The HALO Sleep Checklist
Here’s a few tips you probably haven’t
heard of yet...
1. The Problem of Rational Thinking vs Bodily Awareness
We’ve all been there: you get to bed and your mind begins writing your debut novel, calculating financial pressures, replaying embarrassing memories in perfect detail, tallying the week’s tasks.
The problem is that when we try to use our mind to shut down this kind of thinking, we only make it worse.
Sleep is not a rational or cognitive achievement. Simply put, the mind does not put you to sleep. Your body does. The only way we can shut down rampant thinking in bed is to pay attention to breathing and the tension or relaxation present in your muscles. We shift our focus from abstract ideas in our head to the physical sensations in our body.
As a challenge see if you can watch your breathing without judgement when you climb into bed, and slowly relax your body one muscle at a time. You can actually pretend that your brain itself is in fact just a physical muscle that needs to be relaxed too!
2. Creating the Correct Psychological Associations for Sleep
Working, reading and scrolling through social media. These are all things you want to keep away from your bed. Keep these for the couch and living room. Your bed is for sleeping and if you keep this narrow association in your mind, you’ll find a more narrow tendency arising when you get to bed: sleepiness. Which is exactly what we’re after.
The latest sleep research finds that a bedroom kept solely for sleeping as much as possible helps condition the mind for sleep.
As a challenge, see if you can avoid getting into bed at all unless lights are out and you’re all ready for sleep.
Remember, if your subconscious mind sees your bed as a place to work, relax and watch entertainment as well as sleep, then what is it to decide?
3. Positive Anticipation & It’s Surprising Effects on Sleep Quality
People who fall asleep easily have one thing in common. They look forward to sleeping and it’s blissful relaxation.
People who struggle to fall asleep have one thing in common too. They’re anxious about sleeping and how long it will take them tonight. We begin to see it as a task we’re not good at and a form of work.
Enjoying the process of relaxation and falling asleep when you climb into bed is important, it’s something that should be enjoyable after all. The latest sleep research by Matthew Walker suggests that those who positively anticipate the
quality of their sleep, seem to fulfill that prophecy they’ve set up for themselves, a fascinating phenomenon.
One bad habit that shuts this down is counting hours. We all desire that 8 hour benchmark. So we set alarms and give ourselves windows to fall asleep inside of. Then we fail and worry about the consequences as we count down the hours of sleep we’re losing. Instead, by positively anticipating our night’s sleep we directly improve it’s quality.
4. Introduce a Sleep Supplement without Melatonin!
Unfortunately, whilst melatonin does induce sleepiness, it’s damage to the quality of sleep you actually achieve is so bad as to not be worth it in the first place. What’s worse is that eventually, your body will adjust to the level of sleepiness it induces. It will decline in effectiveness quickly.
But taking a sleep supplement with the right ingredients is a great help! Here at HALO, our scientists have developed an all-natural formula for promoting the quality of your sleep. Our customers have found it helps them fall asleep faster too.
This is because of our carefully composed list of ingredients: Valerian root, Griffonia seed, German chamomile and caryophyllene to name a few. They work together to promote sleep and relaxation by acting on different pathways in the body.
5. Understanding the Connection Between Daily Anxiety and Sleep
There’s a frustrating feedback loop that develops when we experience anxiety at day and poor quality sleep at night. The anxiety that negatively stimulates our nervous system inhibits sleep and the lack of sleep creates a more anxious
mind.
That’s why at HALO, we developed all-natural formulations to help address both sleep and stress. By solving one issue you begin to unwind this problem to achieve a better quality of life. HALO Relax is a precisely composed formulation of relaxation inducing ingredients such as Lemon Balm, Ashwaghanda, Rhodiola and Limonene to name a few.
For those who find they struggle with both issues of stress and sleep we created a discounted bundle, so you can get to work on solving this frustrating loop once and for all.