Listen Now…
Are you getting enough sleep? This is one of the most important things you can ever do!!
Get 7.5 to 8 hours of sleep
While it may not seem critical, trust me when I tell you that it is. Sleep, a good night’s sleep is key to accelerating your health. Most Americans and people living in westernized cultures are chronically sleep deprived. It is just as important for radiant health as is eating nutrient dense food and exercise. If you don’t get a good night’s sleep, your health will deteriorate.
Your body’s sleep-wake cycle, or circadian rhythm, plays a central role in multiple processes.
Sleep deprivation has the same effect on your immune system as physical stress or illness which may help explain why sleep deprivation is linked to an increased risk of numerous chronic diseases. It affects everything from your mood and functioning to disease development and obesity.
Failure to get regular adequate sleep has the capacity to impact your entire health.
In the last two or three decades researchers have discovered just how critical sleep is. While sleeping your brain cells decrease in size, and that helps them more efficiently detoxify.
Sleep is also linked to melatonin. It is an a hormone that is also an anti-oxidant and has cancer protective properties.
Lack of sleep diminishes your fat regulating hormone leptin, while increase the level of the hunger hormone, ghrelin.
If you’re getting seven hours of sleep at night, getting an extra hour of sleep can have a significant impact on your health.
Not getting an extra hour of sleep can increase your risk of developing heart isease, cancer, diabetes, hypertension and cognitive impairment to name a few.
1. An hour before your go to sleep, avoid watching television or using your computer or smart phone
2. Sleep in a very darkroom
3. Keep the temperature in your bedroom below 70 degrees.
4. Take a hot bath
5. Do not use alcohol or sleep aids to help you sleep
6. Try Theanine before going to sleep (especially if you’re feeling anxious and are experiencing racing thoughts).
7. Glass of warm organic (or growth hormone free) milk
Just Move It!
It is critical to move often to improve your health. Yes, you can add movement. There are two types of movement I want you to understand.
It’s imperative to realize how critical exercise and movement are to SuperHealing your cells.
Did you know exercise offers significant protective benefits. A year of moderate exercise, such as walking, can increase the size of the hippocampus, the memory center in your brain, and improve your memory?
Walking up to 5 miles a week can protect you in your 60s, 70s, and 80s, from developing mild cognitive impairment, which can lead to dementia. Exercising in your 40s and 50s will decrease your risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease by a whopping 39 percent. Exercise also keeps your cells young, improves your mood, and significantly lowers your risk of developing age-related chronic diseases.
So these are pretty compelling reasons to get out of the chair and get active. Whatever you do, please move! Your cells will reward you.
While moderate exercise 180 minutes a week is recommended, the latest research has determined as little as 5 minutes a day can improve your health. Some beats none! Can you do that? Of course you can. I found a study that determined moving for a mere 6 seconds helped prevent the development of serious illness in senior citizens.
In addition, there are also non-exercise movements that can make a huge difference.
It’s important to move often, on an hourly basis. Walking 2 minutes an hour is good, or even simple stretches in your chair. These small movements or interruptions are enough to help protect your health.
The Movement Paradox-If You Don’t Move-Meditate!
One final thing I want to share with you is a remarkable and powerful paradox. Earlier, I promised coach potatoes that I had something exciting to share—here it is. The asterisk in the health equals nutrients minus toxins plus movement represents the great paradox of movement. If you can’t move, meditate. What? The cellular changes induced by meditation not only interrupt the harmful changes that being sedentary cause, but is also as mentioned earlier highly beneficial.
So if you can’t move meditate. It causes significant physiological improvements that are the opposite of what happens when you’re sedentary. Your cells are stagnant and sluggish when you’re a couch potato, or sitting for too long. But meditation changes that function to a far healthier one. Isn’t that good news?
It’s never too late to improve your health! As long as you’re on this side of the grass, it is never, ever too late.
To your good health,
Dr. Elaine