[00:00:00] James Breese: Strength Matters Media. Video. Print. Podcasts.
[00:00:05] Josh Kennedy: Today's topic is six tips to help your clients get better sleep. And I'm sure most trainers out there listening in have had this question many, many times from clients. It's a question I get a lot from clients. And in fact, I had a call with a new cricket matters client this morning.
[00:00:18] Shout out to Henry in Sydney, Australia. He asked me about wanting to improve his sleep as well, and so we will go through six tips But before we do that James, how's your sleep? Do you have a do you have a routine or anything any anything off the top of your head without going into what tips? We're gonna give that you do actually no you're gonna.
[00:00:38] You're gonna. You're gonna spill one aren't you because you've just said it
[00:00:41] James Breese: no No, I don't that doesn't happen all the time when I do do it. I'll spill out in a second for me. It's Yeah, but I'm not necessarily following the mold here in the tips that people offer. So a lot of people offer, say, you know, stop watching screen time or stop watching this.
[00:00:59] I find for [00:01:00] me watching screen like something on my iPad before I go to bed helps me wind down because I have my brain works a million miles an hour most of the time, so I like to watch a TV series.
[00:01:11] Josh Kennedy: Basically, you've just broken the rule that we're going to give.
[00:01:15] James Breese: I know there's, there's a rule. So, you know, that's the thing.
[00:01:18] You've got to find what works best for most people and that everyone keeps saying the same things over again. But it's important to adapt them to whatever works for you or your clients. Now, the golden rules are this. For some people it doesn't work. Like, like anything, like nutrition or training.
[00:01:32] Something doesn't work for some people, it does for other people. But for me personally, my one thing I like to do at night time is I like to sit back, watch, either read. Watch something on my iPad, which is, what did I watch last night? Monster's Legacy, the new series on Apple TV. I watched that last night, just before I go to bed.
[00:01:51] And then the other thing I like to do is I listen to, like to listen to an audio book. So I listen to an audio book to help me sleep better. So it helps me wind down. So I'm listening, [00:02:00] listening to some things, whatever I'm listening to at the moment, something lighthearted. I'm listening to the autobiography of Stuart Broad at the moment, a famous cricketer.
[00:02:07] So that helps me de wind and it make me, it makes me sleep better. I find if I don't switch off from everything work, my brain runs a million miles an hour. I can't sleep properly. So it's, that's my, that's what like my routine is most of the time. One of those three at least. Yeah,
[00:02:24] Josh Kennedy: well, it's as you say it's having being able to wind down because I find my Mind races a lot and there's lots of stuff going around in my head I think about work quite a lot and what I've got to do and all gotta do this for this client that client It's hard to switch off.
[00:02:37] So one of the tips and Recommendations is that you know, you do switch off screens ideally 90 minutes, uh, before obviously it's down to blue light, stops your, uh, natural, your hormones and helping you get to sleep naturally. And so it interferes with the, with your circadian rhythms a little bit. Um, but as James said, for [00:03:00] him, he finds that it works.
[00:03:01] So it is, you know, take this with a, with a pinch of salt, I guess, because it might work for some people doesn't work for me. Um, I know if like, Liz is on her phone in bed while I'm trying to get to sleep, I can, I've got my eyes closed but I can see it, I can see it behind my eyelids, uh, so that definitely, definitely one for me is turning off, uh, screens.
[00:03:22] Um, artificial light, uh, not the best, again, obviously. Electricity and, uh, modern age as, uh, that affects our sleep as well. So it's important to dim your lights, turn them off. I don't know. Would you sit in the dark?
[00:03:39] James Breese: I don't know. Well, it's, it's interesting to say that because I found this every time I go back to my parents place.
[00:03:44] So where my, where my bedroom is at my parents place, it's now the spare bedroom they've turned it into. I'm disgusted by it, how dare they, right? So it's a, it's above the garage and it's, it's like an extension built onto it and you've got a skylight. And what they have is, is a complete [00:04:00] blind that blacks out the whole room.
[00:04:02] So you close the two doors and you put a, it's a complete blackout. I always sleep better at my parents for two things. Well, I sleep better until one thing happens, and I'll tell you that in a second, but I literally sleep better because it's pitch black, right? It's so quiet. It's in the middle of nowhere.
[00:04:18] It's not Blooming Farm. So you can't hear anything here until you get woken up by the cockerel, or the rooster in American terms. At 6. 30am in the morning, he just goes cock a doodle doo like crazy outside. So, for me, like, the pitch black thing is so important. You don't realise how much you need it until you have it for the first time.
[00:04:38] And then even then, you sleep longer. Like, I just find, like, I will happily, naturally sleep in, whereas in Cardiff, because the curtains are not as, quite as dark. Obviously, it's lighter outside, street lights, etc. I'll tend to wake up a lot earlier, but home completely blacked out. I'm sleeping in like a baby, an extra hour sometimes, at least.
[00:04:58] Josh Kennedy: Yeah, exactly. So [00:05:00] make your room, uh, make your room dark, nice, dark, and also cool as well. It's as we know, um, In England, in England. Sorry, James. I've insulted that in Britain and in the summer when it gets hot very occasionally, we don't have air conditioning in this country and sleeping at night when it's hot is is really, really tough.
[00:05:20] So apparently an ideal temperature for your room is between 60 to 67 degrees Fahrenheit. So cooler room for sure. So dark and cool. And this is something you do. Um,
[00:05:32] James Breese: no, but stay on that on those staying cool. Something I do do that I don't often do, because I prefer showering in the morning to get myself here.
[00:05:40] But when I do train late in the evening, I'm doing some kind of sport or I want to just, just I've been out doing something all day. I need to have a shower. I find that having a hot shower late at night really helps me sleep better long term. So it makes it, it makes it really hot. Because basically the whole body starts to cool down and the body needs to cool down for [00:06:00] your sleep patterns, right?
[00:06:00] That's what all this they also having a cool room to sleep in. Yeah, so it just brings down the core temperature slightly So it helps you sleep better. So for me personally, it's another tip But also all the science boffins in terms of sleep say as well It's like trying to rate, you know, bring the temperature down So having a hot shower improves your ability to sleep better
[00:06:20] Josh Kennedy: at night.
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[00:07:00] Josh Kennedy: But also again. If you want to try with cold water, and you're that kind of person, you could try cold water as well, but most of the science out there does suggest that a hot shower or bath will have you a more restful night's sleep.
[00:07:14] Um, also, having a wind down ritual, as you said James, you sometimes read a book, I've used sort of um, uh, Relaxation techniques. I've listened to like classical music on YouTube of mindfulness. Again, use mindfulness apps that seems to help sort of turn my brain down a little bit is the, is the easiest way.
[00:07:38] Um, so having a good wind down ritual and anything else you've used James besides reading.
[00:07:43] James Breese: Yeah, I just, I, again, going back to the original, it's, I like that word better. Actually, I think a wind down ritual. is a better way to talk about it. So my wind down ritual is quite literally this. I go upstairs to bed, I brush my teeth, do a bit of a wash, you know, make sure everything's ready to [00:08:00] go, I get into bed, I'll put my phone on it's charger, I'll open up my iPad, I will literally then start watching a TV show.
[00:08:07] If I'm not gonna, if I'm not really into it, I'll literally turn it off, because sometimes I'm just I can feel myself falling asleep naturally with it. But then I always pretty much always like to now when I'm sleeping on my own is like I like to put an audio book on and I listen to the audio book which helps me go into a deeper sleep.
[00:08:23] It just helps me wind over and I pass out a lot faster. So that technically is my wind damage. I have all those things. The wash, then the audio book is probably the most important that I do. Very
[00:08:34] Josh Kennedy: nice. Finally, last but not least is nutrition. And obviously it plays a big part. Try and eat at least two hours before you go to sleep is again, it's the general advice.
[00:08:48] Most people have probably heard that, but again, it doesn't necessarily work for everyone. Um, but me, me and Liz, we, we eat quite late at night generally because, [00:09:00] uh, by the time we got the kids to bed and I've come down and cooked a meal or something, it is about nine o'clock usually, but I'm a bit of a bit of a night owl.
[00:09:08] So I don't go to bed straight away. So that works for us. But James, how does that affect you at all? When you, when the time you eat in terms
[00:09:15] James Breese: of sleep? No, I like to eat early in the evening. I think, I think most of my eating is done by about 5 PM mostly. Unless I'm going out for food with family and friends just because I'm up early.
[00:09:27] I like to eat that way It just tends to work better So if anything if I was going through my daily rituals and how I do things I don't tend to eat anything till about midday. I don't fast per se, but it's a natural way of doing things I tend to be more productive and then between 12 and 5 I eat most of my food and then after 5 p.
[00:09:45] m I may have something light Like, what did I have last night? I had a mince pie. There we go. It's Christmas here. So I had a mince pie, literally, as part of my wind down ritual last night. But, but for me, I, the one thing I do know is, is that [00:10:00] because I'm going through this diet phase at the moment, I'm playing and experimenting, I think is the best way to put it, with intermittent fasting.
[00:10:09] And I do one day a week of a fasted period. So today, for example, I'm going through a full complete fast. What I do know and what I've experienced in the last six to nine weeks now is that on days that I fast, my sleep quality is poorer. So, and that's tracked, and that's the data coming across, not just me anecdotally saying it, you can tell on my watch.
[00:10:30] I sleep less, and I also have less deep sleep, is what I'm finding. However, I do feel better for it in terms of the following day starting to eat again, I sleep better the following night. But it's something that's coming up on my data, from, we talked about it on the smartwatch the other day. Based on that data and how I feel, it doesn't give me the best sleep.
[00:10:48] So I need to be mindful of that so the following day my workouts are less intense. Basically,
[00:10:53] Josh Kennedy: exactly. So we did, we did those in kind of a funky [00:11:00] order. So I'm going to run through them quickly so that everyone knows we have done six tips. We kind of merged them all together though. So first tip, uh, yeah.
[00:11:07] Try and cut off your exposure to screens about 90 minutes before bed. If that works for you, uh, nutrition, try and stop eating two hours before you go to bed, have a wind down ritual. Uh, maybe it's a book, maybe it's some sort of meditation or listening to a podcast, perhaps something like that. Take a hot shower or bath, uh, before bed.
[00:11:27] And then tips five and six is your, all about your sleeping environment. Make sure it's nice and dark and nice and cool, and hopefully that will help you get much better sleep and, uh, better sleep is better recovery and means you can train harder and more efficiently. Wouldn't you agree?
[00:11:42] James Breese: Exactly. Exactly.
[00:11:44] Who doesn't love sleep?
[00:11:46] Josh Kennedy: Exactly. I love sleep. Loves it. I don't get a lot of it because I've got two young kids, but I do love sleep. When I get to have a lion on the weekend, it's the greatest thing in the entire world. Uh, I'm sure parents listening out there can, uh, [00:12:00] fully sympathize with me. That is it for today.
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