For the longest time I would wish for a good night sleep. Life was so busy, full of stress, and full of electronic distractions… sleep was the primary victim of this. This has got to change. When I started this journey one of my goals were to make a change on how I view each night from “wishing for” to being “grateful for” sleep. There are many things that I needed to change to reach this: 

  1. Clear the bedroom of distractions.
  2. Cut out the Diet Soda habit.
  3. Increase activity throughout my day.
  4. Be more committed to my workouts. 
  5. Turn off the electronics. 

 

So let’s get into the changes to become more grateful for my sleep each night. My first step was to clear out the distractions. I read a study somewhere that our bedrooms are for two purposes only Sleep and Sex (FYI by default the results of the journey we are on has increased quality and quantity for both). So out goes the TV, Tablets, Computer, and anything else that would prevent me from falling blissfully to sleep.

Second cut out the Diet Soda. I went over this in a previous post so I won't get into it much. Anyway, caffeine, chemicals, acid, and gas... all prevented my mind and body from relaxing. So it had to go away. New rules of the day, no more diet soda and no caffeine after 2 pm. 

Thirdly increase activity throughout the day. As a profession I am a payment data analyst for GoDaddy.com, so I used to sit on my behind all day long. I needed to find a way to not always be on my butt. So I started getting up and going for walks, get a standing desk, and go for a bike ride around the 2 lakes in our business complex on lunch breaks. I have seen benefits to this other than just the sleep stuff such as increased energy, clearer mind, and less pain each day. 

Fourth being more committed to my workouts. The only time in the day I have to work out is first thing in the morning. So 4:00 AM comes around and my alarm goes off. This used to be the easiest thing in the world to turn off and ignore just to get in another hour or so. So I started treating this as the most important part of my day. Two things have changed, I now get the kids to bed earlier so I can go to bed earlier and when that alarm goes off I wake up excited. Oh the little changes that make big differences.

Finally turn off the electronics. Kind of goes along with my first bullet point, however, expanded to the whole house. As I need to go to bed early so I can wake up for my workouts, the computers, TV, tablets, and phone are turned off at 7PM (silent mode for the phone). This has made a big impact not only for me but also the kids. 

The results from these 5 changes have been fantastic, I SLEEP! Seriously it has been years since I could say I sleep at night. Insomnia is gone, sedentary life is gone, headaches are less, intimacy is way up, and taking a vacation to dreamland is a nightly occurrence. Sleep as far as I am concerned has been the number one tool for being successful on this journey. 

Hi, my name is Travis and I am fat, I am here to heal myself.