5 Tips To Recharge Your Body And Mind Overnight
Now that you know that quality sleep is more important than just getting X hours of shut-eye, let’s talk about what you can start doing this week to take those hours you spend sleeping and turn them into serious recharge time.
Recharging Is Different Than Sleeping
For a lot of people, “sleeping” happens every night, but “recharging” doesn’t. How do you know if this is happening to you? If you wake up as tired (or more tired) than you were before you went to sleep, then you didn’t recharge. You just took a breather, but you’re still exhausted. Naturally, you want more than that out of your night.
The key to restful, recharging sleep is to do the same thing I do to the AA batteries I have at home when I want them to recharge – unplug them first. Unplug your mind from the stress of the day, from all your worries and obligations, and give your mental wheels a chance to spin down and cool off for the night.
Easier said than done? Perhaps so. But perhaps the real issue people have isn’t that “unplugging” is difficult as much as they don’t have a plan for doing so. When you’re stressed and exhausted, winging it isn’t the most effective way to do things successfully. You need a plan.
5 Simple Ways To Beat Insomnia And Sleep Like A Baby
Here are 5 easy tips you can use tonight to unwind and prep yourself for a truly recharging night of sleep. All you need is a notebook, a pen, and a few minutes devoted to taking care of yourself. Here’s what to do:
- Make peace with the end of the day. As unusual as that may sound, this makes a huge difference in your ability to unwind. Think back over the events of the day and reflect upon all the things you did get done. Feel good about that. (Smile, dammit.) And if you totally blew the day vegging out, don’t kick yourself. Remind yourself that we all need “mental health days” and accept that you had a good one. If the day was pure hell, however, at least take a moment to be glad that it’s coming to a close. Find something to be thankful for, and focus on that for a minute.
- Empty your mental pockets. Many people suffer from insomnia or other sleep disorders in part because they can’t mentally let their to-do lists go. You’ve got to be able to shift your attention away from the 1,000 things that aren’t done so that you can sleep in peace. The simplest thing to do is just to take 5 minutes and scribble them all out into a notebook, or type them out, or whatever works for you. Just get them out of your head, tell yourself you’ll deal with them tomorrow, and give yourself permission to relax.
- Schedule out tomorrow. You’ll be more likely to let yourself let go of the worries of tomorrow if you know up front that you’re going to be taking care of them. Take a few minutes to schedule out what you’ll be doing tomorrow, so that when your head hits the pillow, you can enjoy the sense of certainty that comes with knowing what lies ahead. 5 minutes doing this can more than pay for itself by means of a more restful sleep – and give you a clearer reason to hit the ground running in the morning.
- Go for the gold. Olympic athletes close their eyes and visualize every aspect of what they will do in their moment of glory. They see themselves winning, they prepare their body and mind by getting “in the moment,” and they grab the Gold. You can do the same thing. Take 2 minutes to close your eyes and visualize how good you are going to feel as you unwind into sleep, how deeply you will rest, and how incredibly refreshed you’ll feel in the morning. Give it a shot and see why it works so well.
- Loosen up. Take 3 minutes and do a few simple stretches to loosen up your shoulders, neck and back. I’ll go over a few of these in an upcoming post, but you don’t have to wait for me to tell you what you can do. Just listen to your body; see what muscles feel tight and give them a few gentle, 15-30 second stretches before bed. You’ll be surprised how many satisfying pops and cracks are followed by sweet, sweet relief.
You Know What To Do – Now Make It Happen
Give these tips a shot – see how they work for you over the next 3 days and let me know your results in the comments. I look forward to hearing your success stories. And if you’ve struggled with making other sleep tips work in the past, check out the Becoming an Early Riser program – you won’t be disappointed.
See you next post,
Dave
If getting a better night’s sleep is what you’re after, sign up for RSS or email updates to catch the entire “Better Sleep” series of articles.
Hi Dave: I loved your suggestion yesterday of savoring sleep and the suggestions you offer today are also great. I read in a book my Deepak Chopra to massage your face, ears, and scalp with some oil, as well as the soles of your feet. This makes your body release relaxing chemicals into your blood stream that will help prepare you for sleep.
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@Marelisa –
Soles of your feet? I’ll have to try that tonight.
Kick ass, Dave. I’ve been doing the “mind emptying thing”, the visualization and the stretching. But it’s time to try the other things to see how they help also.
Then again – I have 4 kids so I never have trouble falling asleep! But it is also important for sleep to be a recharge, as you said. So I’ll try it tonight.
Thanks a lot Dave,
Brett
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Dave, this tip is really good. I’ve been doing it for awhile.
“Take a few minutes to schedule out what you’ll be doing tomorrow, so that when your head hits the pillow, you can enjoy the sense of certainty that comes with knowing what lies ahead.”
I keep a little memo notepad on my desk near my bed on which I write out my three most important task to accomplish the next day, as well as any other significant things I want to get done. I commit myself to accomplishing them (and then stop thinking about them) and then lie back to read until I get sleepy.
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I’ve started mapping out my day too. At first I was doing it first thing in the morning, but now I do it just before bed so I feel that i can rest knowing exactly (well, more or less) what I’ll be doing. It helps me visualize that too. Shutting down my mind is the hardest part, but I think it might be a case of shutting down my computer earlier than seconds before I hit the sack! As for making peace at the end of the day, that’s getting easier as I become better at checking off all my goals! Yippee!
Massaging your feet works wonders, all to do with reflexology and pressure points. Anything lavender-scented also works to relax and soothe.
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[...] 31. Also from Dave Navarro, “5 Tips to Recharge Your Body and Mind Overnight”. [...]
Thanks Dave,
These are much needed in the hectic schedules we follow now-a-days. I have alreading being doing a couple of those, others will surely helpful..
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Thanks for all the great comments, all – I’ve been away practicing bonus tip #6:
“When you feel like you’re about to burn out, get your ass to the beach with your family.”
Miss the beach already, but good to be back.
5 Tips To Recharge Your Body And Mind Overnight | Rock Your Day…
Now that you know that quality sleep is more important than just getting X hours of shut-eye, let’s talk about what you can start doing this week to take those hours you spend sleeping and turn them into serious recharge time….
Good advice. Although, getting up at 9 am is early for me
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[...] 5 Tips To Recharge Your Body And Mind Overnight [...]
Good tips. Really interesting concept on this blog, concentrating on building the mind and the body. I really sleep only a few hours i.e. 4-5 hours every night and get up totally refreshed and ready for the day next morning. Coming from there I can understand some of the concepts you are putting out.
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Dear Dave,
All great points there but one: Go for the gold. The first part is true and second part needs revision.
In my humble opinion to visualize a win is different than to visualize “after the win”!. Well! It’s like a battle of chess – or any other battle in general. If one visualizes the win as said in “The Art of War” by SunTzu he will win based on “The victorious army first wins and then comes to the battlefield. The losing army first comes into the battlefield and then tries to win.”
But as one visualizes the after win situation his focus will drive away and no wonder that his expectation may fall short sooner or later. He can sleep like a baby tonight but surely the baby inside will cry like hell the other night!
Rock on Dave!
All the best,
H