19: 10 Strategies for Improving Sleep

Welcome to the Women's Success Coach Podcast. A podcast created to inspire growth and to help you learn, achieve, and evolve in your life ongoing regardless of your age. I'm your host, certified coach, and licensed therapist Karen Vincent, and I'm here to guide you and provide you with concrete tips and strategies you can implement in your life. I'm also here to inspire you, challenge you, and cheer you on so that you can create the life of your dreams and beyond. In today's episode of the Women's Success Coach Podcast, I'm talking to you all about sleep. So many of my clients over the years have struggled with getting good sleep on a regular basis, and what I found over and over is that everything is so much harder when a solid sleep foundation is not there. For this reason, I always ask my clients about sleep, even if they don't bring it up as a concern. And I always try to help them improve their sleep as is needed if they're not getting seven to eight hours of sound sleep on a consistent basis. Now, if you're like how I have been in the past, you are already thinking that this is not possible for you and that there's too much to do and not enough time to get it done. If this is you, I hear you and I have you covered. In this episode about sleep, I'm going to offer you 10 strategies that will help you fall asleep faster, sleep, more soundly, and help you sneak in just a little bit more time for sleep. After listening, you can decide to implement one or implement them all depending on your lifestyle and how problematic you consider your sleep to be. So let's dive on in. Hey there, my friend. I hope that you're doing well, and I'm so glad that you're here to listen to this podcast episode, which is all about sleep. Not getting enough sleep consistently will negatively impact so many areas of your life. I'm sure that you're aware of some of them, but I'm going to list off quite a few, and I'm doing this for a couple of reasons. First, I don't think everyone's aware of all of them. And second, I want to have you really think about how not getting enough sleep is impacting you now, as well as how it will impact you over time if you continue to not prioritize it. A lack of sleep results in the cognitive impairment of things like memory, attention, concentration, and decision making. As a result of this, it can become more difficult to think clearly and efficiently, which can in turn negatively affect your productivity and performance. Some studies have shown that a lack of sleep impairs your mind in the same way that having a couple of drinks does. In addition, a lack of sleep can negatively affect your mood and overall emotional wellbeing. Not getting enough sleep can lead to things like mood swings, irritability, increased stress, and it can exacerbate mental health concerns such as depression and anxiety. A lack of sleep can also negatively impact your physical health. It results in decreased immune function, which can make you more susceptible to illness and infection, and in addition, it results in a slower recovery time. Prolonged sleep deprivation is also associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular problems, such as high blood pressure, heart disease, heart attacks, and stroke. And this is because sleep helps to regulate blood pressure, and promotes overall cardiovascular health. A lack of sleep can also impair judgment, reaction time, and coordination, which can result in an increased risk for accidents. Finally, in terms of physical health, a lack of sleep can reduce your overall energy, muscle strength and endurance, making it harder to engage in physical activity. Another area that a lack of sleep can impact is weight gain. And this is because sleep deprivation can disrupt the balance of hormones that regulate appetite leading to increased hunger and cravings, especially for high calorie foods. This is why you may be more likely to crave things like bread chips, fries, or even sweets when tired. Sleep deprivation can also affect your metabolism, making it harder to maintain a healthy weight. I know I've given you a lot, but I have one more for you. A lack of sleep can also result in poor skin health. It can contribute to dark circles under your eyes, puffy eyes, premature aging, and dull complexion. A lack of sleep can also impair the skin's ability to repair and regenerate itself. So if those are not good reasons to try to get a good night's sleep, I don't know what are. It literally impacts your entire life. So now that you hopefully have some motivation to try to make sure your sleep is as good as it can be, I'm going to offer you 10 different strategies that can result in a better night's sleep. I've worked with many, many clients who see positive impact almost immediately, including individuals who have not slept well for many, many years. The first strategy is mindset. Now, bear with me. You're like, what does mindset have to do with sleep? I'm starting with mindset because your body will follow along with what your brain tells it. If you tell yourself that you're not a good sleeper, your brain will work to fulfill that identity for you. Instead of saying,"I'm not a good sleeper", try telling yourself something like"I'm prioritizing taking action that will improve my sleep". This will reinforce that you are both wanting something different and that you are working to make it happen. The second strategy is make it a priority. If you want to make a change with your sleep, you need to commit to it, and then take consistent action to get it to where you want it to be. That may mean turning off the television a little earlier, or not having an afternoon nap, or eliminating caffeine and alcohol. It may not always feel like the most desirable option at the moment, however, once you make it a priority and start to experience a good night's sleep on a regular basis, it will become a no-brainer because of how much better you'll feel. The third strategy, go slow. So just like any other behavior change you make, it's better to ease into it than to try to force something that feels challenging and potentially uncomfortable. You'll be trying to create a new habit or habits,

so you want to adjust so

slowly. So if the issue is that you stay up too late, start going to bed just 10 minutes earlier to start. Once that feels normal, add another 10 minutes, until you get to where you want to be. The fourth strategy, schedule your day. Each morning, schedule what you need to get done during your day, including what time you need to be in bed. This will help you make sure that you're prioritizing and not overscheduling your day. As part of this, schedule what you will do the hour before you go to bed, which ideally should be something relaxing that helps you slow down and start to turn off your brain. The fifth strategy, ask for help. If you can't do it all and get to bed at a reasonable time, ask others for help. Whether you need other members of your household to pitch in and pick up, or you need to delegate some work, figure out how to get some things off your schedule so that you can have the time you need to get proper sleep. Figure out what can go completely, what you can get help with, and what can be put off until later. Once you're sleeping well on a consistent basis, you'll get more done in less time because your overall functioning will improve. Strategy six, decrease stress. So does your mind race as soon as your head hits the pillow? Anytime you're feeling stressed out, it's because of what you're thinking. You may be making mental lists of all the things that need to get done, or you may be thinking about all of the worst case scenarios that could play out related to something going on in your life. You may also be replaying your day and questioning all of the things that didn't go quite the way you had hoped. There are many things you can do to help manage your overall stress, and this includes exercising, practicing mindfulness, taking a warm bath, sipping warm tea, or listening to a guided meditation, however, learning to manage your thought patterns is also very important.

And a way you

can do this is, before bed write down any lingering to-do items or what you need to do the following day so that your brain doesn't think it needs to keep playing them over and over. You

may also want to try journaling for five to ten minutes,

and this will help you organize your thoughts and clear your mind. And if worst case scenario thinking or overthinking are your issue, shoot me a DM on Instagram with your biggest challenge and I'll offer you a more specific strategy. You may also want to try coaching, which can help you fast track your results in terms of decreasing your stress and learning to manage your thinking. Strategy seven, set the right conditions. You may not like these at first, but you will like the feeling of getting enough sleep, waking up refreshed, and being able to function at your very best. Some of the way to set these conditions are sleep in a cool dark room, ideally cooler than 70 degrees. Get off screens at least one hour before bed. Don't have a television on while you're sleeping for that background noise that you think you need. And if you do need noise, try a sleep app or get a white noise machine. Also, don't drink alcohol or drink too much of anything before going to bed. Cut out caffeine in the early afternoon at the latest. Don't exercise right before bed. And remember, if you need to change a lot of these, go slow. Go back to that previous strategy and start to tweak a little bit at a time, starting with just one of these items. Strategy eight, limit napping. When you're not getting an enough sleep at night, you're likely gonna hit that midday slump where you feel like you just need to take a nap to get through the rest of your day. If you really wanna improve your sleep, commit to trying to skip that nap so that you'll be tired earlier at night. And if it feels like a lot, again, start small and start with shortening your nap a little bit at a time until you're able to eliminate it completely. Strategy number nine, breathe. When you get into bed, use breathing to help you slow down your nervous system and relax. You can grab

my guide where I walk you

through five breathing strategies that will help you relax, and you can get that at www.karenvincentsolutions.com/breathing. Again, www.karenvincentsolutions.com/breathing. Finally, strategy number 10, use visualization. When you get into bed, visualize a place you've been that's peaceful, calming, and relaxing. For me, I always visualize myself sitting on a beach. It's a very specific beach, and I imagine the sound of the waves, the smell of the salt air, the light breeze on my skin. The warmth of the sun and the way the sand feels in my feet. I feel relaxed just talking about it here. So if you get into bed and do some breathing and then visualize yourself somewhere calm and peaceful, you're planting this imagery in your brain and encouraging it to focus on this while you're sleeping, instead of focusing on all your worries or your to-do list from the day before. If you want to dive deeper into visualization, you can check out episode six of this podcast, which is all about the power of visualization. So there you have it, 10 strategies for improving your sleep, and as I do with all my episodes, I want you to take some action. I want you to improve your sleep if this is problematic for you. So I'm going to review each strategy again quickly and encourage you to pick one, start small and build from there. All of this information will be in the show notes as well, so you can always go back and reference each strategy as often as you would like. So let's take some action. As a reminder, you have 10 strategies you can try. Start small and build from there.

Number 1 is mindset.

Remember, you're not going to tell yourself you're a bad sleeper. Instead, tell yourself something like, I'm taking action to improve my sleep until I get a solid sleep every night. Number two, make it a priority. You have to focus on this and make it a priority if you want to see real change. Number three, I talked about this a lot, go slow. Start small. Your brain will freak out on you if you try to make massive change at once. So start with one thing, start small and keep increasing it until you get it to where you want it to be. Number four, schedule your day. And that should include when you're going to bed and what you're doing the hour before you're going to bed to get your body slowed down, to slow down your mind and to get into a more relaxed place. Number five, ask for help. Nobody's gonna pitch in unless you ask. So figure out what you can delegate, what you can get off your plate completely, and what you can postpone so that you can get to bed on time. Number six, decrease your overall stress. There's lots of great strategies exercise and mindfulness and meditation, and taking a warm bath, drinking warm tea. All of those things will help you manage your stress, but you also have to manage that thinking. If you're overthinking and ruminating and playing out all the what ifs, that is going to dial up your stress.

So you want to learn to

manage your thinking as well as take action on some strategies that will help you decrease your stress overall. Number seven, set the right conditions. I gave you a lot of options of things to do and to think about there. Again, start small.

Maybe you create a cooler

sleeping environment to start. Maybe you start turning off your TV and use a white noise machine. Maybe you stop drinking alcohol or having a lot of water right before you go to bed. Maybe you limit caffeine to the mornings only. Any of those things will help. Again, just start small and dial it in. Number eight, limit napping. We talked about that. Again, start small if you need to, but clearing out those naps is gonna make your body ready for sleep at night when you want to be sleeping. Number nine, breathe. Use breathing to slow down your nervous system. And remember, if you go to www.karenvincentsolutions.com/breathing, I have a resource guide that walks you through five specific breathing strategies that will help you to slow down your nervous system. And number 10, use visualization. When you get into bed, visualize somewhere peaceful, somewhere calming, and really set yourself there. Pull in all your senses and experience that and tell your brain, this is what I wanna be thinking about when I'm sleeping. Not all of the worries about tomorrow or replaying the day from today. So there you have it, 10 strategies. Reach out to me, dm me, let me know how it's going. And certainly, you can DM me on Instagram if you have any specific questions, about your situation. I'm happy to help in any way I can. That's a wrap. You should be proud of yourself for investing time in you, which is so critical for success and for overall life fulfillment. I look forward to having you join me for my next episode. And in the meantime, go click that subscribe button so you'll know when it's released, and you can also follow me on Instagram at Best Boss Lady Life that's at Best Boss Lady Life on Instagram. Also, remember that whatever it is that you're working on, you've got this and I'm here cheering you on.