1.Avoid coffee, red wine and chocolate the night before
To wake up fresh you need to get a good sleep and one of the best ways to ruin a good sleep is to upset your gut. You really need to keep it happy during the night.
Coffee, red wine and chocolate have been scientifically shown to disturb your sleep more than any other food. They upset your intestines in such a way that you will wake up constantly or have a very light sleep that doesn’t re charge you at all. Try not to have these things after lunch time.
2. Go to bed happy with your partner
One of the best ways to get a terrible sleep is to go to bed before you solve a problem with your partner. In my relationship I never let the sun set on an argument, even if I have to compromise a little bit on my own ego.
Before you go to bed make sure your partner is happy (as much as you can) and make sure that you are happy with them. It is also one of the best things you can do for your relationship, let alone your sleep.
3. Meditate, pray and calm down before going to bed
Every night before I go to bed I do about 30 minutes to an hour of meditation. This is amazing as it allows you to throw out all the days worries and forget about the worries of tomorrow. The future cannot be changed while you are asleep and the past is gone so there is no point losing sleep over it! Let it go.
Meditate or pray or do whatever you do. Simply sitting there and watching your breath is a great way to prepare yourself for a nice deep sleep. Check out this post if you want to learn to do a quick little stress relieving meditation.
4. Don’t eat dinner right before bed
A lot of people run home after work, cook up some dinner and then eat it and go to bed. This is a bad idea. The process of digestion takes a while and you do not want to be laying down right after you ate a big meal. Try and leave a few hours in between your bedtime and your dinner and see how you feel the next day.
5. Organize your room according to Feng Shui principles
I know a lot of you probably think that Feng Shui is a load of bull but just give me a second to convince you that it actually has some “western logic” behind it.
For those of you who don’t know Feng Shui is an ancient Chinese art of setting up your home in a way that balances the energies and vibes by putting furniture in certain “hot spots”.
The bedroom is particularly important and I have found that since I arranged my room according to Feng Shui principles I have had a much more “rested” sleep. In particular the placement of your bed is important. Feng Shui tells us that you should sleep where you can see the door but not be in he direct path of the door opening. This helps us sleep with a sense of security. I can see the practical reason for this. You can get some more bedroom Feng Shui tips here.
6. Go to the toilet
Even if you do not need to go to the toilet before bed you should still have a go and squeeze out whatever you can. The reason for this is that the kidneys will continue to work during the night and by the morning your bladder will be nice and full. If your bladder fills up early you might feel the need to go during the night and this cuts out valuable time from your sleep.
You might think that sleeping is about the total time spent asleep but this is incorrect. It is important to stay asleep without breaking it because it takes some hours to get into the “zone” where you are truly at rest. A toilet break interrupts this zone.
7. Not too hot, not too cold
Another sleep related tip: your sleep is greatly affected by the how hot or cold you are during the night. It is important to get a good balance as this keep your energies calm and stops them from spiking.
Try and find a balance between clothes and bed covers. For example, I like to sleep without any clothes but with a heavy blanket. This keeps my temperature pretty consistent.
8. Keep the window open
One of the best things you can do for your health in general and your sleep in specific is to keep your window slightly open during the night. This has two benefits.
Firstly, the gap in the window will allow poisonous carbon dioxide to float away. The reason the human body breathes out is because carbon dioxide is poisonous. And during the night you take a heck of a lot of breaths and your room fills up with this gas. Let it out the window.
The second reason is that you need to allow new oxygen to float in. This might also help you regulate the temperature of the room.
9. Keep your sleep consistent
People think that you MUST have eight hours sleep to get enough.
Not true.
It is more important to go to bed at the same time and wake up at the same time everyday. Not everyone needs eight hours. In fact, if I get eight hours sleep I usually feel tired and groggy for the entire day. Six to seven hours is about right for me.
Start by setting your bedtime at the same time each night. Forget what is on the television and just go to bed at say 11pm each night. After a while start setting your alarm for the same time each day; even on weekends. If you don’t start waking up fresher and happier each morning I will write you a personal apology.
10. Cut out noise, it’s actually killing you!
I recently read in New Scientist Magazine that your life is actually being shortened by noise during the night. Yep, that’s right… that screaming police car or roaring traffic is actually killing you! The magazine said that the noise has an effect on your heart and waking up many times during the night puts your body under a lot of stress.
Try and keep your room quiet by wearing some earplugs. You can get earplugs that only cancel out certain sounds so that you can still hear your alarm or a baby monitor on your bedside table.
11. Drink a glass of water
A cool glass of water on an empty stomach actually has a lot of health benefits as well as serving to wake you up. The water will kick start your metabolism and as such you will wake up faster and feel more alert.
12. Exercise
When you are groggy in the morning and nice run in the fresh air can wake you up fast. However, the interesting thing is that when you exercise in the morning you will actually have more energy the NEXT day. The more you exercise the more energy you will have as you become fitter and healthier.
Exercise first thing in the morning is a great way to wake yourself up
13. Don’t drink coffee… everyday
Science is now showing that our body becomes accustomed to the caffeine in our coffee and we have less of a reaction to it. This means that your daily cup of coffee is waking you up less and less every day that you drink it.
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