high
Speaker 4: for quite a while even after I fall in asleep.
Speaker 1: Interesting.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so probably about a three hour window for that
Speaker 4: would be ideal as well. So if we're going to
Speaker 4: about eleven to stop by eight.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I like that. What about these tools, these sleep
Speaker 1: feedback tools like the or Ring the Whoop? I don't
Speaker 1: really I can't think of others by name off the
Speaker 1: top of my head, but they're two very popular ones.
Speaker 1: What is your advice on those for people? Would you
Speaker 1: recommend either of those or both of those?
Speaker 4: I would say it depends. I love them both a
Speaker 4: fit bit and or and I look at the data
Speaker 4: and I find that it helps me to look after
Speaker 4: myself and for people, if it does that for them,
Speaker 4: it's great. If people feel like they're not getting any
Speaker 4: sleep at all, it could be really good for them
Speaker 4: to use one of those as well and to notice
Speaker 4: that maybe they're getting a little bit more sleep than
Speaker 4: it feels like. Yeah, but it can be sometimes the
Speaker 4: opposite in that it shows that they're waking a little
Speaker 4: bit more than what they think, and that can produce
Speaker 4: more anxiety for people.
Speaker 1: Yeah. That's a really good answer, isn't it. Because if
Speaker 1: you infatuate or fixate on the data and it's an
Speaker 1: unhealthy obsession, then you can really get in your head
Speaker 1: and you can start to overthinking.
Speaker 4: What about alcohol, I would say it has a much
Speaker 4: more negative impact than most people would realize.
Speaker 1: Well, we almost, we must tell ourselves it helps almost.
Speaker 1: I have a nice glass of red and I'll put
Speaker 1: me or I'll have a little you know, I'll have
Speaker 1: a little nightcap or whatever. You know, we use terms
Speaker 1: like that, and you might fall asleep more easily, but
Speaker 1: you don't you don't know the quality of your sleep
Speaker 1: when you're in it.
Speaker 4: I've definitely noticed that with the trackers that I use
Speaker 4: for myself as well, that it increases the resting heart rate,
Speaker 4: It decreases our heart rate variability. It definitely lowers those recoveries.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, so they're the two.
Speaker 4: There are two sort of factors that we look at,
Speaker 4: and it doesn't have to be much. It can even
Speaker 4: just be two drinks and it will lower that recovery
Speaker 4: score for the next day. What about napping, I would
Speaker 4: say napping is good, right, with some limitations. Okay, so
Speaker 4: I do think there's a big difference between say a
Speaker 4: twenty minute pound ap and two hours, yeah, and napping
Speaker 4: for four hours during the day, which is really just
Speaker 4: spending too long in bed. Yeah, and with the power
Speaker 4: app if it means that you wake up refreshed after it,
Speaker 4: and it means that you're able to get through the
Speaker 4: rest of the day better, and then you're still able
Speaker 4: to sleep pretty well that night because it shouldn't impact
Speaker 4: your night's sleep too much.
Speaker 1: That's great. I mean, as soon as I asked the question,
Speaker 1: I was thinking back to the pressure point that you
Speaker 1: brought up. You know, if you do nap for too long,
Speaker 1: surely that's going to have pulled your pressure down if
Speaker 1: you're still going well, I normally get a bed at ten.
Speaker 1: I stuck a two hour napy and I'm still going
Speaker 1: to try to get a bet at ten. Let's say
Speaker 1: we're tossing and turning and we're not getting into good
Speaker 1: quality sleep at all. You know, we might be in
Speaker 1: bed for four or five hours, but we've never really
Speaker 1: got into good quality sleep at all. And that's happening
Speaker 1: night after night after night. What actually happens to our
Speaker 1: bodies and brains. From a physiological perspective, I do think it.
Speaker 4: Just puts a lot more pressure on our immune system.
Speaker 4: I think we're more likely to get sick over time.
Speaker 4: And there is some more recent data that's even saying
Speaker 4: that if you have long term problems, it can lead
Speaker 4: to increased risk of Alzheimer's.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: So I know that there are those health complications, but
Speaker 4: I do think it's important to know that there's extremes.
Speaker 4: So if you're sleeping somewhere between say five and eight hours,
Speaker 4: it's probably not going to be heaps of negative impact
Speaker 4: over time. But if you're only sleeping say two, three
Speaker 4: or four hours a night, then people will really start
Speaker 4: to see those negative impacts building up quite quickly. So
Speaker 4: the first week, first two weeks, they're going to start
Speaker 4: to get really tired, find it hard to do what
Speaker 4: they want to during the day, and then unless they're
Speaker 4: addressing that, it can get worse and worse.
Speaker 1: I'm glad you brought that up, because I think I
Speaker 1: think we tend to go straight to the short practical implications,
Speaker 1: you know, the commliness, the forgetfulness that you know, not
Speaker 1: struggling at work a bit or whatever it might be.
Speaker 1: But actual long term health ramifications in these extreme cases
Speaker 1: I think is really important to point out.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and so I guess the last thing I'd say
Speaker 4: about that is it is important to get help. And
Speaker 4: if you get help. It can make a big difference.
Speaker 4: My clinical trial was four sessions across eight weeks, and
Speaker 4: that improved most people that we saw. Yeah, right, Whereas
Speaker 4: if people don't address it at all, those sleep problems
Speaker 4: can remain for ten twenty thirty years.
Speaker 1: What advice can you give to our listeners out there
Speaker 1: to give them a bit of a shakeup?
Speaker 4: I try to give people this sense of try it
Speaker 4: as an experiment. You know, let's prioritize this for a
Speaker 4: few weeks or a month and see what difference it
Speaker 4: makes in your life. Now, after that month it doesn't
Speaker 4: feel like it's worth the time, then maybe you don't
Speaker 4: have to make that a priority and you can focus
Speaker 4: on the other two and maybe that's enough. But if
Speaker 4: they're really not prioritizing it's probably having some type of
Speaker 4: negative impact, even if they don't realize it. So focusing
Speaker 4: on a little bit more improving their sleep and seeing
Speaker 4: the benefits can be enough to then help them to
Speaker 4: keep doing it.
Speaker 1: It's really good advice. I was sort of as I
Speaker 1: was asking you that question, I was thinking I was
Speaker 1: putting it in the exercise in my own you know,
Speaker 1: for my own advice that I give people and I
Speaker 1: adopt a pretty similar attitude. You know, if you try
Speaker 1: too hard to push it on someone, they just push
Speaker 1: back or falls on deaf ears that I want to
Speaker 1: know about it, But just get up a movie body
Speaker 1: for thirty minutes, five days a week, and if you
Speaker 1: don't feel better in a month, you'll never hear from
Speaker 1: me again. And guess what, none in on people out
Speaker 1: of one hundred and eight. Thanks so much. I'm definitely
Speaker 1: going to keep doing this, you know, if they've actually
Speaker 1: done it consistently. So I think that's I think that's
Speaker 1: really good advice to our listeners. What does your book
Speaker 1: have in it that we didn't discuss today? I'm far
Speaker 1: more comprehensive, obviously, But what can people expect from your
Speaker 1: book outside of what we each added to today, Because
Speaker 1: I think it'd be really good to let them know.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's a ten step process, right, Okay, So it
Speaker 4: walks people through in terms of how can they really
Speaker 4: identify what their problems are? Where can they get the
Speaker 4: information they need, What are the best strategies out there?
Speaker 4: How can they figure out which strategy is going to
Speaker 4: be best for the problem they're trying to fix?
Speaker 1: It really individualizes it like that.
Speaker 4: How can we put this plan into place? How can
Speaker 4: we do a bit of an assessment beforehand to see
Speaker 4: where you're at and then doing it and tracking it,
Speaker 4: see how it goes afterwards. And if you don't know
Speaker 4: where you're at, how you're going to know if you're
Speaker 4: improve exactly?
Speaker 1: Exactly? Yeah, and sleeps the hardest one it can be.
Speaker 4: But with the sleep trackers now and people can do
Speaker 4: a sleep direa, they can fill out some questionnaires. There
Speaker 4: are some ways to get a good picture in here.
Speaker 1: I like that. I like that. So they can find
Speaker 1: it at book topia. And where can they find you
Speaker 1: if they want to track you down?
Speaker 4: Yeah, so people can check me out at demon Ashurth
Speaker 4: psychology dot com and send a message. I'll always respond
Speaker 4: to it.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much, dam for your time and I
Speaker 1: learn a lot. Thanks so much for Johnny's on the
Speaker 1: woodline as thank you. Well, there you go. A great
Speaker 1: chat with Damon and I'm feeling more awake than I
Speaker 1: was half an hour ago. And I mean that. I
Speaker 1: think with Damon that I really liked was he wasn't extreme,
Speaker 1: he wasn't trying to be controversial for being controversial sake,
Speaker 1: I see a lot of stuff out there, not just
Speaker 1: in sleep, food and exercise, all of it. And I
Speaker 1: think in an effort to be the be the food
Speaker 1: guy or be the sleep girl or whatever it is,
Speaker 1: they come out with these really extreme approaches that often
Speaker 1: make you feel really guilty. And he didn't do that.
Speaker 1: And even his advice regarding snais about saying, look, whatever
Speaker 1: works is the most important thing here and don't feel
Speaker 1: like it has to be by the book if that's
Speaker 1: actually having the opposite impact with a really powerful learning
Speaker 1: for me, and to make sure I take that home tonight.
Speaker 1: And next up, we have a great exercise question from
Speaker 1: one of our wood Lifelessness. So this question is coming
Speaker 1: through from Alsa, and it's not the type of exercise
Speaker 1: question that you might expect, but it's actually when I've
Speaker 1: had numerous times, and it's a really really good question
Speaker 1: because whether it's a tragedy like Alsa has recently experienced,
Speaker 1: or something else extreme that has happened in your life
Speaker 1: that has totally thrown your world into chaos, you can
Speaker 1: relate to what else is asking. And here's her question.
Speaker 2: Hi, Sam. My question is around getting back into a
Speaker 2: healthy routine after the loss of people you love. I've
Speaker 2: recently lost both my parents within the space a couple
Speaker 2: of months, and I'm struggling to get back into a
Speaker 2: healthy routine of eating and fitness, even though that's something
Speaker 2: I've always enjoyed doing. Just wondering if you have any
Speaker 2: suggestions on what I can do to help get that
Speaker 2: back on track.
Speaker 3: Thanks.
Speaker 1: First of all, answer, I'm sincerely sorry for your loss.
Speaker 1: I've actually had this question quite a bit, typically from
Speaker 1: people from my twenty eight program who were in wonderful
Speaker 1: routines and then a tragedy of some kind happens in
Speaker 1: their life and they really do lose their way. So
Speaker 1: the advice that I'm going to give you is advice
Speaker 1: that I've given them, And the first thing I say
Speaker 1: is don't rush, don't stress yourself out about it, don't
Speaker 1: put too much pressure on yourself. I think the advice
Speaker 1: here needs to be twofold. It needs to be your
Speaker 1: great wellness routine that you're probably in beforehand, will wait,
Speaker 1: can wait, and is never going to be as important
Speaker 1: as losing people that you love so dearly. That being said,
Speaker 1: when we are in a really really challenging time, doing
Speaker 1: things that build our resilience, build our strength, give us energy,
Speaker 1: connect us with the people, give us focus or distraction
Speaker 1: can be really powerful, and working out, exercising, cooking, food
Speaker 1: prep all of those things are great examples of that category.
Speaker 1: So you need to be ready, you know, you definitely,
Speaker 1: and perhaps the fact that you are calling in and
Speaker 1: asking me that question means that you are ready or
Speaker 1: you are close to being ready, So I think that's
Speaker 1: a really good sign. The I guess the key here
Speaker 1: is start back with baby steps. It might be exercising
Speaker 1: every second day. It might be healthy breakfasts just to
Speaker 1: get you up and going in the morning and build
Speaker 1: from there so you're not putting too much pressure on yourself.
Speaker 1: The process with grief and dealing with such a tragedy
Speaker 1: is not a linear one. You're not just going to
Speaker 1: get a little bit better every day because you do.
Speaker 1: You're going to have okay days, and you're gonna have
Speaker 1: terrible days. You're gonna have okay mornings, and then you're
Speaker 1: going to have days where you completely can't handle anything,
Speaker 1: which is absolutely normal and understandable. So I think baby steps,
Speaker 1: focusing on any type of exercise that you like the most,
Speaker 1: don't do stuff that you don't like doing, don't do
Speaker 1: stuff that's super super hard. Do stuff that's going to
Speaker 1: get a bit of a sweat, going to get those
Speaker 1: endorphins pumping and going to make you feel a little
Speaker 1: bit better from a mental perspective, and then the physicals
Speaker 1: just a bonus. And I think if you start there
Speaker 1: with a nice, yummy breakfast that's full of good stuff
Speaker 1: that's going to give you some energy, and a nice
Speaker 1: early morning sweat session even every second day, that would
Speaker 1: be my advice where to start. And then you listen
Speaker 1: to your body and you listen to your brain. If
Speaker 1: that makes you feel better, if that helps you cope
Speaker 1: with this really really hard time, even just a little bit,
Speaker 1: then maybe do a little bit more and build from there.
Speaker 1: But as soon as you feel like it's having a
Speaker 1: detrimental effect, back it off, and as soon as you
Speaker 1: feel that it's helping, do a little bit more to
Speaker 1: see where the sweet spot is. So there we go.
Speaker 1: Great to be back. I have missed you all. I
Speaker 1: mean that sincerely. I'm going to take Damon's advice. You're
Speaker 1: not going to be too early tonight, but I still
Speaker 1: do need I think, one good night sleep to get
Speaker 1: myself back on track. So with that said, of course,
Speaker 1: please send in your questions, sending anything else you'd like
Speaker 1: to talk about. There's a link in the show notes
Speaker 1: where you can do that. Until next week, I'm going
Speaker 1: home for a little nap. See ya.