Jerry Seinfeld’s Rules of Sleep – is this your life, too?

Do you remember the hilarious Jerry Seinfeld bit about Night Guy, Morning Guy and Day Guy? It was all about sleep habits. Seinfeld said as a Night Guy, he didn’t care that Morning Guy was going to be exhausted because he stayed up way too late – that was Morning Guy’s problem!

Well… I’m a Night Gal, trying to become a Morning Gal. And I’ve really been struggling...

We’re all guilty of this, especially when facing big work deadlines: We skimp on sleep during the week and then binge-sleep on weekends, telling ourselves that we’re ‘catching up on lost sleep’.

I battled sleep disorders for many years. I did my most creative thinking and writing late at night, often until 4 AM. While studying for my MS degree at Miami University, I was an insomniac. I wanted to get everything done as quickly as possible, and that meant functioning on about four hours of sleep a night.

During the dissertation phase of my doctoral program at the University of Toronto, I became a shift worker: I stayed up and worked until 4:00 or even 7:00 AM, and woke up after sleeping four to six hours. I’ll never forget my Ph.D. supervisor Dr. Harvey Skinner, a world-renowned health psychologist, telling me that I needed to “eat, sleep, move and breathe” my dissertation.

The words -- eat, sleep, move, breathe – later became the title of my signature keynote talk, and it’s now the main focus of Byte-Size Wellness Academy, my online wellness self-coaching program.

These crazy hours continued through my three-year postdoctoral fellowship with the National Cancer Institute of Canada – during which time I gave birth to my two kids – and my subsequent research career at several teaching hospitals in Toronto.

Even while barely sleeping, I was on top of the world. It was like an addiction which spilled over into my personal life. I became a dance-a-holic – salsa dancing between 10 PM and 2 AM. Then, I got into west coast swing, dancing more normal hours except when I’m “swung over” following quarterly dance events where I’m dancing from midnight until 6 AM!

I’ve overcome several other sleep challenges, including restless leg syndrome – which was resolved thanks to my weighted blanket. My post-menopausal sleep apnea, which forced me to sleep with a CPAP machine, has been cured with weight loss, yoga and breathing exercises my sleep doctor thinks opened my airway muscles.

Here’s what I’ve learned: Matthew Walker, Ph.D., once said, “Sleep is not like the bank. You can’t accumulate debt and then try to pay it off at a later point in time.”

While I can’t pay off my sleep debt, I can pay it forward with my 7-Day Sleep Challenge.

If you’re in need of a focused sleep program that’s intuitive and easy to follow, my seven-day sleep hygiene helps people feel more attentive, engaged and productive. Each challenge day has a downloadable resource, a five-minute task to complete, and several yoga, mindfulness and breathing practice videos to follow. Participants train their brains and bodies to stick to a consistent sleep time and wake up time so that they can bring their best selves to virtual/hybrid meetings and work.

Here's what the sleep challenge program covers:

● Day1: What's Your Sleep Story?

● Day 2: Optimize Your Morning & Daytime Routine

● Day 3: Optimize Your Evening Sleep Routine

● Day 4: Breathing and Relaxation Practices

● Day 5: Be a Cave Man or Cave Woman

● Day 6: Wind-Down with Bedtime Stretches/Yoga Poses

● Day 7: Rise and Shine with Yoga Poses

Plus, you’ll get bonus information (the ABC's of Sleep, FAQ's and Myth Busters) along with a Certificate of Completion.

I'd love to welcome you personally as an individual or, if you are an HR or meeting professional, your attendees or workplace employees can benefit from my personalized up-to-date sleep hygiene program!

Happy, productive employees and meeting attendees have had a good night’s sleep; they feel energized and invigorated.

Click HERE to schedule a Zoom meeting to check out my sleep hygiene program and discuss individual and group pricing options.

Sleep well,

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