Improve your well-being with practical advice about diet, exercise & sleep – thousands of others have.

Sleep, diet and exercise habits are crucial for well-being and success in work and life because they help maintain an important part of your brain – the hippocampus.

To remember this word, we break it down into: 

• Hippo (imagine a hippopotamus)
• Camp (picture a campsite)
• The pronoun ‘us’

Putting this all together gives us Hippo-camp-us.

Science suggests the hippocampus is the main part of the human brain that produces new brain cells. It turns out these new cells are very important for helping us to manage stress, perform well and to learn new things such as new processes at work. Poor diet, exercise and sleep can lead to this area becoming damaged. That makes managing stress and consist high-performance more difficult than they need to be. 

Also, good exercise and a good diet help the brain to release a protein called brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF). This helps brain cells to grow and flourish, so we can manage stress and learn more with less effort. We think of good diet, exercise and sleep as the foundation for all of the following:

• Better stress management.
• Spending less time on unhelpful thoughts.
• Performing well at work under pressure.
• Being productive to drive creativity and innovation.
• Building and maintaining robust levels of confidence.
• Better leadership for improved individual and team performance

How can I improve my sleep, diet and exercise habits? 

We teach people a process to help them build new sleep, diet and exercise habits. Here is an example of the process focusing on sleep:

STEP 1 – Score the quality of your sleep last night out of 10 – we call this ‘self-watching’.

STEP 2 – Then identify and write down how many more hours (or minutes) of sleep you want to achieve this evening – we call this the ‘aim’.

STEP 3 – Then make a detailed ‘plan for reaching this objective i.e. write down what time you will be in bed, what time you will prepare for bed, what time you will turn off your electronic devices e.g. mobile, laptop, tablet.

In combination, we call this the S.W.A.P.® Cycle. We need to swap the unhelpful things that hinder our diet, exercise and sleep (D.E.S.®) – and replace them with habits that help us improve. Improving your D.E.S.® can be difficult because the A.P.E. Brain® can get in the way.

Can you stop your A.P.E. Brain® from preventing you making a D.E.S. S.W.A.P.®? 

Continue reading this Blog to help you achieve this. You will be awarded a ‘D.E.S. S.W.A.P.® Skill’ medal:) Watch the video to find out more:

To help you improve diet, exercise and sleep, here are some insights. These are taken from our WORKSHOP – “How to build better Diet, Exercise and Sleep habits: Simple and practical knowledge and skills to help you make sustainable improvements to the foundations of health and happiness.” 

See the workshop details below:

For more details click here.

Or contact us to find out more.

We start with this useful audio guide to improving your diet, exercise and sleep. It contains the main points of this blog. You can listen to it on the move to remind yourself how to start building good habits in this area.

Learn how to improve sleep, diet and exercise - a practical audio guide.

To listen to audio guide, click here.

Download your FREE Sleep, Diet and Exercise Improvement Guide 

This easy-to-read Tougher Minds booklet contains practical tips to help you improve your diet, exercise and sleep. To download it, click on the image below.

WHAT SHOULD WE EAT?

To produce and grow new neurological connections, your brain needs a combination of energy, building blocks and antioxidants.

ENERGY

The brain’s fuel source is glucose, which is a type of sugar. Although your brain only makes up around 2% of your overall body weight, it uses 20% of your oxygen and 25% of your glucose. 

Carbohydrates are the body’s main source of glucose. It is best to eat complex carbohydrates which release glucose slowly. These foods tend to be natural and unrefined. They provide a better and more consistent source of energy for the brain than sugary and processed foods. Hence, you should always try to eat complex carbohydrates like green vegetables, wholegrain or wholewheat bread, wholewheat pasta and brown rice, sweet potatoes, beans, lentils and peas.

BUILDING BLOCKS 

The brain is a fatty organ, and so needs fatty acids to make it work properly. Specifically, the brain needs omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids. So your diet should contain these if you want your brain to work well. Typically we eat too much omega-6, but not enough omega-3. To boost your omega-3 levels you can eat cold-water fish like tuna and salmon, and oily fish like mackerel. Kiwi fruit, soya beans, spinach, flax seeds, chia seeds and walnuts are also sources of omega-3 fatty acids.  

JUNK FOOD

There is strong evidence showing that junk food can quickly damage brain function, particularly the hippocampus.

ANTIOXIDANTS

Another consequence of inadequate nutrition that can be damaging to brain function is known as free radicals. However, a group of molecules known as antioxidants can be used to combat the negative effects of free radicals. Antioxidants include vitamins E and C, and alpha lipoic acid. Foods that contain vitamin C include oranges and other citrus fruits, red peppers, kale, broccoli and strawberries. Foods that contain vitamin E include almonds, spinach, sweet potato, avocado, chard and trout. Finally, foods that contain alpha lipoic acid include broccoli, liver, kidney, spinach, potatoes and carrots.

SUMMARY

So, what you eat can help or hinder your learning and your ability to change and develop?

To boost learning you need to eat :

• Complex carbohydrates
• Foods which contain omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids
• Foods which contain antioxidants

HOW CAN WE BOOST EXERCISE LEVELS? 

IN MINUTES

Walking is classed as exercise. The government recommends that people do at least one hour of moderate to vigorous aerobic exercise every day. For example: cycling, brisk walking, running or playing tennis.

BONES and MUSCLES

The government recommends that, on three days per week, adults do muscle-strengthening exercises. For example: 

• Lifting weights
• Working with resistance bands
• Doing exercises that use your own body weight, such as push-ups and sit-ups

SWEATING

It is important that your exercise makes you sweat or perspire. Walking quickly is a good way to do this.

TRACKERS

There are many apps and physical activity trackers available that can be used as helpful ways of triggering and tracking beneficial levels of exercise. Also, if you are using a tracker beware of the ‘licencing effect’. This means that people sometimes gain weight when they track the calories they burn because they underestimate their calorie intake. For example, some might do a walk that burns 250 calories and then as a reward treat themselves with a chocolate muffin that they do not realise contains 450 calories. 

WHAT INSIGHTS CAN I USE TO IMPROVE SLEEP? 

CONSISTENT SLEEP PATTERNS

The time you get up in the morning has an impact on the time you can go to sleep in the evening. So it might be difficult to fall asleep early on a Sunday night if you overslept on Sunday morning. Keeping sleeping habits regular throughout the week is important for good, consistent sleep. 

EXERCISE

Doing enough exercise during the day can help you to sleep better in the evening.

CAFFEINE

Caffeine is found in coffee and tea and some sports drinks. How much caffeine you consume during the day, and when you consume it can make an impact on your ability to fall asleep. Data shows that consuming caffeine six hours before going to bed has a negative impact on sleep.

ALCOHOL

Drinking alcohol can damage your health. Importantly, it can affect the vital organs and functions, including the brain, liver, bones and hormones. Although alcohol can sometimes make you fall asleep quickly, it reduces sleep quality. This means that alcohol is unhelpful for sleep. Many high-performing sports and business people rarely or never consume alcohol.

SOUR CHERRY JUICE 

Research studies in adults shows that people who drank two glasses of sour cherry juice per day achieved an extra 34 minutes of sleep per night. The studies claim that sour cherries contain high levels of melatonin, a hormone responsible for sleepiness.

FOOD

Eating small carbohydrate and protein snacks before bed can help you have a good night’s sleep.

SOCIAL MEDIA

Checking social media before bed can make you feel anxious, and therefore make it difficult to fall asleep, and get good quality rest.

TECHNOLOGY 

The light produced from smartphones, tablets or laptops can make your brain think that it is daytime. So using electronic devices up to one hour before you go to bed can inhibit sleep.

HYDRATION 

Dehydration can make it more difficult to fall asleep, and reduce sleep quality. It is recommended that men drink around 2 litres, and women drink 1.6 litres of water per day. These are only average numbers, and everyone’s individual needs will be different. It is also important to remember that all drinks contain water, but that some will hydrate you and others dehydrate you. For example, caffeine (found in coffee and tea) is a diuretic which can cause dehydration. 

ROOM TEMPERATURE

Sleep is triggered as body temperature reduces. If your bedroom is too hot it will be difficult to fall asleep.

GETTING BACK TO SLEEP ROUTINE

Many people wake up in the middle of the night and struggle to get back to sleep. Significantly, this becomes an unhelpful and unwanted habit. To break this habit you should build a ‘get back to sleep’ routine. Here is one example routine that many people have found useful: 

• Wake up in the middle of the night
• Do not check the time as this can add pressure to get back to sleep
• Go to the bathroom
• Have a glass of water and half a banana
• Do not check your phone
• Get back into bed
• Read a book until you are ready to fall back to sleep

DARK, QUIET & CALM

Humans are designed to sleep when it is dark, quiet and you feel calm. Make sure your bedroom and sleeping practices help to promote all three factors.

You can improve…

Remember sleep, diet and exercise habits maintain and boost the brain. They are crucial for well-being and success in work and life. If you build better sleep, diet and exercise habits, life will become easier.

Do you want to help your people build better sleep, diet and exercise habits? 

This WORKSHOP below is proven to help these foundations of health and happiness:

For more details click here.

Or contact us to find out more.

Well done, you now have more skills to help you improve your diet, exercise and sleep.

Celebrate by watching this video:

You can also Contact us now for your FREE CONSULTATION