By Lynn Gamwell
What if there were 10 simple ways to improve your sleep? Good sleep is essential for every aspect of our lives. Most people need around 8 hours of sleep per night although some need less and some need more for optimal health. When we don’t sleep well our work suffers, our relationships feel strained, our health is compromised, our concentration is impaired, and we feel like we are just dragging through our day. But getting the sleep we need is not complicated. A little awareness and a few tweaks to our daily habits can help us to feel awake, energized, and with a brand new attitude toward life. So consider implementing at least some of these top ten tips and you’ll be sleeping like a baby!
1) Create regular rhythms of sleep and wake times.
Regularity helps set the body’s internal clock and allows our sleep-inducing hormones to function for a better night’s sleep. This can be easier said than done. For those times when our body needs a little help, melatonin, a naturally occurring hormone, can help stabilize sleep rhythms. Mercola Melatonin Spray combines Melatonin with Valerian, the two most trusted natural sleep aids.(1) It works with the body’s own hormones helping you to fall asleep and stay asleep. It is especially good for shifting time zones, night shift work, and occasional sleeplessness.
2) Make your bedroom a soothing place to be.
Your bedroom should nurture you and feel like a retreat from the concerns of the world. Decorate with aesthetically pleasing objects and colors. Eliminate clutter or work from your sleep space. This creates a place where you will naturally feel at ease and relaxed. Use the bed only for sleep, light reading, and sex.
3) Have sex!
Research shows that being intimate can have sleep inducing effects for several reasons. The obvious reason is that it tires one out physically making one ready for sleep. Another reason is that connecting with a partner improves mood and decreases worry, which is one of the main reasons people lie awake at night. Sex has also been shown to release hormones that cause drowsiness.(2) So grab someone you love and cuddle up! Your sleep depends on it!
4) Avoid caffeine and alcohol later in the day.
Without stimulants or drugs the body is allowed to set it’s own rhythms for waking and sleeping. Over time you will become more in tune with your body’s innate sleep needs. Alcohol can make one sleepy, but it has been shown to be detrimental to sleep cycles, often leaving one groggy the next day.
5) Develop a wind down ritual.
A set of behaviors that you choose can signal the body to switch to relax mode and prepare to sleep. This should always be a pleasurable activity, which allows your cares to drift away. Ideas include meditation, journaling, light reading that is not work related, or restorative yoga. Yoga or simple stretches can release tension from the physical body helping the mind to disengage from the day and sleep more restfully.
6) Take a bath.
Bathing in hot water raises your body temperature, inducing sleep. To enhance the calming effect, try a few drops of essential oil like lavender and add Ancient Minerals Magnesium Bath Flakes. Magnesium is a calming sleep aid as well as being good for inflammation and muscle pain. Your joints and muscles will thank you as you slip into deep, restorative sleep!
7) Warm your core.
Warming one’s mid-section can have much the same effect as a hot bath in less time.(3) Use a heating pad, a hot water bottle, or your partner’s body for some soothing, sleep inducing relaxation. Try drinking some relaxing tea such as chamomile to increase the core warming effect. Sipping Natural Calm magnesium powder in a hot cup of water could be a wonderful addition to your nighttime ritual for soothing stress, relaxing muscles, and warming your core all at once!
8) Eliminate noise and light.
It might seem as though the nightlight in the corner is helpful or the traffic outside doesn’t affect your sleep. But it does!(4) Turn off all lights. The darker you can make your room the better. Consider purchasing black out curtains or using an eye mask. Keep earplugs by the bed and always in your travel bag. Get the best sleep possible wherever you are.
9) Limit media use.
In our world of artificial light and endless access to technology it is tempting to spend much of the evening watching television, checking e-mail, working, or just surfing the web. But the light emitted from screens inhibits production of melatonin, our body’s sleep inducing hormone.(5) In addition, technology distracts our minds from getting sleepy, which can prevent us from getting the sleep we require.
10) Use a natural sleep aid.
Rather than resorting to addictive medications with many side effects when sleep eludes you, try Ancient Minerals Magnesium Good Night Lotion. A combination of melatonin, magnesium, and MSM (methylsulfonylmethane), Good Night Lotion is specially formulated to alleviate sleep issues. MSM’s pain and inflammation fighting qualities enhance the sleep inducing effects of melatonin and the calming qualities of magnesium for a better night’s sleep.
Now you can get better quality sleep and wake feeling refreshed and revitalized. Sleep well!
- Hyman, Mark MD The Blood Sugar Solution
- http://www.nbcnews.com/id/11326819/ns/msnbc-the_ed_show/t/new-study-claims-sex-can-help-sleep-deprived/#.VvwoPUttIqs
- Hyman, Mark MD The Blood Sugar Solution
- Weil, Andrew, MD, Healthy Aging: A Lifelong Guide to Your Physical and Spiritual Well-Being
- Weil, Andrew, MD, Healthy Aging: A Lifelong Guide to Your Physical and Spiritual Well-Being
