The 4-Hour Body_ An Uncommon Guide to Ra - Timothy Ferriss [118]
Turning Off Monkey Mind
Next, I moved on to the biggest problem: getting to sleep in the first place. No matter how theoretically restful my sleep should be, based on Zeo results, more than 30 minutes of onset insomnia negated it all.
What follows are the changes and tools that had the largest effects on time-to-sleep. Some of them are more convenient than others. I excluded drugs3 from testing, and if a given improvement couldn’t be replicated at least three times on consecutive nights, it was omitted.
TEST 67–70° AS YOUR BEDROOM TEMPERATURE.
This was the variable I experimented with the most while in Nicaragua for my medical tourism adventures (coming up later), and it was also the variable that had the most consistent effects. Specifically, using a single bedsheet at a room temperature between 67°F and 70°F produced the fastest time to sleep. Warmer temperatures never worked, but as low as 65°F would work equally well if I wore socks to keep my feet warm. If you can’t control the ambient temperature, testing socks of different thicknesses is the easiest variable to change for tweaking heat loss.
Ideal temperature is highly individual, and each person will have a narrow range, so experiment to find your own.
EAT A LARGE FAT- AND PROTEIN-DOMINATED MEAL WITHIN THREE HOURS OF BEDTIME.
I discovered this unintentionally while tracking testosterone changes. Consumed within three hours of getting under the sheets, meals of at least 800 milligrams of cholesterol (four or more large whole eggs) and 40 grams of protein produced dramatically faster time-to-sleep scores than meals of lower volume or lower protein and fat. Eating two rib-eye steaks, each about three-quarters of a pound, had the strongest tranquilizer-like effect.
USE LIGHT CUES – THE PHILIPS GOLITE.
I bought this high-end blue-light emitter for a friend who suffers from seasonal affective disorder (SAD)—aka mild to severe depression during winter months.
He already owned the same device, so I began to use it as a replacement for coffee first thing in the morning. I set it to the side of my laptop, pointing at me for 15 minutes at about a 30-degree off-center angle (if noon is my laptop, pointing at me from 10 A.M. or 2 P.M.). That evening, my time to sleep was less than 10 minutes for the first time in weeks. I was able to replicate the effect four nights out of five.
Though most often used for jet lag or winter depression, I’ve found the goLITE to be singularly most useful as a corrective sleep tool, even if I wake up late and need to go to bed at a normal hour. Battery life is long and, at the size of a small square book, the goLITE is portable enough to fit in a carry-on travel bag.
TAX THE NERVOUS SYSTEM WITH ISO-LATERAL MOVEMENTS.
Exercise is commonly recommended to improve sleep.
The problem for me was that results were unpredictable. I might exercise for 20 minutes and fall asleep in 10 minutes, or I might exercise for two hours and fall asleep in two hours. There was no repeatable cause and effect. It seemed like a coin toss.
This changed when I began to incorporate iso-lateral (one-arm or one-leg) resistance training. I logged faster to-sleep times after 8 out of 10 training sessions. The more complex the stabilization required, the shorter the to-sleep time. To experience this effect for yourself, do a single session of pre-hab testing from the “Pre-Hab” chapter.
TAKE A COLD BATH ONE HOUR PRIOR TO BED.
The Japanese have longer average lifespans than most other nationalities,