We can talk a lot about what a winning mindset can do for us and even look for ways to improve. But there is one crucial factor that can impact the progress we have made and hold us back. And it is simpler than you think: sleep. If you are not getting enough sleep, then this episode is for you. April Shprintz reveals the sleep hack that will supercharge your mindset and your life. Tune in to find out the different ways lack of sleep keeps you from showing up your best—physically, emotionally, and mentally—and how to overcome it!
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The Sleep Hack That Will Supercharge Your Mindset And Your Life
I am so glad you are here. We talk a lot about mindset and the important tools, the reframing, and the understanding that things are happening for us, not to us, and knowing what to focus on, but we don’t always talk about the things outside of ourselves that can impact our mindset. Some of them we know about, like what the economy is doing and what life outside of us is based on the relationships that we have with our family and the people closest to us if we have health issues. Things like this can make it a challenge to have a winning mindset and see things from an empowering place, but we are very aware of them.
One that can sneak up on you that most people are not aware of how much it can impact your life and how much it can impact your mindset is a lack of sleep. It sounds so incredibly simple. If you ask 10 people, 8 out of 10 of them would say they are not getting enough sleep, but they probably couldn’t tell you all of the ways physically and physiologically that is impacting their life.
Some of these you might know, but not getting enough sleep means that you don’t have the ability that you want to focus. You are short on patients. You are often much more emotional. You gravitate towards sugars, starches, and things that make you put on weight, then you feel even more sluggish, so you don’t want to work out.
Lack of sleep can get you going down a path that is no good. The scary part is most people don’t think about, “I am not in the mindset that I can deal with this because I haven’t had enough sleep.” I have always been pretty sensitive to sleep, and doing sleep deprivation in the military was super tough for me. I started prioritizing sleep and saw an incredible difference in my life, which candidly I took for granted.
Sleep Hack: Lack of sleep can get you going down a path that is no good.
If you follow me on social media or see the things that I post on LinkedIn and Instagram, you may already know about this, but my dog Cowboy had to have surgery. During that recovery period was up about every hour for the first couple of nights, which if I’m talking to any young parents here. Ignore me that I’m even complaining about two days of sleep deprivation.
What I noticed was the difference in the way I was able to handle situations. The difference from a mindset perspective in those two short days of sleep deprivation was mind-boggling. I realized that the best thing I can do for folks is to share with them how to get into a sleep routine in an easy way that will help you get that amount of sleep that makes you not only your physical best and your emotional best, but your mindset best every day.
I tried a bunch of different methods a few years ago, and the one that I found the simplest and the easiest to follow is the 10-3-2-1-0 method. It’s pretty easy to remember. It’s pretty easy to do. It does require a little bit of change in your routine depending on what your habits are, but I find that the benefits have so far outweighed making those small changes.
Sleep Hack: Six to seven hours after the time that you feel like you could take a nap is going to be when you want to go to bed.
The first thing you want to do before you implement that rule is to try and understand what your best bedtime is. What is your best natural bedtime? This is easier to determine if you are someone who doesn’t do a lot of caffeine in the afternoon because you have this lull in the afternoon. Even if you are someone who caffeinates in the afternoon, you know when it is. You know when you feel like you need a little pick-me-up. For me, it’s around 3:30. I know that about 6 to 7 hours after that is my ideal bedtime. That time that you feel like, “I could take a nap,” 6 to 7 hours after that is going to be when you want to go to bed. You can apply that time to the rest of the 10-3-2-1-0 sleep rule.
The 10 is no caffeine 10 hours before bedtime, whatever that bedtime ends up being for you. For me, it’s between 9:30 and 10:30. I usually aim for 9:30, but sometimes I do get to sleep as late as 10:30. Second is the 3, no food or alcohol 3 hours before you go to bed, and then the 2, you want to stop working 2 hours before you go to bed.
Sleep Hack: Don’t drink caffeine 10 hours before bedtime.
Candidly, this is the hardest one for me because I’m someone who can get inspired at night. If you have been in that place, you also know that you may be inspired and you may crank out some great stuff, but then you are not going to sleep anytime soon. That’s the toughest one, and then the one-hour one is one that most folks are pretty familiar with. It’s no screens for an hour.
If you do this and you read a book and you do things around your house, most of us will get bored enough that we will give in to being tired and go to bed. The zero is zero times you are going to hit snooze. If you do this consistently and it happens so quickly, within a week, you will feel incredibly different. It is amazing the difference in your quality of life when you are getting that good routine sleep. What is so funny is nothing else could change about your life, not a single thing, but you will feel like your life is 1 to 2 points better because you are well-rested.
It is amazing the difference in your quality of life when you are getting that good routine sleep. Share on XIf you don’t believe me, try it for yourself. Reach out to me on social media or go to the website, WinningMindsetMasteryPodcast.com. All the way down at the bottom, there’s Ask April. You can leave me a message. Let me know how it’s working for you. I think this is going to make a huge difference. Here’s to your success.
