Bad Sleep = Bad Everything

In this episode, Charles and Dan unpack key insights from The Diary of a CEO conversation with sleep scientist Matthew Walker — exploring how modern life undermines rest, what’s actually happening in your brain while you sleep, and the small, practical changes that can improve energy, focus, and overall well-being.

We discuss:

• Why sleep loss affects every system in the body
• The myths around caffeine, naps, and “catching up” on weekends
• What REM sleep really does for emotional regulation
• Simple steps to build a better nightly routine

Watch the original Diary of a CEO episode featuring Matthew Walker:
🎧 The Science of Sleep – Why You’re Tired All the Time

Listen to all Mindfully Masculine episodes and find more from Charles and Dan at MindfullyMasculine.com

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction
• 1:05 Why We're So Bad at Sleep
• 7:56 How Evolution and Culture Shaped Rest
• 12:31 Sleep, Work, and Productivity Myths
• 21:31 How Sleep Affects Mood and Relationships
• 24:52 Temperature, Chronotypes, and Sleep Tech
• 36:02 What Society Could Do Differently
• 43:42 Caffeine, Alcohol, and Other Sleep Killers
• 49:15 Action Steps and Takeaways
• 53:10 Closing Thoughts

Transcript

Charles: 0:00

How I believe that our current cultural attitudes toward sleep and our cultural attitudes toward a lot of issues can be driven in ways that we don't notice or understand by people who are in power, where we've got a status quo that works for the people in power, and so they want to keep that going. And one example of that is the CEO of Netflix basically saying war on sleep, because the fact is, in a modern capitalist society, if you are sleeping, you're neither producing nor consuming. So what good are you? Welcome to the Mindfully Masculine Podcast. This is Charles. Today, Dan and I are taking a closer look at the diary of a CEO and Stephen Bartlett's conversation with sleep scientist Matthew Walker. We'll talk about what really happens when we don't get enough sleep, why modern culture still glorifies burnout, and how small, realistic changes in your nightly routine can make a big difference in how you feel and function. You can find all of our audio video episodes along with anything new we're creating and sharing at mindfullymasculine.com. Thanks and enjoy.

Dan: 1:04

Good morning, Charles.

Charles: 1:05

Good morning, Dan. How are you? I am doing well. How are you? Uh pretty good, but I didn't put my phone on Do Not Disturb. Now it is. Okay. Um, I'm doing well. Uh how'd you sleep?

Dan: 1:16

I slept probably on a scale of one to ten. I it's probably seven last night, so better than at my uh average for sure.

Charles: 1:26

Yeah, it's probably around six or seven. I woke up uh a bit in the middle of the night and didn't get back to sleep right away. But that's that's not all that uncommon for me. Um I mean, when el when else are you gonna do your hunting? I mean, honestly. Victims can see during the day. So gathering. Yeah. Um yeah, so uh that uh brings us to our topic of this episode. You and I um were we're staying on track with uh talking about some really great discussions from the Diary of a CEO show on YouTube. And this one was with uh Dr. Matthew Walker, who is a neuroscientist, and he wrote a book called Why We Sleep, and they went through and talked about pretty much everything you can imagine when it comes to sleeping and doing it the right way, doing it the wrong way, and uh a lot of the mistakes that all of us seem to be making, or at least most of us. Um he suggests, Dr. Walker, that we're in a global sleep loss epidemic driven by modern technology and modern economic systems. And it's very hard to disagree with him on that because um we have seen for a good long while there have been cultural drivers that say the earlier you wake up and the less you sleep, the better person you are. And I've been guilty of some of that as well because I am naturally a morning person. So for people who have to sleep later and and stay up later, in the past I have done a little bit of condescending and looking down my nose at those folks. And uh I, you know, previous to this episode, I knew that that was not scientifically legitimate or necessarily very ethical of me. But uh so it's one of the things I'm trying to leave behind.

Dan: 3:21

Do you think that comes from some sort of notion that people who are sleeping in while you're active are lazy? Yes. I think I mean just looking at them not doing anything, and you're up and about getting the day started, and it's just like, how dare you?

Charles: 3:35

Right? Almost, right? Like Oh, I'm doing all this work, you're just lying there. Yeah, but it does it, you don't you don't do the math in the opposite way. No.

Dan: 3:42

Where when I would when I go to sleep, it, you know, you're sleeping, you're not seeing and you're not witnessing them doing all the other stuff that and it's like also like how productive is somebody really what kinds of things are being done? Or what do we think they were doing? Because I think we're also associating that with partying and staying up late for reasons that are not really productive for the most part.

Charles: 4:04

I thought it was a good thing. Well, yeah, because I mean, you know, it doesn't you date a bartender and you realize that that's not the case. She, you know, she was often up late working harder at night than I was working during the day at all. Well, I'm I'm sitting at a keyboard all day and she's actually doing manual labor, and then it's like, oh, that's you know, it's not right. Just because she happens to be doing it in a place with live music doesn't mean that it's not work. Right.

Dan: 4:26

You know, that's the thing, is just you don't unless you really to spend the time to think that through and really put yourself in other person's shoes, you're uh it's very easy to come up with those ideas that, hey, yeah, you're lazy if you you're sleeping in and staying up late.

Charles: 4:38

And I think culturally it's also a lot, you know, from the the nine to five job, whether it's in an office or an assembly line, manufactory, whatever it is, it's just this idea or or even schooling. You know, you wake up early, you get dressed, you have your breakfast, you go to school or work, and then at the end of the day, that's when you have fun, relax, and go to sleep. So whether somebody's actual work or school schedule reflects that they're having fun in the evenings and relaxing, we kind of think, oh, that's what that's what people do at night is they have fun and they relax, even if they have a job.

Dan: 5:12

I'm wondering if that comes from the culture of being human as we evolved in terms of the the labor that we were doing over the years, right? So we started out really as like hunter-gatherers and then and then became farmers. And when were both of those activities done primarily was in the mornings. You start early in the morning, as soon as sunlight comes in, you're out there, you're you're working, right? And so maybe part of the reason why we've got that in our brains culturally and and that that opinion sometimes is maybe it comes from that. Is that's what work is. That's that's our opinion of what hard work is, productive work, valuable work, because we're bringing in food and potentially money into the family.

Charles: 5:58

Yeah, I think those activities. I think we have to point to the agricultural revolution for that because during the hunter-gatherer phase, no, it was very it was very likely that there were, you know, he he said that you've got these early risers, these late risers, and these people that are kind of in the middle. Yeah. And that was the shift that it was broken out into that shift for monitoring for danger and stuff like that. So I think for the hunter-gatherer, the people that woke up late and stayed up late and kept watch, you know, as the fire was burning out, it was their job to keep you safe while you were sleeping.

Dan: 6:31

But which val which job do you think people valued more?

Charles: 6:34

I think back then it was probably equal.

Dan: 6:36

I don't I disagree because people want to eat. And so if somebody, if if the the hunters came back with a big feast, it's like, oh, we haven't eaten in days, and we finally got something, like celebration, we're we're eating everything else. And you're just kind of sitting there, and yeah, maybe it was maybe maybe you have a good a good story, like you defended the tribe. Like, how often does that might maybe happen? Like, probably not that often. Not as not as often as you're bringing in food. So I'm thinking back, I'm thinking it's probably more celebrated when you're bringing in sustenance for the the the community.

Charles: 7:11

Yeah, so maybe I might be right. The the early risers may have had a little bit of a of a higher status even back then. But you know, what we know now from science is that there is no better or worse, there's just different and um And it's beneficial that we're different. Yeah, if we That was interesting. Yeah, and you know, he may he makes a good case that if sleep was something that was optional, evolution would have selected it out of us a long time ago. So the fact that it's so expensive from a survival and an evolution standpoint, yet we still we still require it means it must be super duper important. Otherwise, we wouldn't still be sleeping eight hours a night or whatever.

Dan: 7:55

Exactly. He made the point is when we're sleeping, we're absolutely vulnerable to to whatever attacks or yeah. Um and uh if if you remember you talked about how some animals can have half of their brains saying I had never heard that before. I didn't know that. And the other brain, the other half of the brain is awake. One of them was birds, and that was so fascinating to me the analogy or what he talked about was birds will sleep with one eye open and the other eye shut, and it will be determined based on where they land on a branch, like a flock of birds land, star line, whatever, yeah. Right, right, lands on this, and you know, the the ones, the birds that are closest to the end have their eyes open, you know, uh on on one side, and their eyes are on the side of their head so they get the full 180 view, and sleeping on the other.

Charles: 8:43

I know, and then he's like, Oh, yeah, you would switch, they wouldn't even switch with people on the inside or birds on the inside, they would just the outside ones would just switch places.

Dan: 8:51

Well, what we said we're gonna turn around, they would just turn around in place, which is much more efficient. That's right, yeah. Trying to get organized, and oh, I was over here, buddy. The other ones, too. Right, yeah, and then and then they turn around and then they rest the other part of the brain. It's crazy, but because of that, a flock survives because they can be you know aware of danger or you know, shifting winds or something knocking people off.

Charles: 9:12

Why would evolution go to the complexity of figuring all this out if it wasn't absolutely essential for survival?

Dan: 9:18

And what's crazy is yeah, some birds operate in that fashion, and then the birds in the middle, both of them, I think they both both have sleep. Both brain halves have sleep. Yeah. And so, yeah, I remember he was, yeah. So we talked about, yeah, I guess over time, sometimes our our brain can shift based on our sleep needs. So, like, you know, teenagers, we are a lot of times our school systems are back ass words because we're getting the teenagers off much earlier than other, you know, than than what their brain is wanting to do. Right. And I just remember sitting in a class, I don't know about you, but when I was a teenager, I was falling asleep in class. I mean, I wasn't sleeping great as it was, but I was just never, I was falling asleep in class all the time. It was just, I was always tired.

Charles: 10:05

For me, it was always it was always after lunch. I never had a problem in the morning. I would I would wake up and be Yeah, I guess me too. I did uh we'll talk about the uh sleep quiz that you and I both took um on another sleep doctor's website. But yeah, I am if I've got something important to do, then I'm doing it in the first few hours after I wake up. That's really when I'm at my sharpest. And that was pretty much the case when I was in school too. Yeah. But man, after lunch, it was real hard, especially depending on the temperature and the level of stimulation. Like if it was a a chemistry lab class, no problem. I could stay awake, no, no issue. But if it was just, you know, a lecture class with somebody who was fairly dry and it was after lunch and it was, you know, getting a little too cool in the room. Funk. Yeah. And it was it wasn't just me. There was a lot of us that had that problem in high school.

Dan: 10:55

Yeah. I mean, I have I have notebooks where you can see my hand like taking notes and it like trails off. Like somebody, like literally, somebody gave me a drug and it was just it's it's it's I I review and I'd be like, what did I just write here? Like, it's just terrible.

Charles: 11:11

So we uh we talked about this a little bit the other day um when we were preparing for this episode, and uh, you know, how how I believe that our current cultural attitudes toward sleep um and our cultural attitudes toward a lot of issues can be driven in ways that we don't notice or understand by people who are in power, where we've got a status quo that works for the people in power, and so they want to keep that going. And one example of that is the CEO of Netflix basically saying war on sleep, because the fact is, in a modern capitalist society, if you are sleeping, you're neither producing nor consuming. So what good are you? You were hours too, because they have the whole grind culture of people bragging about, oh, I only need four hours, I only need five hours, I only need six hours. It's like, well, you know, we all kind of need eight. And, you know, as as productive as you are on six, you'd be even more productive if you were on eight.

Dan: 12:10

See, and that's where I feel maybe it wasn't quite intentional. I I could under I agree with you on the early rise of the.

Charles: 12:19

Yeah, I don't think there was a master plan. I think it, I think it's more of a, hey, we've kind of noticed that this is working for us, so let's, you know, let's find ways to reward behaviors that that are working for us.

Dan: 12:30

Yeah, I think I think people just didn't realize, you know, even the even the the ones with a lot of power and access to information that we don't have, I I think just logically it was just an easier, hey, you're awake, you're able to do things. And then that was kind of right. And that was it. They they left it that they didn't look into the the data, probably because it was difficult to get that data about how productive somebody was, right, based on the amount of sleep the hair was. Now with the trackers and everything, you know, there's a lot more data out there about how we we operate. And so, you know, he was saying that um sleep deprivation costs nations about two percent of GDP, which it comes out to like 411 billion in the UK or in the US, which to me, so worldwide that's got to be trillions of dollars. And here's the thing, too, is the you know, the the companies on the leading edge of everything, almost like Google. Uh they've got sleep, you know, sleep rooms for their employees now and sleep pods. So they recognize, yeah, go ahead, take a nap, and and you'll be more productive. So they they understand that the bottom line really is is benefiting for people who actually get enough sleep.

Charles: 13:35

Yeah, it's it's interesting how yeah, the the companies on the edge of technology are are figuring that out and implementing it where you know some of the older fashion, certainly I don't see any small businesses putting in, you know, napping rooms anytime soon. Yeah. Because I think it's still, you know, like no, you get your sleep at home and that's you know, and I I can see why, because if you don't have a huge staff of people to help manage the rooms need to be cleaned and they need to be managed. I was thinking about the shifts, yeah. Somebody leave for a nap.

Dan: 14:07

Like, how do you get that covered, right? How do you plan for for you know for things to still be running the right way when somebody's just definitely it would take work. I randomly like need a nap in the middle of right, unless you had like pre-programmed times. Yeah, that's it's definitely more work on management, the owners, everything else. So I can see us human beings, I don't want to take on more work so this person can take a nap. Like think about even just saying it out loud makes me feel like I think holy cow, that would that's a hard task, right?

Charles: 14:36

It would have to be a top-down thing where the guy, you know, the guy or the gal at the top believed that it was necessary and they were taking the naps and they were like, listen, you know, you don't you don't have to go to sleep if you don't want to, but you know, in our eight-hour shifts, yeah, everybody gets a 20-minute nap, and that's just the way that it is. Yeah. Um, but one of the other things we were talking we were talking about was the example of, you know, where the the cultural pressure to perform kind of can fly in the face of what's actually good for people was perfect attendance awards for school.

Dan: 15:07

Yeah, you were saying that the other day, right?

Charles: 15:09

The idea of, you know, oh, I I go to school every day, whether I'm sick or not. It's like that's not it's not good for you recovering from your cold, your flu, your COVID, your illness, whatever it happens to be. It's not good for you to show up, and it's not good for the rest of us for you to come to work either. Yeah. But we're still going to give you this little gold star at the end of the year that says you didn't you didn't miss a single day. I don't know if they do that anymore. I I wouldn't be surprised if that's gone the way of the dodo, but it certainly should. I mean, that's ridiculous that we that we reward people for showing up every day, whether that's a good idea for the individual or the group or not. I mean, that's so here's cool. Here's here's right. So I mean that's that's what we want out of somebody working on an assembly line. We want them to show up every day, we think, unless we think about it a little bit deeper, and then we're like, no, it's it that's not good either.

Dan: 15:54

So what I don't understand is adults get sick days at like every job, almost every job, it gives you sick days. Yeah, or yeah, paid time off. Uh was it just I I think we like it was kind of an unspoken thing at at school when I was in high school, is you could get a number of like it's not like you were handed sick days like you are at a job. It was one of those there were consequences after you took too many sick days. And like that number sometimes wasn't really known or whatever. But why not allow you know students and accommodate the curriculum to have sick days too?

Charles: 16:29

Right. Yeah, and I I would say, even to the point where I mean, in a good job where you're working on a healthy, productive team, if you get sick, somebody else is going to jump in and do your job for you. Now, obviously, the goal with school should be we're trying to get an education, we're trying to learn things, but I would say, yeah, you should there should be some incentive to say, okay, if you're gonna miss school, here's the work you should do to catch up, but we're not gonna require you to turn it homework for the days that you were sick.

Dan: 16:58

Yeah. Or you can do the work at a different schedule, whatever. I mean, these days with technology and everything, like having that flexibility, you know, you could do some more virtual stuff, whatever. There's no excuse to, you know, make sure somebody's sitting in that seat 300, you know, whatever days, how many days are you 180 days year, whatever it is, right? Like, come on.

Charles: 17:18

Yeah, I I do, but again, we as we you and I have talked about, you know, the whole public school system in this country was built on preparing people to work manufacturing jobs and be slaves, basically. Yeah. Show up when the whistle blows and work hard until the second whistle blows, and then you go home, and then you know. Yeah. And yeah, in some cases it was, you know, in in some industries, it was you lived on company land, you bought your groceries from the company store. I mean, there was some crazy practices back in the day after the industrial revolution, where yeah, the the business magnates pretty much ran your life.

Dan: 17:52

Yeah. Well, what's interesting is some of those high technology companies like you know, Google and things like that, they also they've it's interesting because they also will have different incentive plans where the you know you they'll get your laundry done for you. So they really want you there. You know, they'll they'll arrange for babysitting, whatever it is, whatever your needs are to keep you in that office as much as possible. Now, that's something I heard about you know 10, 15 years ago. Yeah.

Charles: 18:16

I know if that's still the culture. I had heard that some of them even had uh, you know, RV campgrounds camps. Oh, yeah. Where you could you could live on campus in your RV and save a bunch of money. And but you know, the trade-off was you're right there if they need you. Yes. And uh I would take that deal. Yeah.

Dan: 18:33

I mean, and that's the thing, is uh and that might be good for a phase of your life. You that might be perfect for you because it's like, I mean, the housing in that air in Silicon Valley is ridiculous. Right. So to basically live, you know, fairly rent-free and and you know, I mean, that's that's a that's uh you know, it's a willing trade-off a lot of people will take, sure.

Charles: 18:51

Yeah, so anyway, back to uh back to the sleep, yeah. The sleep that we were talking about. Uh I did like that he in in sort of emphasizing the importance of sleep, he basically said, you can take a day off of eating, you can take a day off of exercising, and the impact to both of those will not be comparable to taking a day off of sleep.

Dan: 19:12

I think he even said drinking water.

Charles: 19:14

Yeah, he did.

Dan: 19:14

He the only thing was oxygen.

Charles: 19:16

Yeah, basically it's oxygen, then sleep, then everything else.

Dan: 19:20

That's insane.

Charles: 19:21

But I mean, it kind of makes sense. I mean, I do I have had some days, you know, in the last five or ten years where I had to stay up all night solving a critical tech problem for one of my clients. And yeah, the next day I I feel like garbage. I mean, I can I think I'm I'm healthy enough where I could still do it, where if I have to work through a night, I can work through a night and be functional the next day, but not at my best, and certainly not two days. Yep. Trying to do it two days in a row, absolutely not. Where when I was, you know, um, when I was in college and I was a camp counselor during the summer, I had a couple of times where I stayed up all night two nights in a row and just didn't sleep at all. And I I was loopy and I but I didn't need to be very high performing. But God, thinking about doing that now gives me the shivers. Um let's see, one thing uh or he did get into sleep supports immunity, metabolism, emotional regulation, which is a big one, cardiovascular health, and hormone balance. And when you don't have we'll we'll get into what the the negative side effects of chronic bad sleep, but um the emotional regulation was one that really stood out to me because there are a lot of people that uh have poor sleep, and to say that they're grumpy or they woke up on the wrong side of the bed is an understatement. Like the yeah, peop people that chronically abuse their sleep schedules are not not nice people to be around. I've I've seen it. And they'll still brag about how little sleep they need, but then the rest of the people in their lives have to have to deal with the yeah, the outcome of that and the consequences of that. Yeah.

Dan: 21:02

Um that's uh it it's it's if you think about it, it really makes sense because sleep is doing a lot of cleansing and a lot of regeneration for everything in your brain, and your brain is controlling everything in your body, right? So your hormones, you know, they talk about appetite. Um what's crazy is the the weight loss. He said 60% of your weight loss will come from muscle if you're not sleeping well.

Charles: 21:30

Yes, and I I am in the middle of of trying to trim down right now, and uh I mean, really, I'm not doing what I ought to be doing diet-wise to maximize my muscle, but I am doing what I need to do injection-wise to maximize the sustainability of my leap body, which is you know, I've I'm on my doctor's prescribed dose of uh testosterone and I'm getting pretty good sleep. And so, you know, whether whether my my scale is super accurate about lean body mass or not, at least I'm I'm consistently using the same scale at the same time every day. And for what it's telling me is I am I'm cutting fat and I'm not cutting anything else. Yeah. And hopefully I can I can maintain that. And I'm gonna I'm gonna do a little bit better on the diet side. But on the sleep side, I I feel like you know, most nights for me are a seven or eight out of ten. Last night was a little below average, but uh, or a little below my average. But for the most part, I get to bed pretty early and wake up fairly early as well. And it it seems to work for me. And I like I don't usually during the normal course of a day feel like I need to take a nap or feel like I am shortchanging myself on sleep. I I usually have a fair amount of energy all day long. And then when it's time to go to bed, I go to bed and I fall asleep fairly quickly. Um and as a result, hopefully, as I keep uh I've got another 10 or 12 pounds to drop, hopefully it will continue to be body fat and not uh lean muscle mass. Yeah. Um he mentions that uh couples will often clash over their mismatched sleep rhythms, and I've I've definitely I've had that in relationships where for the most part um I seem to be I find myself in relationships with a lot of people who um not always but typically go to bed later and wake up later than me. And he suggests um sleep divorce. Getting divorced. Sleep divorce, yeah, where you ha have separate sleeping arrangements, which um I think he mentioned something about the Scandinavian method or something where it's two beds in the same room. Um, but he also noted that's not as effective at dealing with if one partner gets up and and gets up and and leaves a room and comes back to the room in the middle of the night, that's still gonna be disruptive. Or if one partner snores, that's still you know, being in the same room is gonna be not as good an option as having two completely separate bedrooms.

Dan: 24:02

Yeah, they said the data shows that people when they sleep by themselves get better sleep, more rested sleep and but they don't report better sleep.

Charles: 24:10

I thought that was interesting.

Dan: 24:11

That's right. They said the level of satisfaction of sleep is uh higher when you're sleeping with a part.

Charles: 24:15

And I I feel I feel like that's definitely the case. I I would rather especially, you know, if if I'm if I'm with somebody, I would rather sleep in a bed with them than sleep in my own bed. Yeah. But, you know, that's it. If I if I ever find myself cohabitating with someone again, I could see a scenario where for me, what I find is for me to sleep comfortably, all I need is a full-size bed. I don't need a king-sized bed if I'm sleeping alone to be comfortable. Okay. So, like if I'm traveling and the hotel's like, oh, we don't have a king room for you, we have two doubles. No problem. I don't care. I can sleep perfectly fine by myself in a double size in a double bed.

Dan: 24:52

Yeah.

Charles: 24:52

Um, so that said, I ever found myself cohabitating in a house with someone, I could see maybe in my in my office having a full-size bed in there, so that um, you know, if if either one of us were not sleeping well, it's very easy to just get up and then, you know, or if over time I realize that I'm not sleeping as well with my partner as I would if I was alone, you know, having that having that flexibility in a house, I could see some value in that. Yeah.

Dan: 25:22

Yeah, I've I've needed to minimize the amount of when I've been with somebody, uh the the because I'm a very late sleeper. So I've needed, so I've gotten like a split top king bed. So basically what that is, it it it the the halfway split. But you don't I hate the gap. But you don't the gap is annoying, but you can shove some pillows in the middle there so you're not like falling in the gap in the middle of uh whatever. But um, yeah, but the thing is though, if somebody's getting up or down, somebody's got restless leg syndrome, you're not feeling that on the other side of the bed. And you're still you still have that that still that that one bed the other pieces having completely separate blankets and not so you're not like like or or they need to be really huge so that you don't feel someone when they like turn over and then they they they yank the blanket off of you. And it's just it a lot of times we don't even notice when that happens because we're mostly asleep, but those little those little disturbances will wake us up and take us out of the proper state of our our brain, that that you know, the brainwave state.

Charles: 26:24

So um I've had yeah, I've had the separate blanket thing proposed by partners before. I'm like, absolutely not. That is that is counter, that is counter to my goals. I want to be under the same blanket as you and is that interfere with your Dutch oven activity or is that the problem? I would never um no, that is not the problem. It's just I I want to be able to, when I'm cold, I want to be able to roll over and spoon my partner and warm, I want to be able to roll over to the other side, and I don't want extra cloth and interference in the way. Yeah.

Dan: 26:57

That uh I yeah, I I have I have pushed back and now have you ever been with somebody who needs or would like the ambient room temperature to be every fucking time, yes.

Charles: 27:09

No, no, no different than what you would guess. Yes. Ugh.

Dan: 27:13

And I'm guessing it's warmer and not colder. It's warmer. Uh-huh.

Charles: 27:18

You've had that problem too?

Dan: 27:20

Oh, I've never not had that problem.

Charles: 27:21

Yeah, same. I I've never been with anybody who liked it as cold as I do. Yeah.

Dan: 27:25

And yeah, that's that's tough, man, because now the one workaround that I found for this is expensive, but if you get one of the, you know, the cooling devices that also offer heating, um, so Uler is one of them. I think eight sleep offers one that's like ridiculously expensive, but it's basically a mat that's filled with water and it can raise the temperature up and also adjust over on a schedule throughout the course of the night. And so I've created I've bought two of them, so we have independent ones. So hers is a lot warmer, it keeps her nice and warm while the ambient temperature drops and helps me sleep, and mine is cold. And that's that that is how I've gotten through that, but that adds significant cost to any sleeping environment.

Charles: 28:24

See, and I I have but considering how important sleep is, I think it's more than worth the imagination. I get it. I my my issue is anything I'm not really comfortable adding anything to the bed. So I like I like the mattress, yeah, the fitted sheet. Yeah. If I add, you know, any kind of a mattress topper or a mattress cooler, or I mean, I I am bare bones. I am mattress, fitted sheet, comforter, no top sheet, just a soft duvet cover that feels nice and and nothing else. Okay and and I kinda I mean listen, I my room, like just last night, I turned it down to 66 based on what I was usually I keep it around probably 60, 69 is is usually where I keep it. But last night I went down to 66 and the room around me is not comfortable, it's too cold. But underneath, but the bed with the comforter on me is perfect, and I like it to the point where I don't want to get out from under the covers. That that is what's comfortable for me, where the air is cold enough that I don't want to get out from under the blanket. Yeah. But I've yeah, I've never dated anybody that likes it that cold. And I don't know. I mean, it's kind of weird though, because I mean, the the average woman has a higher body fat percentage than the average man, so it can't be related to that.

Dan: 29:52

Uh, I think actually one of the biggest drivers in terms of how warm we are is how much we eat. And And if my my experience is the the ladies that I've been dating typically eat a lot less than than I do, but also less than what their body needs. And so their body doesn't, your cells don't have that extra energy to give off as heat. And a lot of them either that or they've got some some some thyroid issues between those two things that will absolutely affect your body temperature. So what feels, you know, something that feels cold to us could be feeling extremely cold, much more cold to somebody else who doesn't have that extra body heat to give off.

Charles: 30:34

Well, I'm gonna push back a little bit because I've known many of your former relationships. Yeah. You think they were perpetually in calorie deficits? Uh yeah, actually. Or nutrient deficits. Well, maybe nutrient deficit. Yeah.

Dan: 30:48

I think so. And and also some thyroid issues as well. Okay, I could see that. But absolutely.

Charles: 30:53

Yeah, I didn't.

Dan: 30:54

Yeah. Because it would be, it would, it would be, and it wasn't just when we're sleeping. It was just like sitting around, always colder than I was.

Charles: 31:03

Um, I'm in I'm in a significant death.

Dan: 31:08

Driving in a car, like I want the air conditioning like blowing right on me. They turn it completely off.

Charles: 31:13

Oh, see, even in my car, yeah, my car, the air conditioner is never off. It it's yeah. Oh no, okay. It's always on the lowest temperature setting and then the lowest fan setting. Yeah. Like even when I get cold, I never turn it off because the air the air gets stale. So what I'm doing right now is I have the air on the lowest setting for both the temperature and the fan, and I have the heated seats on the lowest setting as well. So I get a little bit of a little bit of warmth from the seats. But yeah, I am I am always running hot. I don't know what Yeah. I mean But the science says that that is where I should be for the best quality sleep. Absolutely.

Dan: 31:53

Yeah. I think I think that's the thing too, is I'm wondering see, there's a range there, and I guess they don't really ever talk about what um what we're coming into the room with. Like what of what what is our body like what does our interpretation of that temperature feel like on on somebody, right? So I think that's part of it too. I guess if you're feeling too cold, I don't know. Is that is that a thing? I don't know.

Charles: 32:19

I'm sure, I'm sure too cold you know, is a thing.

Dan: 32:22

But maybe that's that's that's what it is. But that's why running in a problem.

Charles: 32:26

I don't know. Yeah. You know, is it is it my body's too cold or is I'm just not used to it.

Dan: 32:31

I mean, it's so here's the thing is but my you know, my partners would always sleep at no problem at a much warmer temperature, and they get great sleep. And yeah, am I a little jealous? Absolutely. Uh, but that was that they they were just sleeping well at at a temperature where I there's no way I couldn't sleep.

Charles: 32:48

Yeah, I dated one girl where she slept with her windows open no matter what the temperature was outside. In Florida? Yes. Oh, yes, dude. Yeah, AC off, windows open, no matter what the temperature was outside.

Dan: 33:02

Was she from the equator?

Charles: 33:04

Yes. Okay. She was from Guatemala. Okay. There you go. All right. All right, let's move on. So, yeah, that that worked for her, but it did not work for me.

Dan: 33:13

Okay.

Charles: 33:14

Um, okay, so let's talk a little bit. You took your quiz on uh I did. What was that? Uh sleepdock.com slash sleep dash quiz. And I was a lion, which means I am naturally alert early, most productive before noon, and ready to wind down by nine or ten. And that's me to a T.

Dan: 33:32

Yeah.

Charles: 33:32

Um it also said it did say it suggested that early morning workouts are good. Um yes, if if it's uh steady state cardio. Like going for a walk. I love an early morning walk. Yeah. Lifting heavy early in the morning, not so much. Um, but like a 6 30 a.m. walk is my ideal. That is perfect for me.

Dan: 33:55

Yeah.

Charles: 33:55

Um, I feel great on an early, early morning walk with uh right now I'm listening to Strong Ground by Brene Brown, which is amazing. I'm gonna do another mini book report on that once I uh once I finish it. And uh it's great. Um just yeah, there's there are a few things I enjoy more than a nice long walk. And I mean, long is relative. For me, I did five and a half miles yesterday and it was it was great. I I love you know having that first cup of coffee. Well, first cup of coffee and first dump in the morning and then going for the walk is is optimal for me. Yeah, because uh yeah, where I walk around, um, there are not a lot of public restrooms readily available. I made that mistake when I first moved back to Winter Garden. I went for the walk with the cup of coffee in hand, and I found myself like, okay, this is this could be a problem. It wasn't. I was able to take care of business and get get where I needed to go, but it can oof.

Dan: 34:52

When I was doing 75 Hard last year and I was doing those 45 minute walks, yeah, I had a couple of uh accidents that let's just put it that way, where I didn't I didn't make it back on time, you know. Um so I feel you. I literally I I feel that uh for sure.

Charles: 35:08

Yeah, that's why when my my best day is um well, my best, like everybody, or like everybody who's come to this conclusion, your best day starts with your best night the night before, getting everything ready. And for me, that includes having my workout clothes ready and also having my delightful bun, heat, and brew coffee maker programmed and ready so that I wake up to a pot of freshly brewed coffee. I start sipping and you know, doing some of the just bare minimum, not not any heavy work before my first walk, but um just sort of you know opening up my computer and seeing you know what the day looks like. Yeah, sipping on the coffee, go into the restroom, and then hitting the road and doing, you know, at least three miles. Ideally, if I can get six in, that's that's perfect. Um but yeah, so the uh the lion likes that. You are a dolphin.

Dan: 36:02

Right. Tell me a little bit about that.

Charles: 36:04

So he said that's only 10% of the population because Oh, these are chronotypes, by the way. This is basically you take you take this little quiz and it says based on based on your attitudes towards sleep and what you notice about your sleep, here's here's what you are, and here's how you should optimize.

Dan: 36:20

Yeah, and he said, you know, it's it's 10%.

Charles: 36:22

I think I'm 15.

Dan: 36:23

Okay. So it was it was the lowest amount of people are are the dolphin chronotypings because we we're all over the place a little bit.

Charles: 36:32

Yeah, the other ones I think were bear and wolf, were those and there's only four, right? Right with this guy's test. Yeah.

Dan: 36:37

Um so for me, it's it's not early morning exercise, but it's like mid-morning exercise or mid-morning tasks. I I'm I'm great like from like nine to one or two, something like that. Um before and afterwards, groggy or or tired type of thing. Um so it was it was I mean, it was accurate for the the questions that he asked me. Um yeah, so that I I don't really have anything other than um he really just said that you know the chronotypes can change over time and depending on our age as well. So I yeah, I other than that, like dolphins are just kind of like inconsistent with their like light sleepers, yeah, they can wake up easily. Um, and I think that was also one of the things he was mentioning with the the half of a brain sleeping at once.

Charles: 37:34

Yeah, dolphins can are one of the animals.

Dan: 37:36

Because they have to they have to get up, right? Because they have to get to the surface, they can't just sleep underwater the whole time, right? Because they have to get they have to get some oxygen at some point. Yeah. Um, I'm just thinking, what a pain in the ass that's gotta be. But apparently, I guess if you're if your brain can do that, that's that's an amazing thing. I uh I gotta figure out how to how to hack that. Is there a biohack to have half of our brain sleep and the other one awake and then switch it off and and rotate?

Charles: 38:02

Not uh not that he said in this podcast and uh I talked to Dr. Mike about that, and I said, I'm sure there's some sort of drug they're working on for that. Yeah. I mean that would be amazing. But then we're bored after that, after that's been solved. Right, but then all diseases and cured and then the half-brain stuff uh can can be the the next thing. Uh he does talk about uh he goes through a list of what society could do differently to make things better. Um he mentions that governments have lots of campaigns and public service announcements about a lot of things, but not getting good sleep. Uh businesses could replace the idea that sleep is weakness with sleep is good. And it was interesting. He did mention that um if employees take a survey on the presentation skills of the leaders, if the leader has been sleep deprived, even if the the employees have no idea what the the sleep schedule of the CEO or the leader is, they will rate them as less charismatic if they've delivered a presentation on less hours of sleep versus more hours of sleep. It makes sense. It totally makes sense.

Dan: 39:08

Right. Yeah. I I am I'm absolutely more creative when when I've got, you know, and and and taking on, you know, they talk about your biggest task as as the frog, right? For you know, swallow that fog as a book. I and I know and also willing to take challeng uh risks and take on challenges. I think they were talking about that employees were a lot less likely to take on a challenging task if they're sleep deprived.

Charles: 39:34

And it makes sense. Yeah, that's that's interesting because the the part of the uh of Brene Brown's book that I was just listening to this morning um was really it was about creating an environment where people feel safe taking risks and rewarding people for taking smart calculated risks versus rewarding them for the outcome. So you wanna you want to be in a company or an organization where you are encouraged and rewarded based on taking a good risk, not necessarily how well or poorly that risk works out. Yeah. Because I mean, lear learning what is a good risk versus a bad risk and being encouraged to take good risks is more important for the long-term health of your organization than just rewarding good outcomes and punishing bad outcomes. And yeah, having having a workforce that is taking their sleep needs seriously will will add to that.

Dan: 40:30

Yeah.

Charles: 40:31

Um, I want to talk a little bit about napping. So um I've heard different things, as uh Steve Bartlett, the the host, had heard, where basically if you can't sleep for a certain amount of time during a nap, you're better off not taking the nap in the first place. Where it doesn't actually work that way. What the way it seems to work is short naps are good, long naps are good, medium-term naps not so good. And uh I'm going to definitely remember that when I'm in a situation where I need a nap.

Dan: 41:00

So do you remember what they defined as medium-term?

Charles: 41:03

Yes. So um I believe he said that a nap as short as nine minutes can have a um a positive benefit to your mood and your reaction time. If you go longer than 30 minutes, though, there's a good chance that you're gonna get into some of the kinds of sleep that are harder to wake up from. And so there could still be some benefit, but immediately after you wake up, it's gonna be a little bit harder to get back into the swing of things.

Dan: 41:37

Okay.

Charles: 41:38

Where um the impression I got was 20 to 30 minutes. If you're we're talking about a workday nap, like during your work hours, 20 to 30 minutes is about as good as it's gonna get for you. Where if it's a little different, like I would say, say, for example, you work all day and then like on a Friday, you work all day on Friday, and then you know you're gonna go out with your friends and you're gonna stay out late and you wanna have a little bit of juice to do that, then you could go up to 60 minutes or even maybe a little bit longer to replenish some of those, recharge some of those batteries so that when you go out, you'll be able to stay awake later. But keep in mind it could also negatively, when you do finally get home, you might have a little bit more trouble getting to sleep.

Dan: 42:20

I think that's was he saying that's because we're getting into the different sleep cycles or sleep stages when we're doing those longer naps.

Charles: 42:28

Yeah, I think REM and deep sleep are both a little harder to get out of quickly. Yeah. Where light sleep is easier to get out of quickly, but it's less recharging than the other two as well.

Dan: 42:38

Another point that he made, which is interesting, is a lot of people think REM sleep is is the good stuff. And he said, no, no, no. Light sleep, deep, deep sleep, and rem, they're all good stuff. Right. And it's not one is better than the other. It's kind of where what you need, right? And but REM, I think does a lot of the the repair that I think they were talking about, right? Was that well is that right?

Charles: 43:00

It's because REM is when the dreaming happens. Yeah. And then the dreaming happens is when um he he mentioned specifically for any negative experiences that you have. Um the emotional regulation. Right. Rem Rem's job, part of Rem's job, is to allow you to hold on to the memory of those negative experiences without holding on to the negative emotions that you experienced while you were going through it.

Dan: 43:23

Interesting. And and that's probably why a lot of us look back on old relationships and things and with a fading effect bias.

Charles: 43:31

Exactly.

Dan: 43:31

And we're like, oh, it wasn't so bad.

Charles: 43:33

Yes. Meanwhile, it's it's part of Rem's job to let you look back on on previous things as less traumatic than they felt in the moment.

Dan: 43:42

That's why it's a good idea to write yourself a note uh right in the moment when you're going through something traumatic.

Charles: 43:49

So you're doing journaling just think yes, a journaling practice on for so many reasons is a good idea. Yeah. And I I've just gotten back into my my five-year journal, man. I I see there are some gaps where I wrote for it the first time in 21.

Dan: 44:01

Yeah.

Charles: 44:02

And now like 20, like today. Like I had my first entry was in 2021, and then my second entry for October 17th was 2025. I completely skipped 22, 23, and 24.

Dan: 44:13

Wow. Okay. Yeah. I it's been a while since I've been, I have one as well. I haven't put it in there. But what's interesting is I just had a thought was a lot of times when I journal a little bit at right before bed or just plan my day, just like kind of look through all my appointments for the next day. If I do that the night before, I usually sleep better. And I'm wondering if that's because I need, I'm not getting enough REM sleep, probably. And I'm wondering if I need less REM sleep because I'm not having emotions or things running through the back of my mind, like I don't know a little bit of like low-level anxiety of I don't know what's coming up the next day because I didn't look at it the night before. Now, I don't have that if I've done that. And maybe that's why I end up sleeping a little bit better or I feel like I've been sleeping a little bit better the next day.

Charles: 45:02

Yeah, I wonder if uh from a strict uh from strict definition, I wonder if someone who is a light sleeper is spending more of their time in the light sleep cycle, if that's exactly what it means, or if it means other things. I I don't know. You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Is it just your your body is more open to the stimulation around you in your sleep environment when you're a light sleeper, or is it that you literally spend more percentage of your time in light sleep than deeper than deep sleep sleep than somebody else?

Dan: 45:35

Yeah.

Charles: 45:35

So that that might be something for us to look up. Let's talk about caffeine briefly. And this is another this is where I am guilty of some magical thinking, which is, you know, I'm I'm happy to say, you know, anybody who is like, I can get by on four hours of sleep or five hours of sleep, they're a douchebag. They don't know what they're talking about. Um, where I make the mistake by saying, oh, caffeine, you know, coffee and caffeine late in the day, it doesn't affect my sleep at all. Well, the evidence is it does affect it. Now, I I don't experience some of the same. I've got friends, um, maybe you, or you, or well, humble brag, right? I've got friends that would say, Oh, if I have a cup of coffee after four o'clock in the afternoon or an espresso or something, I I won't be able to get to sleep. Where I've never had that problem. I can yeah, I can have a cup of espresso with dessert after dinner at 9 30 and then get you know, get home by 10 and pretty much fall asleep right away. But what the science says is the quality of your sleep is not going to be as good as if you didn't have the caffeine.

Dan: 46:38

Yeah, and that's I think the same case with alcohol. Like you might be able to get to sleep a little bit better.

Charles: 46:42

You feel like you're you fall asleep faster with the quality. And he makes a good uh, and let's talk about alcohol and sleep medications. The big thing that hit me in that section of the conversation was being asleep and being sedated are not the same thing. Yeah. And um of the things that happen to you while you're sedated overlap with some of the things that happen to you while you're asleep, but not enough of them to make you feel like, okay, if I am hammering the melatonin or the alcohol or the unisom or the benadryl or the whatever or the THC every night to get to sleep, that's not the same thing as falling asleep naturally. And you're not getting the same health benefits. So don't think that there is something that you know you shake out of a bottle that's going to give you the same thing. And that's why he said, especially for chronic insomnia, the number one fix for that is going to be cognitive behavioral therapy, not something that comes out of a pill bottle.

Dan: 47:46

Yeah. And interestingly enough, um I feel like reflecting on your day, journaling, planning for the next day, there that's a little bit of uh some cognitive behavioral therapy there for yourself. It's not not the official, but you are I still think through things uh and and you're using your brain to kind of, you know, it's obviously not exactly the same, but it it's still the same type of method where you are thinking through some things and you're kind of bringing yourself back into reality.

Charles: 48:24

I mean, yes, it's certainly better than nothing, I would say. And I mean, but the I mean, based based on the impression I got from what he said was that the cause of insomnia is anxiety, either anxiety in your mind or anxiety in your body. And and the way to work through anxiety is through CBT.

Dan: 48:44

Yeah.

Charles: 48:44

And if there are other things, you know, non-chemical solutions that you can like routines or meditation, stretching, working out, going for a walk right in before bed, if there are things you can do to at least on some level make peace with your anxiety before you lay in the bed, then you should definitely do those things. But for somebody with chronic insomnia where you are just not getting the rest that you need, then I think talking to somebody and and working through those root causes of that anxiety are going to be the way to do it.

Dan: 49:15

Mostly at a level that is not going to be impacted by you know breathing techniques, right? Right?

Charles: 49:20

Yeah. You know? Yeah, absolutely. Um, let's see, there was something else I wanted to say about um about oh, if you find yourself in bed and you can't get back to sleep or you can't get to sleep, he says 30 minutes is pretty much the window where if you're just laying there for 30 minutes trying to go back to sleep and you can't go back to sleep, there's a couple things. You should probably get out of bed because you don't want to associate being in bed with not being able to sleep. Um, so get up, do something else. The other, the other course of action is, and and part of this is what are you capable of talking yourself into? If you can talk yourself into, okay, whether I go to sleep or not, no big deal. I am gonna lay here and I'm gonna relax and be as restful as I possibly can. And that's gonna be good enough. I'll still be able to, I'll get my job done tomorrow. I'll be able to safely drive to work and back, and I will be able to perform adequately tomorrow, even if I just lay here and rest and and relax as much as I can.

Dan: 50:19

Yeah.

Charles: 50:19

If you can believe that, number one, you will still get some benefit from laying there and resting, even if you're not asleep. And number two, you're also more likely to just fall asleep. So it's either get up and do something that gets you out of the environment where you feel the high pressure to sleep, whether that's go watch TV, go sit at your desk, whatever it is, just get up and get out of the bed and then go back to the bed when you're tired, or make peace with the fact that you can be in bed not sleeping and still be okay with yourself. The other thing he said is take all the clocks out of your bedroom. If if you suffer from insomnia to the point where you wake up and you can't get back to sleep, and it makes you anxious because you're in watch the clock, yeah, move move along.

Dan: 51:02

Was um was it Steven or or the doctor who said that they heard of a a technique or a rule where uh if you are gonna use your phone in your bedroom, yeah, you have to stand.

Charles: 51:15

Yes. I think it was the doctor.

Dan: 51:16

Yeah. So you can't, as soon as you sit down on your bed with your phone, uh, you're done. So you can use your phone in your room, but you can only do it while you're standing.

Charles: 51:25

Yes. I thought that was interesting. That is pretty good. Yeah, the idea of you can have your phone in your room, you can use your phone in your room in your bedroom, but if you're gonna do it, do it standing up. And I that's the yeah, I I probably I definitely do lean toward the side of doing too many things in my bed. Where and and it used to drive my one of my ex-girlfriends crazy because if it was time to watch a movie, if it was time to spend time with each other, and and part of it was in my smaller RV, I didn't really have a lot of seating areas. I had yeah, like the only TV was in the bedroom, and that was it. And yeah, that didn't uh did I even have a TV in that bedroom? I don't I don't remember. Yeah, I did. I had a TV up on the up on the wall and an arm. And uh yeah, that was it. If if we were gonna watch a movie, in my place it was laying in the bed, and she hated that. She was like, no, the and she was right. I mean, you know, yeah. Hey, if you're listening, you were right. The bed is for sex and the bed is for sleep. And that should be the only thing that the bed is for. Yep. If you're watching a movie, go sit on the couch. Because not to brag, my new RV has a couch, and it's a nice one too. Um, but yeah, that is there there's science behind that idea that you you don't you don't lay in the bed to have a conversation, you don't lay in the bed to watch TV. The lay in the bed is for sleeping and for sex.

Dan: 52:51

Yeah, I mean, I go to a desk to do my my work. I don't do it in the bed or in the bedroom. Like I I know people have uh desks in their bedroom. I could never do that. It's just our brains are so associative with location and uh the experiences that we have.

Charles: 53:06

So yeah, and I have uh I now have a uh a TV in my living room, and I have a TV in my bedroom. And I find that I really didn't need the second TV for the living room. I could have just moved the the bedroom because I never use the bedroom TV. It's uh any media consumption, it's usually a podcast or something that I don't have to, you know. It might be something on YouTube, but I'm not I don't care about what the video is. I'm just listening to it. Yep. And so I listen to that on my phone, and the uh yeah, the bedroom TV is not seeing much use at all. And I I actually have um I've got the TV in the living room on a stand. So it's in that that sort of cubby where you would put a TV. I mean, your old camper, you know where it is. Uh, but it's on a stand where I can easily unplug it. And then I also have some area on the um the kitchen counter where I can set the TV and then it's like right deadline right across from the couch. Okay. So I can I can move it around and uh and very easily watch watch TV from the couch, which is uh which is nice because yeah, the I believe them 100%. So let me um hit a couple more things. Number one, your blue light mode on your phone or your tablet is actually useful in so much as it depends on what you're doing on your phone or on your tablet. So if you turn on nighttime mode where it minimizes the blue light, but you're still scrolling through social media, either getting excited or angry at what you're seeing, still not good. And it's going to negatively affect your sleep. If you are, you know, kind of consuming relaxing media on your phone or on your tablet and you're in in nighttime mode with the blue light turned off, then that there is some benefit to that.

Dan: 54:51

Yep.

Charles: 54:52

Um, the other thing he said was no screen 60 minutes before bed, which I I can't, I don't know that I can do that.

Dan: 54:58

Oh, that's that's a hard ass for everybody.

Charles: 55:00

Yeah. Um and also he said, turn down the lights in your place as it gets close to dark, which I that's already a habit of mine anyway. I I don't keep bright overhead lights on when it's not absolutely necessary. So basically, if I'm cooking or I'm doing paperwork, then I've got bright lights on. If it's anything else, then the lights are not on. Yeah. Um let's see. He does he does talk about the link between trying to, we we talked about trying to lose weight on poor sleep. It's going to just eat your muscle instead of your fats. That is, that is very tough. And he said, um, there are fewer, I'm trying to remember how he said it, but he basically said there are fewer correlations in medical science as solid as the fact that if you sleep poorly, you are going to be overweight. Yeah.

Dan: 55:48

That is just I mean, I will see it on a day-to-day basis. If I don't sleep well the next day, I haven't I haven't dropped any weight. Like I'm I'm either the same or more. And you know, with regardless of of what I ate the day before.

Charles: 56:02

Yeah, he said that uh if you wake up uh after a bad night of sleep, your body is usually just going to instruct you to eat an additional three or four hundred calories.

Dan: 56:12

Yeah. So I think I think for when that's happening, I think that is, in all fairness, water weight, your body is holding on to extra fluid is it in terms of protecting yourself because it realizes, hey, yeah, I'm not getting what I need.

Charles: 56:25

What you see on the scale. Correct. But the motivation to eat another three or four hundred calories the next time that will add up. Yeah, that that's all hormone-based, I think, with the uh what is it, the ghrelin and the uh and leptin, yeah. And uh yeah, you if if you're trying to maintain or lose an extra three or four hundred calories a day is gonna make either of those yeah, you know, significant. I go for these five and a half mile walks and they're good for like 700 calories. It's ridiculous how how little how little walking around actually you know burns. It's so unfair because one one good one fancy donut is is gonna blow that away, or one crumble cookie is gonna blow that away. So it's completely unfair. Um, I did want to say, oh, I've got 10 action steps and I want to read through these. So if you if if you're willing to take on having better sleep like I am, um see how many of these you're already doing or are willing to do. Number one, keep a fixed bedtime and a fixed wake time. I can do that. I'm not doing it right now, but I can do that and I I should do that and I will do that. Uh, how about you?

Dan: 57:31

It's uh yeah, except for weekends. Can't do it.

Charles: 57:33

Can't can't. Can't or won't.

Dan: 57:36

Won't won't. I I yeah, I just um your schedule changes quite a bit on the weekend? Yeah, enough to where it is usually three hours past when I normally go to sleep.

Charles: 57:49

You want me to give you a tip on that? Learn to hate live music. That has really worked at live. Workers for me. Yeah, work I love. Not not having a uh, yeah. If you if you hate uh if you hate drinking alcohol and you hate live music, it's a lot easier to keep that uh weekend schedule exactly the same as the weekday. So sure. Um dim your lights one hour before bed. We talked about that. Keep your bedroom cool. He said 65 to 68 is a sweet spot. Uh cut caffeine afternoon.

Dan: 58:19

Just cut caffeine all together like I did. Have you? I have. I mean, I will uh I mean I've been I so I haven't been like zero caffeine, but I've probably over the last month I've had maybe three or four cups of regular coffee and maybe one or two caffeinated sodas. Wow. Yeah. And it it has helped my sleep. Interesting. Yeah, I was I I cut it back. So I stopped at two, and then I stopped having caffeine at noon, and then I stopped altogether, and I f I feel better. I mean, I I don't avoid it. I you know, I I don't so if I'm a girlfriend, she makes great coffee, uh, you know, we'll have a cup or whatever together.

Charles: 59:01

That's a fancy machine.

Dan: 59:02

Yeah, it's it's it's delicious. And so I'll I'll do that once in a while. Yeah. Um, not even once a week, maybe once every two weeks now. Um, but it's it's been more than a month. Um, yeah, the headaches, they're there for the first week because you're withdrawing, but after that.

Charles: 59:17

See, I've stopped caffeine and I've not had the headaches. I wonder if that's related to Well, you're probably very quick metabolic.

Dan: 59:23

I think you're a quick metabolite.

Charles: 59:24

Yeah, I wonder if you're not going to be able to say, yeah, I wonder if it's the same thing that that lets me seemingly drink it all day without feeling impact, you know, also lets me get off of it without the headaches. I've never I've never had the caffeine headache that I can remember from from giving it up. And I, you know, I've done like some juice cleanses and stuff where I I haven't had coffee and I've I've not had the headaches. Um avoid alcohol within three hours of bed. Um that's easy for me. I uh use bed only for sleep and sex, which I'm pretty much there now. Yeah. Um get up after 30 minutes awake, meaning don't lay in bed in 30 minutes. Minutes even I I can't because I'm a lion and I wake up and I've I am hungry and I am energized when I wake up. So I know I want to get out of bed, I want to make my coffee, I want to have a snack, and I want to get out the door on my walk. Um like I'm I'm not a big snoozer. Are you a snoozer? No. Yeah, me neither. When nope, uh I might I might snooze once, yeah, but never and and on that test, it basically categorizes zero to one snoozes versus many snoozes. Those are like the two choices you have.

Dan: 1:00:29

I actually don't wake up with an alarm clock. I mean, it's I wake up before my I set one as an emergency.

Charles: 1:00:35

I usually wake up before my two.

Dan: 1:00:36

And so I like to wake up on my own. Uh, it's a lot less disruptive, it's a lot less anxiety when you hear when you don't hear even like these gentle alarms and stuff sometimes just really like jerk me out of bed. So I try to plan my days so that I don't need to be, you know, I I've got that emergency cutoff just in case I'm I had a horrible night's sleep and I end up sleeping late.

Charles: 1:00:56

But usually sleep before I wake up before my you know, one of the things I missed about my old uh the original or fairly old uh Fitbits were that they had a thing where you could program it to say, okay, I need to be awake at 6 a.m. Yep. And then it would basically find when you were in light sleep based on your body movement before 6 a.m. It would it wouldn't let you get back into deeper REM. It would say, oh, okay, you know, you're you're 35 minutes away from the time you want to wake up and you're in light sleep right now, so I'm gonna wake you up right now. Oh, that's nice, and that was nice. I I yeah, I might need to see if uh we were talking before we recorded. I've got the Apple Watch 2 Ultra now, and it is a little based on the the actual body of the watch and the metallic um uh titanium band that I like, it's a little bulkier than when I had my Apple Watch six, so it's a little harder to sleep with. But if I could find something, an app for that where it would basically say, okay, you know, wear it all night. We're gonna monitor your sleep, and when we can tell that you're in light sleep before your alarm, we'll wake you up then. Yeah, I might look at switching back to that. Um, we'll see. Um, he says, don't rely on weekends for catching up. The catching up on sleep is a myth. You know, you can you can get a little bit of it back by sleeping extra. Like if you don't sleep or only sleep for a couple hours, the very next day, if you sleep a little longer, you'll get some of that back. Yeah. But there's no screwing yourself out of sleep all week and then making up for it on the weekend. That it doesn't work that way. Yeah. Uh meditate 10 minutes nightly. Nighttime meditation is tough for me. I can meditate for 10 minutes a day, but I usually have to do it in the morning. Yep. Um I'll try it though. I'm not gonna just dismiss it out of hand. I I mean, I'll even try the cutting caffeine afternoon. Yeah. A little.

Dan: 1:02:48

I'm curious.

Charles: 1:02:49

But that's gonna be tough. Yeah. Um and then track how you know, if you do make some of these improvements and you do get better consistent sleep, try to notice through journaling whether the positive benefits are there for you and give it a week before you decide that this is horseshit. I'm not gonna keep doing this. So good. Those are the uh pieces of advice. All right, Dan, let's stop there and I will uh talk to you next time. Sounds good. Okay, that wraps up this episode of the Mindfully Masculine Podcast. We hope our conversation about sleep gave you a few practical ways to rest better, recover faster, and show up as your best self. If you know someone who might benefit from or enjoy this episode, please share it with them. It's one of the best ways to support the show. Thank you for listening to the entire episode, and we'll talk to you next time.