Thinking About You in Your Bed

The pursuit of health and hotness is a funny thing. Those seeking the physique of their dreams understandably spend a lot of time, energy, and money on the things that will most obviously affect their results.

They’ll join gyms, hire trainers, buy supplements, and work with nutritionists. They’ll look to make big, strong choices on the path to taking control of their fitness.

And believe me. I’m all for that. I love me some big strong choices.

While these are positive action steps, humans are not always great about executing the day-to-day little things that really add up. Any MFF Ninja knows that recovery is a big part of the process.

When we’re prioritizing getting better over getting tired, we know it’s important to make sure we’re doing our best to maximize our training by giving our body what it needs to respond to the inherently stressful stimulus of gettin’ the fuck after it.

While there may not be anything sexy about drinking sufficient water, doing your soft tissue work, or eating plenty of greens, they’re non-negotiables if we really want to achieve peak levels of health and hotness.

In our experience, one of the most commonly dropped balls is, unfortunately, the very cornerstone of all recovery: sleep.

Most of our society has grown accustomed to functioning in a state of chronic sleep deprivation. Particularly my beloved fellow NYers. NYC is not only the town that doesn’t sleep, but it’s a town of folks who work their asses off every waking second.

So I don’t blame anyone for staying up past their bedtime for some badly needed downtime watching mind-numbing TV. Believe me, I totally get it. But if we want to be our best selves… that shit ain’t gonna cut it.

Sufficient quality sleep is profoundly important for the many hormonal processes involved in getting hot, whether it be getting leaner or adding muscle. Some research has even seen associations between inadequate sleep and obesity. This is to say nothing of the cognitive ramifications of running on fumes. Ever make shitty decisions while bleary-eyed tired? I’ll bet you have!

So in the interest of helping you get your sleep on point, allow to me to make some recommendations to maximize your time spent in bed.

(Your time spent SLEEPING in bed… other recommendations would go beyond the scope of this here article. P.S., you’re a sick fuck. And that’s why I love you so!)

1. Make sure your room is pitch black. Seriously. Get some black out curtains. I even recommend trying to minimize the number of electronics in your room and covering the light coming from your alarm clock.
2. Consider using white noise if you live in a noisy area. Personally, I love me a simple fan, but feel free to get fancy with a white noise machine or mobile app if that’s your preference.
3. Develop a consistent bedtime routine. It’s ideal to get away from your computer and TV at least an hour before your intended bedtime so all that light doesn’t confuse your brain into thinking it’s still daytime.  Consider adding some meditating, gentle stretching, or boring-ass reading to help slow your brain down.
4. If you find you’re sensitive to caffeine, consider scaling back your total consumption and/or cutting off as early in the day as possible.
5. Invest in a great bed and bedding. Since we ideally want to spend around a third of our life in bed, this is NOT the place to skimp and try to save some beans!
6. Do everything you can to get your room to an ideal temperature. For most folks the high 60s is ideal.
7. If possible, try to sleep at consistent times every night. This is often hard to do if you have a highly variable schedule, but the more you get in a routine here, the easier it will be to get your body in a groove.
8. Generally speaking, most people seem to have superior sleeping quality when they can align their sleeping schedule as close to nighttime as possible. If you can choose between sleeping from 10pm to 6am and sleeping from 1am to 9am, the former will usually be superior!
9. Never do work in your bed. Your bed should be for sleeping and sex and maybe light reading. Teaching your body to associate your sleeping quarters with writing work emails is not the best idea.
10. If you have a hard time falling asleep, consider supplementing with melatonin.
11. If you really can’t turn your brain off, consider seeing a therapist. Seriously. It’s that big of a deal. Some people are naturally better or worse sleepers, but if you sense the issue is chronic anxiety, it will serve you to treat the cause and not the symptoms of your sleeping problems!
12. Commit to making sleep a priority. Most of us know what it’s like to fall into the Twitter and Facebook whirlpool. I promise you, nothing really fascinating is happening that you can’t catch up on in the morning. Go to bed!

Oftentimes, it’s the little things that will really make the difference as we’re looking to achieve optimal levels of  performance in any realm of human achievement. If you’re not where you want to be with your health and hotness goals, troubleshoot your sleep.

Like they say, “Small hinges swing big doors.” Don’t let all that hard work go to waste!  Make sure your time in bed is all that it can be. And yes. I totally mean that every way you think.

Did you know getting quality sleep is one of the seven habits of highly sexy motherf*ckers?

Click here to find out what the other 6 are!