in this lecture, we're going to talk about how you can sleep fewer hours and feel better. Wait, what? I know, I know all the common wisdom says that you should be sleeping more, not less. Sleep is so hugely important for every aspect of your health, physical fitness and recovery, Brain health focus and more. But what if I told you that for most people, sleeping eight hours is actually worse than sleeping 7.5 or that sleeping seven hours is actually worse than sleeping six. It sounds strange, but it's actually true. You see, for most of us we have a 90 minute sleep cycle where we dip in and out of deep sleep. If you wake up in the middle of a sleep cycle, you'll actually feel groggy and exhausted throughout the entire day. Even if that means that you actually slept more. I figured this out when one of the companies that I invested in was launching during the same week that I was leading an executive board retreat, I only had time to sleep 4.5 hours each night. But somehow I felt amazing...

in the morning. I just needed about a 20 minute nap in the afternoon and I was ready to bounce back. Well, it turns out that I was unknowingly experimenting with something called polyphasic sleep. In this case I was on a biphasic sleep schedule, which it turns out is healthier and more natural than sleeping once you see because of modern electricity and the fact that we work in offices not out in nature, we've become accustomed to waking up in the morning and staying awake until evening, but that's really not natural sea in experiments where people are secluded without clocks or distractions or lights, they actually naturally gravitate towards sleeping twice a day. You can probably relate to this because you probably get really tired every day at around 3:00. In my other course, I give a lecture just about sleep and napping. I'm a huge advocate of napping and for years I would take a 22 minute nap almost every single day. This snap allowed me to sleep on average six hours a night and these days I sleep 7.5 hours per night instead of eight or more. And I feel great If I don't get 7.5 hours, I will instead go for six, which is a multiple of 90 minutes and then add in a 22 minute nap during the day. It also coincides with a lot of research and experimentation from other polyphasic sleepers, some of whom take it to the extreme and cut all complete sleep cycles. Instead taking only six 20 minute naps every day. Now, I definitely don't recommend that. But I do recommend that you start adjusting your sleep to at least be in multiples of 90 minutes. If your lifestyle affords it, you should try cutting your sleep down by one sleep cycle and squeezing in an afternoon nap. Now, even if you can't do that, you can optimize your sleep in other ways so that you don't need to sleep eight hours and by the way that eight hours number, we've all been conditioned around. It's totally bogus in tons of military research in dozens of countries. It's actually been determined that everyone has different sleep requirements and for many of us, six hours is perfectly fine, especially if napping is available. I've confirmed this in interviews with some of the top sleep coaches and experts in the world, including Nick Little Hills who hosted an entire 30 day upgraded sleep challenge for members of my private mastermind. It should be noted though, that on average women do need a little bit more sleep than men for biological reasons that we won't get into. You should optimize your sleep by following these important rules. Make sure your room is as dark as possible with no L. E. D. S. Or light coming from the street, avoid blue light at night by adjustable smart LED bulbs if you can afford them or yellow colored light bulbs. If you can't install flux on your computer and avoid using your phone in bed. Blue light tells the brain that it's daytime and it actually keeps you awake sleep in a cold room with a warm blanket. You can go as low as 64 F or 18 degrees Celsius though that might be a little bit cold for you go to sleep and wake up at the same time every day, have a snack immediately before bed, depending on if your goal is to lose weight or gain muscle. This snack could vary, but it's not a bad idea to have a natural fat source like peanut or almond butter before bed. This will keep your body nourished and prevent that exhausted feeling in the morning. Take magnesium before bed to help your body sleep. Never use a snooze alarm. Instead use an adaptive alarm like sleep cycle or pillow, which measures where you are in your sleep cycle and wakes you up at the optimal time to prevent grogginess if you can afford it. I also strongly recommend picking up an apple watch or an aura ring to track your sleep by tracking your sleep. You'll be able to see when your body naturally wants to rest and wake up and you'll start to see how different factors affect your sleep. Now, if you can afford those smart led bulbs or some other kind of smart lighting system, you should really use light to wake you up, getting light into your eyes, releases the hormones that wake you up and make you alert. So this also means try to avoid using sunglasses first thing in the morning. Anyways, I'm going to link you to another great course on sleep hacking that will go into more detail about all of this. I'll also link you to the apps I mentioned above as well as some great articles about polyphasic sleep and light, check them out and see how you can optimize your sleep to be more effective and more efficient.

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Jonathan Levi

Serial entrepreneur, bestselling author, keynote speaker & online instructor; His media products have been enjoyed by 250k+ people.

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Sleeping less and feeling better

Sleeping less and feeling better

Lesson Info

28. Sleeping less and feeling better

Lessons

Class Introduction: Structure & how to succeed

Why do things quicker

Where most people spend (or waste) their time

Quiz: Chapter 1

The power of preparation

Having clear priorities & goals - and making them "SMART"

Organizing priorities with the Priority Star Exercise

Setting deadlines & and making them real

The Pareto Principle - our secret to being effective

The "Bad" kind of multitasking, avoiding distractions, and meditation

Batching similar tasks

The "Good" kind of multitasking & the wheel of life

Planning for structured rest periods

Using small chunks of wasted time effectively

Quiz - Chapter 2

Just how much time are you wasting on your computer?

Automating meeting scheduling

Text expansion - stop typing the same things over and over

Speaking is faster than typing - and clicking

Using custom gestures to speed up common tasks

Launchers - act without doing

Wasting less time reading and sorting through email

Automating simple, repetitive tasks effectively across the web

Watching lectures, videos, and podcasts faster

Quiz: Chapter 3

Getting fit in fewer hours

Spend less time cooking