The Science of a Good Night's Sleep
The Science of Happiness
PRX and Greater Good Science Center
4.4 • 1.9K Ratings
🗓️ 12 May 2022
⏱️ 22 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Do you struggle with sleep? This week Drew Ackerman of Sleep with Me podcast tries tips for a good night's sleep, and we explore why it's so important to our well-being.
Episode summary:
A good night’s sleep can be hard to come by, and beating yourself up over not sleeping enough will only make it worse. On this episode of The Science of Happiness, the host of Sleep With Me podcast Drew Ackerman joins us to try science-backed tips for finding your natural sleep rhythm. Drew, also known as “Dearest Scooter,” talks about his history with insomnia and sleep anxiety, sleep hygiene, and his philosophy on bringing more self-compassion into his approach to trying to fall asleep. Then we hear from sleep scientist Eti Ben Simon about how sleep affects your social life.
Practice:
Here are four tips to help you sleep from Dr. Eti Ben Simon.
Avoid alcohol and caffeine after 2 p.m. to unmask your true biological sleep needs.
Keep lights dim in the evening and limit access to LED lights after 9 p.m.
Go to sleep as soon as you feel tired (even if you're in the middle of something). This will help you figure out the earliest window it is physiologically possible for you to fall asleep.
Do not use an alarm clock to wake up.
Try a version of this practice with the sleep tips in this article by expert Eti Ben Simon:
Today’s guests:
Drew Ackerman You might know Drew as his alias, “Dearest Scooter*,”* the host of Sleep with Me podcast. Drew struggles with bedtime worries and has a history of insomnia himself, but he’s great at helping others sleep. Sleep with Me is one of the most listened-to sleep podcasts. On each episode, “Scooter” lulls listeners off to dreamland with meandering bedtime stories intended to lose your interest.
Listen to Sleep With Me Podcast: https://pod.link/sleep-with-me
Follow Drew on Twitter: https://tinyurl.com/2p8nrhnp
Follow Drew on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dearestscooter/
Follow Drew on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Sleepwithmepodcast/
Eti Ben Simon is a sleep scientist and postdoctoral fellow at UC Berkeley, where she works at Matthew Walkers’ Center for Human Sleep Science.
Learn more about Eti and her work: https://www.sleepingeti.com/
Follow Eti on Twitter: https://twitter.com/etoosh
Follow Eti on Google Scholar: https://tinyurl.com/328aa5yr
Resources for A Good Night’s Sleep
Psychology Today - What’s Your Sleep Type? Two forces that dictate our sleep, by Eti Ben Simon: https://tinyurl.com/2nesff8t
Matthew Walker’s 11 Tips for Improving Sleep Quality: https://tinyurl.com/2kadu7va
TED - Sleeping with Science: https://tinyurl.com/23mmbdy3
Harvard Health - 8 Tips to Get a Good Night’s Sleep: https://tinyurl.com/2p8um9z7
BBC - Why Do We Sleep? https://tinyurl.com/2p8z9v2d
More resources from The Greater Good Science Center:
Four Surprising Ways to Get a Better Night’s Sleep: https://tinyurl.com/2p832bh5
How Mindfulness Improves Sleep: https://tinyurl.com/2p8rhkhj
Your Sleep Tonight Changes How You React to Stress Tomorrow: https://tinyurl.com/2p8zvbjz
Tell us about your experiences and struggles with falling asleep by emailing us at [email protected] or using the hashtag #happinesspod.
Help us share The Science of Happiness!
Leave us a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts or copy and share this link with someone who might like the show: pod.link/1340505607
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | As a kid, I had a lot of anxiety about school and every night I would stay up kind of worrying |
| 0:10.5 | about what was going to go wrong the next day, what was it going to get in trouble, and |
| 0:14.8 | almost trying to play out the day and predict what was going to happen and plan everything |
| 0:18.2 | out. And then it got to the point where I was like, wait a second, I can't sleep, like |
| 0:23.2 | I'm so nervous. And then I got it in my head, but it's like, how am I going to fall asleep |
| 0:28.4 | now? Now I'm tired. How am I going to get to sleep? And it was this cycle that just went |
| 0:33.0 | on and on and on. And one of the things that I think about even now is I'm the oldest |
| 0:38.2 | of six kids, but how lonely it was. I share room with my brother, but he's sound asleep |
| 0:43.2 | and I'm tossing and turning. And then the idea of just like water or food, we need sleep, |
| 0:49.4 | but it's not something that we can just turn on and off or just get, you know, and then |
| 0:53.8 | the more you try to get it, the harder you try to reach for the worse it gets. My parents, |
| 0:59.0 | I would tell them I couldn't sleep and they're like, why don't you think of something nice? |
| 1:02.6 | Why don't you imagine yourself descending a staircase? And some stuff would work for |
| 1:07.6 | one night, but then it wouldn't work the next night and the anxiety would come back. |
| 1:13.0 | I'm Dacker Keltner. Welcome to the Science of Happiness. This week we're exploring the science |
| 1:26.9 | of sleep. How to get more of it? What happens when we sleep well versus not at all? And on our |
| 1:33.1 | next episode we'll go from sleep to dreams and explore how to have conscious lucid dreams. |
| 1:39.4 | Today's guests suffered from insomnia as a kid and that sleeplessness still creeps back into |
| 1:44.8 | his nights from time to time. So we compiled some of the best research back tips to help him sleep. |
| 1:51.0 | We'll see how that went and we'll hear from a sleep expert from the Center for Human |
| 1:54.7 | Sleep Science here at UC Berkeley where I teach my happiness class. She'll talk about how sleep |
| 1:59.2 | affects everything from our brain function and hard health to how we engage with both friends |
... |
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