Why Sleep May Be the Most Important Thing You Do

Dr. Shawn Talbott (Ph.D., CNS, LDN, FACSM, FACN, FAIS) has gone from triathlon struggler to gut-brain guru! With a Ph.D. in Nutritional Biochemistry, he's on a mission to boost everyday human performance through the power of natural solutions and the gut-brain axis.

Want to feel better than you’ve ever felt?

Every year, millions of us make New Year’s resolutions with the hope of improving our lives. 

Common goals include losing weight, getting in shape, reducing stress, and improving overall health. 

While winning the lottery might remain a distant dream, achieving the other four is entirely within our reach.

Imagine feeling more energetic, balanced, and resilient than ever before. Well, believe it or not—this is totally possible for all of us. 

You just need to know exactly what to do. 

Thus, in this blog post, I’ll be sharing insights and tips on how to overcome burnout, restore biochemical balance, and reclaim your natural energy. These strategies are drawn from years of research and practical application, and they can help you make lasting changes to your health and well-being.

If you’re eager to dive deeper into these concepts, follow along to gain valuable tools to help you meet your wellness goals. This blog post will be your ultimate guide to help you on your journey to a healthier, more vibrant life.

(Note: A lot of the information in this blog post comes from Dr. Shawn Talbott’s book, Best Future You: Harnessing Your Body’s Biochemistry to Achieve Balance in Body, Mind, and Spirit. Buy a copy here.)

The Importance of Getting Enough Sleep

Just as you pay little attention to the fact that your heart beats in a regular pattern, so too are you normally unaware of your body’s natural rhythm during restful sleep. 

But night after night, your body follows a well-worn path into dreamland: Breathing slows, muscles relax, heart rate and blood pressure drop, and body temperature falls. 

The brain releases the “sleep hormone,” melatonin, and begins a slow descent into sleep.

Understanding the Sleep Cycle

The rapid beta waves of your restless wakeful state in the daytime gradually change into the slower alpha waves that are characteristic of calm wakefulness, or “relaxed alertness,” where you generally want to spend most of your time.

Eventually, your brain drops into the still-slower theta waves that predominate during the various stages of sleep. During a full night of sleep, you normally pass through several stages: Stage 2 (lasting ten to fifteen minutes), then Stage 3 (lasting five to fifteen minutes), and finally to the deepest portion of sleep in Stage 4 (lasting about thirty minutes). 

Even though Stage 4 lasts only about a half hour, it is the most “famous” portion of the sleep cycle, because it is when you dream and exhibit rapid eye movement, popularly referred to as REM. 

Your total sleep cycle, from early Stage 2 to final REM sleep, takes an average of ninety minutes to complete.

The Impact of Sleep Interruptions

And, most importantly for people who have trouble sleeping, this cycle repeats itself over and over throughout the night—which means that interruptions can make it harder to get back to sleep, depending on which part of the cycle the sleeper is experiencing when awakened. 

In sleep-research labs, where alarm clocks, lights, and other interruptions can be banished, scientists have found that the natural duration of these repeating sleep cycles (the “physiological ideal”) is eight hours and fifteen minutes.

Health Risks of Inadequate Sleep

The idea of getting more than eight hours of sleep per night may sound great—but what if you simply can’t (or won’t) get that much shut-eye? You could be setting yourself up for numerous health problems, beginning with the fact that your blood-sugar levels will rise. 

Sleep researchers have shown that getting only four to six hours of sleep per night results in signs of impaired glucose tolerance and insulin resistance. 

This means that cheating on sleep—even for only a few nights—can put a person in a prediabetic state. These changes in insulin action and blood-sugar control are also linked to the development of obesity and an increase in risk for inflammation-related conditions, such as heart disease.

Hormonal Changes and Obesity

Poor sleep also contributes to obesity, because it precipitates changes on the hormonal level. 

Growth hormone and leptin are reduced in people who spend less time in deep sleep. (Leptin is a hormone that plays important roles in regulating appetite, body weight, metabolism, and reproductive function.) 

When you have less growth hormone in your system, it typically results in a loss of muscle and a gain of fat over time. Reduced levels of leptin will lead to hunger and carbohydrate cravings.

The Vicious Cycle of Poor Sleep

Given all these health impacts, I am continually astonished by how many people think they can just “get by” with inadequate sleep and are then surprised when they struggle with low energy, weight gain, constant hunger, depression, or any of the other problems associated with being “out” of biochemical balance. 

Thinking that you can “get by” with inadequate sleep is exactly like thinking you can “get by” with a steady diet of Twinkies. 

If you’re “shorting” yourself on sleep, you are virtually guaranteeing that your biochemical balance will be chronically disrupted, and you are putting yourself in a position of weakness in each of the Four Pillars of Health.

To give you some idea of just how detrimental a lack of sleep can be to your biochemical balance, look at what happens to an average fifty-year-old who sleeps just six hours per night. 

That middle-aged person has nighttime cortisol levels more than twelve times higher than the average thirty-year-old who sleeps eight hours per night!

Not only will an inadequate quality or quantity of sleep upset biochemical balance, but it will also limit your ability to fall asleep the next night (because your cortisol is still too high) and the amount of time that your mind spends in the most restful stages of deep sleep.

Research Studies on Sleep Deprivation

A vicious cycle gets set into motion when you experience poor sleep, an overactive stress response, and subtle changes in biochemical balance that lead you down the path toward burnout and chronic diseases.

Numerous research studies verify the damage caused by sleep deprivation, including the following:

  • A Yale University study of 1,709 men found that those who regularly got less than six hours of shut-eye doubled their risk of weight gain and diabetes because of elevated cortisol and its interference with insulin metabolism and blood-sugar control (leading to glycation).
  • University of Virginia researchers have reported that jet lag—and the elevated cortisol that comes from sleep deprivation and altered body-clock cycles—is not just bad for health but can lead to higher death rates as well (at least in older mice). The increased death rates are thought to be due to a suppression of immune-system function by disrupted biochemical balance. The fact that these sleep-deprived mice die sooner probably comes as no surprise to exhausted, globe-trotting business executives or stretched-to-the-limit soccer moms.
  • Researchers at Brown University Medical School have also shown that sleep quality (how restful your sleep is), but not necessarily sleep quantity (how many hours of sleep you get), is closely related to biochemical balance and your state of vigor. As you might imagine, subjects with lower levels of sleep quality (including children and teenagers) also had the most disrupted biochemical balance and overall stress, as well as the lowest vigor scores.
  • In Stockholm, Sweden, researchers at the National Institute for Psychosocial Medicine conducted a series of experiments related to those at Brown and showed that total sleep time was significantly decreased (leading to problems with biochemical balance) in workers during their most stressful workweeks. The stress at work also led to daytime sleepiness and nighttime restlessness—so even though the workers were tired, they were still too stressed and metabolically imbalanced to sleep.

Personal Reflections on Sleep

Even if you understand the importance of sleep as proven in these studies, you may feel lucky to get just six or seven hours of shut-eye. I know I do—and yet I also realize this is still not enough sleep to maintain my own biochemical balance within healthy parameters. 

On top of that, I also know that some of the best ways to ensure a restful night of sleep are to avoid caffeine after noon (yet I sit here writing this with an afternoon cup of java next to the laptop), leave work at the office (yet I’m writing this from my home office), and skip the late-night TV (yet my DVR lets me watch primetime shows after my wife and I put the kids to bed)—so that’s three strikes for me.

I tell you all this “personal information” in the hope that you will see that maintaining your biochemical balance—or improving your vigor—is not an “all-or-nothing” proposition. No one does this perfectly, myself included.

Sometimes you have lots of stress, and sometimes you have less. Sometimes you get adequate sleep, but for many of you, that doesn’t happen often enough. 

On certain days you’ll be able to exercise and eat right—and on other days you’ll hit the drive-through and feel like you’re working nonstop. 

The point here is not to strive to be “perfect” in your efforts to maintain biochemical balance. 

Rather, the best approach is to apply the principles outlined in this book as consistently as possible to ensure that you can do as much as possible to keep your vigor high as often as possible.

VIP: Building Better Sleep Habits

So I offer you the several ideas in the following section on developing better sleep habits not to give you more things to add to your “to-do” list but to present some ideas and techniques that have proven helpful to many people, including me. (Here are some additional sleep better naturally tips.) 

Don’t feel like you need to incorporate all these ideas perfectly. Rather, these are some suggestions for you to consider and adapt to your individual needs so you can tap into one of the most powerful VIPs—getting good sleep!

Exercise Regularly

Exercise on a regular basis. 

As indicated in earlier sections, exercise can help you reduce inflammation, stress hormones, blood sugar, and oxidation, and the pleasant post-exercise fatigue may be just what you need to help you sink into your bed in the evening.

Avoid Exercising Too Close to Bedtime

Don’t exercise too close to bedtime. 

Exercising too close to bedtime can increase alertness enough in some people to interfere with their ability to fall asleep.

Relax Before Bed

Take time to unwind by enjoying a nonelectronic relaxing activity, such as reading. 

Electronics, including computers, video games, and televisions, can increase alertness and stimulate the brain into a wakeful state that can make it hard to fall asleep.

Exercising too close to bedtime can increase alertness enough in some people to interfere with their ability to fall asleep.

Create a Sleep-Friendly Environment

Make your bedroom dark and cool. 

The slow drop in body temperature that you experience in a cool room can help you feel sleepy, and a darkened room with as little light distraction as possible can help you stay asleep.

What to Do If You Can't Fall Asleep

If you can’t fall asleep after twenty minutes, get up. 

If you try to fall asleep and can’t, get up and do something relaxing, such as reading, until you feel tired enough to fall asleep. 

The stress that comes from trying to “force” yourself to fall asleep will almost certainly keep you awake longer and may interfere with restful sleep when you finally do drift off.

Smiling on Stress

Over the years, I have picked up a few witty sayings and anecdotes about coping with stress from friends and colleagues. I hope a few of them give you a chuckle, because laughter is a great way to ease stress:

  1. Accept that some days you’re the pigeon, and some days you’re the statue.

  2. Always keep your words soft and sweet, just in case you have to eat them.

  3. If you can’t be kind, at least have the decency to be vague.

  4. Never put both feet in your mouth at the same time, because then you won’t have a leg to stand on.

  5. Nobody cares if you can’t dance well. Just get up and dance.

  6. Because it is the early worm that gets eaten by the bird, sleep late.

  7. The second mouse gets the cheese.

  8. You may be only one person in the world, but you may also be the world to one person.

  9. A truly happy person is one who can enjoy the scenery on a detour.

  10. We could learn a lot from crayons. Some are sharp, some are pretty, and some are dull. Some have weird names, and all are different colors, but they all have to live in the same box.

Conclusion: Your Path to Better Sleep and Improved Vigor

Achieving optimal health and vigor requires attention to the fundamentals of good sleep, balanced biochemistry, and stress management. 

By understanding the importance of sleep and implementing these practical strategies, you can improve your energy, mood, and overall well-being.

Remember, the journey to better sleep is not about perfection but consistency. Integrate these tips into your daily routine, and you'll find yourself more resilient and balanced over time. 

Small, incremental changes can lead to significant improvements in your health and quality of life.

As you embark on this journey to reclaim your natural energy and restore balance, know that each step you take brings you closer to feeling your best. 

Prioritize your sleep, listen to your body's needs, and don't be afraid to make adjustments along the way.

Wishing you the best of luck on your journey to better sleep and a more vibrant life. Sweet dreams and good night!

About the Author

Exercise physiologist (MS, UMass Amherst) and Nutritional Biochemist (PhD, Rutgers) who studies how lifestyle influences our biochemistry, psychology and behavior - which kind of makes me a "Psycho-Nutritionist"?!?!

Discover Your Best Self: Boost Your Mood, Increase Your Energy, and Enhance Your Focus with “Mental Wellness 101” – Our FREE Training Course!

{"email":"Email address invalid","url":"Website address invalid","required":"Required field missing"}
>