Okay, now that you the basics of the mechanics of sleep. Let’s talk about how you
can use this new knowledge to sleep less, have more powerful sleep, and have more
energy in your life. I have given you the previous “scientific” information here
because I wanted you to have a knowledge base with the “right” information. Too
often in life we try to achieve something but with the wrong information! I have a
belief in life that there are 3 fundamental steps to achieving anything, whether it is
getting quality sleep, achieving a financial goal, a personal goal, or anything else,
these 3 steps are…
Step 1) Get the right information
Step 2) Make the right plan
Step 3) Take ACTION!
To give you a personal example of how step #1 is so important:
I go to the gym about 3 days per week, and every single time I’m there, I see the
same people relentlessly working out their abs on the ab cruncher machines. And
these people are doing about 10 - 20 sets of 100 to 200 repetitions of ab crunches
and sit ups, for up to 3 hours! Every time I go past them I laugh a little, and I also feel
a bit sorry for them, because they’re wasting their time.
The reason why they’re doing all the sit ups is because they’re desperately trying to
get a 6 pack of abs on their stomach.
I have a 6 pack myself, but is it because I trained hard for 2 years to get it? No,
actually it took me only about 7 weeks. I learned that the only way for your abs to
become visible is to decrease your body fat percentage below a certain point, about
7% for men and 12% for women. This is only achieved by following a specific diet
and working out ALL the muscles of your body, not just one. This way you’re working
out every single muscle, and your body fat decreases all over your body, instead of
following the “spot reducing” method, where you work out only one part of your body
and expect the muscles to become visible through all your fat. This is the only way to
get a 6 pack of abs.
That information took me 3 minutes to learn! 3 Minutes of powerful information
prevented me from wasting my time for months, or perhaps years without getting the
result I wanted.
So this is what I meant by “getting the right information” in life. Often people have the
right MOTIVATION to do something, but they have the wrong INFORMATION. A lot
of people want to have more time and energy in their lives, but they don’t have the
right information on how to go about getting that result! This is why I have chosen to
write this book for you, and teach you about the mechanics of sleep first.
In this section we’ll talk about all the methods and understandings you must have to
optimize your sleep clock for optimum sleep performance. Afterwards we’ll talk about
sleeping problems and finally how to tie all this information together to create your
own sleep optimization plan and reduce your sleeping time. After finishing this book
and filling out your Personal Evaluation Plan, you may feel compelled to explore a
more fun part of sleep: Dreams, in the other book that came in the downloadable
package.
Remember, your main goals are to:
1) Increase the quality of your sleep.
2) Increase the level of energy you have every day.
3) Decrease your sleeping time by as much as you can. (We’ll explore this in detail in
a later section.)
Getting enough Sunshine
I cannot over emphasize how important this is! As explained earlier, the amount
of natural sunlight that enters your eyes has a drastic effect on your temperature
body rhythm.
•
When we’re exposed to high intensity light, our body temperature increases, and
melatonin levels rapidly decrease.
•
Exposure to natural sunlight also delays the temperature drop. This allows you
to stay awake and alert for longer periods of time.
•
Lack of sunlight results in higher melatonin levels, this leads to lower body
temperature levels, feeling very sleepy, and tired through out the day.
Lack of sunlight will create a flat-line effect in your body temperature, because it will
not get a chance to rise high enough, your body temperature won’t fall low enough
during the night either. If your body temperature is flat-lined, this could cause major
sleeping problems, and it will be very difficult for you to sleep deeply for long periods
of time. A lot of people who complain about “poor sleep” usually don’t get enough
sunlight.
Consider how for the most part of our evolution we were always outside during the
day, it seemed that nature intended us to be this way, then suddenly over the past
100 years we drastically changed our exposure to natural sunlight. Most of us hardly
get any sun today at all! We drive to work in a car, we wear sunglasses, we work in
offices, what kind of effect do you think this has on our sleep clock?
