Sleep Health with Dr. Kimberly Lemke

We welcome Dr. Kimberly Lemke to discuss her groundbreaking efforts to enhance sleep quality through her DRIFT method.  Poor sleep is everywhere, affecting people in our own families and circles even if we are not experiencing it ourselves.  Dr. Lemke shares with us practical tips and tools that we can use everyday to improve the quality of our sleep.  From the importance of light, to learning how each of our senses plays an important role, Dr. Lemke shows that is is easier to achieve and get a better night’s sleep without even thinking about it.

Dr. Kimberly Ann Lemke is an esteemed licensed clinical psychologist and recipient of the prestigious 2020 Enterprising Women of the Year Award. With a passion for promoting sleep wellness and mental health, Dr. Lemke has dedicated her career to empowering individuals and organizations to achieve optimal well-being. Her expertise in addressing a wide range of psychological issues complements her focus on sleep science and its profound impact on overall health.  

Certified as a Sleep Science Coach, Dr. Lemke is celebrated for her groundbreaking efforts to enhance sleep quality and reduce the organizational costs associated with sleep deprivation. Her innovative online sleep course, Drift , has earned recognition for its unique approach to tackling sleep-related challenges. Drift goes beyond the “you need to sleep more” advice and provides customers with unique and transformational strategies for individuals and organizations to optimize their workplace environment and workday in order to improve nighttime rest.  

Beyond her online platform, she delivers impactful workshops on sleep, stress, and holistic well- being within corporate wellness programs, showcasing her dynamic public speaking style and commitment to community welfare.

(3:36) Dr. Lemke shares with us her journey to study clinical psychology  
(6:01) How do different environments (hospitals, academia, etc) shape her approach?  
(8:28) Dr. Lemke shares some statistics and discusses her Drift sleep method.  
(13:48) Dr. Lemke shares the “Sleep Balloon” method.  
(16:56) How can we stop thinking about ourselves and our time as “expenses” and start prioritizing sleep and rest?  
(20:51) What trends and patterns does Dr. Lemke see in her work?  
(23:35) What common misconceptions do people have between sleep and mental health?  
(25:40) What other strategies can Dr. Lemke share with us about how to get better sleep?  How can what we eat and drink affect our sleep?  
(31:27) Dr. Lemke shares some success stories with us?  
(33:40) How can people deal with travel and jet lag?  
(36:48) What about all of the products that center around getting good sleep?   
(40:48) What is constructive worrying time?  
(45:58) What does Dr. Lemke see as the future of sleep science?

Connect with Dr. Kimberly A. Lemke
www.drkimberlylemke.com
www.driftcourse.com  

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Constructive worry is basically like pregaming, way less fun. But
it's like pregaming if you will, with your brain. So
it's like, let me worry about it before, let me
think about it before. So two hours before bedtime, sit down,
take a piece of paper, your phone. I don't care
how you do. Whatever you've got right, you could be
a post it. And what you do is you sort

(00:20):
of identify what do I think is going to be
in my braining tomorrow right or tonight? And you can
usually we know, right, either something that's been there for
a while, right, and we know it's going to show
up again that night, or something new that's popped up
during the day that you know is unsettled, or you
think about it. So that constructive worry is do it

(00:41):
before bedtime and just give yourself three next steps so
that when you go to bed at night, if your
brain brings it back up, which it usually will, you
can say like, hey, we've already thought about it, and
then that will help you sort of drift drift to sleep.

Speaker 2 (00:56):
Welcome to the Warriors at Work Show. This is Genie,
your guide and host. This is a show for men
and women in the workplace who want to move from
the predictable to the potent. This is your weekly dose
of inspiration with an edge. I talk with CEOs and
Shawman's sports marketing executives and therapists. All of us are

(01:20):
like minded thinkers and doers who tell stories, share wisdom,
and challenge each other to have the best life possible
inside and outside the office.

Speaker 3 (01:32):
Welcome to your Warrior conversation. Hey everybody, it's Genie. Thanks
so much for joining me here at Warriors at work. So,
I don't know about you, but sleep has been a challenge,
particularly the last couple of months. And while I feel
like I'm pretty well educated and have lots of resources,
I really felt compelled to get into a discussion with

(01:55):
an expert enter Doctor Kimberly Lemke, sleep science coach, licensed
clinical psychologist, corporate wellness consultant, founder and CEO of Drift.
As a sleep science coach, doctor Lemke is celebrated for
her groundbreaking efforts to enhance sleep quality. I had the

(02:18):
opportunity to see her speak and was blown away by
how practical her ideas and her perspectives were. We are
going to talk about the connection between sleep and mental health.
We're going to share some success stories that she's had,
but the practical tips and tricks that we can all
do today. You will be blown away by this. We

(02:42):
all need more sleep, and doctor Lemke has the answers.
I am so thrilled to bring to you this conversation.
Enjoy all right, Doctor Kimberly Lemkay, I am so excited
for this conversation. Probably one of the most profound conversations
having in the world right now is the importance of

(03:04):
the work that you do. So thank you so much
for being here with me.

Speaker 1 (03:07):
Well, thank you for having me. I'm so excited to
be here and talk about this with you and your audience.

Speaker 3 (03:13):
So I've had the benefit of seeing you work your
magic in a room and feel so grateful to have
your level of expertise at Warriors at work because you know,
I'm in service to people in the business community and
right now mental health and sleep in particular, which we're
going to take a deep dive in, is so topical

(03:36):
and so where I thought would be kind of interesting
to start. You know, your career really spans two decades
of experiencing clinical psychology, specializing in the treatment of children, adolescents,
and adults with extensive experience and mental health and sleep science.
So I want you to just take a step back
and talk to us about why did you get into

(03:57):
clinical psychology. Tell us a little bit about your journey.

Speaker 1 (04:01):
Yeah, so it's it's an interesting it's a funny story.
So my mom didn't tell me this for years until
after I was in the field, but she told me
the story about how when I was four years old,
apparently I would take my barbies and I would line
them up on like the little barbie couch, and I
would ask the barbies how they felt. So I'm pretty
sure from a young age, while everybody else is playing

(04:22):
with like the barbie pool in the car and I'm
asking him about their emotions, I'm pretty sure there's a
part of me from early on that was meant to
do something in this field, and so I always felt
called to it. I always felt called to you know,
emotions I always felt were very powerful and just as
much as sort of thinking was important, sort of thinking,

(04:43):
but the heart as well was important. And throughout the years,
you know, as I went out and got my doctorate,
one of the things that I really feel passionate about
when it comes to why do what I do is
I think that everybody has we all have some form
of darkness, we all have some form of struggle. And
so the analogy I use is for myself in this field,

(05:05):
is that I never want anybody walking alone in their darkness,
and I want to be there. And the role sort
of I take on in my own head is that
as we're walking through their darkness, I have a flashlight. Right,
they have a flashlight too, but sometimes I think all
of our own flashlights go a little dim and we
can't see certain things, and so you know, it's just

(05:26):
that idea of shining sort of light on certain ways
to think or certain ways to feel in different perspectives,
and so sort of doing that until somebody's flashlight comes
on their own and then they can see it and
then they can sort of navigate through it. So that's
really sort of why I got into this was one
I think I was called clearly from a very young age.

(05:47):
But two, I don't enjoy people having to be alone
in their darkness. And if I can walk with them
and I can shed light with them on whether it's anxiety, depression,
or sleep issues or struggles, I just feel call to
do that.

Speaker 3 (06:02):
And you've worked really in a variety of clinical settings,
you know, from hospitals to academia. How have these different
environments really shaped your approach?

Speaker 1 (06:15):
I think the first thing that I've really learned is
really everyone struggles, right, and in a day and age too,
where there's social media and everybody puts out, you know,
their best foot forward, and whether it's LinkedIn or it's
Instagram or it's a Facebook, everybody showing the highlight reel
of life, right, and in working in all these different settings,

(06:37):
you know, that's you know, sort of this you know much,
if you will, of somebody's life. It's a small portion,
if you will. And people don't like to talk about
the other stuff. And so I think not only to
teach me that everyone struggles, but regardless of whatever setting
I was in, we would always ask about sleep. So
whether it was school or we're doing an evaluation for

(06:58):
a hospital or outpatient center or schools, you know, when
we asked people how do you sleep? The answer was
typically not good. And we started to notice that people
were falling into categories regardless of the setting we saw
them in. And so we saw people who just couldn't
turn their brain off at night. We saw people who

(07:19):
would put their head on the pillow and just not
be able to fall asleep. And then we saw people
who would wake up at the dreaded two to three
am hour and not be able to fall back asleep.

Speaker 3 (07:29):
And you're like, don't don't check the time, don't check it.

Speaker 1 (07:32):
Yes, exactly, it is exactly. And so we regardless of
the setting, and a lot of times sort of regardless
of the age, we just kept seeing the same issue.
And so that's where that became a passion of mine,
was we saw it across you know, ages, We saw
it across settings, and so I really felt like I
needed to go there and learn more about it. And

(07:55):
then one day there was a Desmond to two quote
that I came across that said, as opposed to pulling
people out of the river, why don't we figure out
why they're falling in in the first place. And the
moment I heard it, it just clicked with me, as
sleep is why people are falling in. Whether it's anxiety,
or it's depression, or its productivity issues or its stress management,

(08:19):
all those sort of things, we just see it so
closely tied to sleep. And so that's where sort of
my focus really sort of took.

Speaker 3 (08:27):
Light and you developed the Drift Sleep method, which goes
way beyond typical advice about sleep. And I want to
offer some statistics here to set the table that you
shared with me that I thought were so powerful. Healthcare
costs of individuals with insomnia is eighty five percent higher

(08:49):
than those without on average, those who report poor sleep.
This blew me away. They lose seven point two hours
of productivity per week, and poor and fair sleepers have
a turnover rate of forty nine percent, resulting in thirty
two point four billion dollars in replacement costs for organizations.

(09:12):
So you started a touch upon this, but of course
I want to take a deeper dive. I'd love to
hear your perspective and your approach on the Drift Sleep method.

Speaker 1 (09:25):
So, I mean, those statistics are startling, Oh my gosh, right,
I mean, and nobody talks about it. And you know,
I'm a business owner. I own two businesses, and so
you know, originally when I'm learning about this, it's it's
also how does it affect my businesses? Right? And so
not only you know, do I you know, adore sort

(09:46):
of people and want them to sort of be the
best humans they can be. But also as a business owner,
it's also important to know what the research says about
how to help your people. And so, you know, we
look a lot of times as organizations on the costs
that we're spending, especially in the day and age. Right,
we're looking at, you know, what sort of things you

(10:06):
know we put funding in? What sort of things are
we not putting funding in? And you know, one of
the things that shows up in those statistics is how
do you not focus on this? Right? If you've got
a forty nine percent turnover rate, if every person who's
a poor sleeper loses seven point two hours of productivity
a week, right, and if you're a billable our person,

(10:29):
you know, multiply that by whatever rate it is, right,
And you look, you look at healthcare costs and that
eighty five percent. Right. You think about the diabetes medication,
We think about the blood pressure medications, the sleep medications.
So many things are related to sleep. And so when
I talk to organizations, I'll say, your people are going

(10:50):
to see me one way or the other. You're either
going to see me in my private practice when they're anxious, depressed,
thinking about leaving their work not productive, right, or stressed
out or we sort of catch them ahead of time, right,
And so a lot of sleep now and a lot
of sort of sleep methods and courses talk about the
sort of evening time, right, Like what do you do

(11:11):
at eight pm? Right? So at eight pm, you know,
you turn off your phones and don't drink anything alcoholic
at night and listen. That's great advice, and it's true.
And here's the deal. It doesn't work. Nobody does it right.
Like there's so many things I know work and I
don't do it right. And my friends don't do it,
you know, the people I work with some episode do it.

(11:33):
I mean, it's it's just we have to be human
as well. And so when we're just focusing on sort
of you know, I use analogy of a football game,
and so that fourth quarter is sort of that bedtime routine.
It's incredibly important. So you have to play the fourth
quarter if you're gonna win at the game, right, But
you've got to play the first three quarters. And in

(11:56):
sleep there's a very specific way to do that if
you want to win at sleep. And so so much
of the device now focuses on one things that we know,
we've tried and we're not going to do right, and
so we have to like authentically have conversations about like, okay, well,
then how do we be realistic with what we do?
And then sort of also that idea of how do
we integrate it indoor days? And I think that's where

(12:21):
the driven method is very different, is that would it
be great if we could all, you know, go and
take an hour walk at lunch and would it be
great if we could all wind down at you know,
six o'clock and they'd be phenomenal. There's not a chance
that I don't I can't even do that right. Like
a lot of the businesses I work with, people can't
just leave their their office and go work on sort

(12:44):
of sleep and relaxation and those sort of things. So
one of the things that we talk a lot about
is how do you integrate these tools into your day
so that it builds time into your day, it doesn't
take away time, right, And so that is the key
component is if we can work on those you know
that for those first three quarters seamlessly integrated, you can

(13:04):
be in your meeting actually working on sleep, and you
can be you know, on phone calls where can't sleep.
You can be driving a car, work, can't sleep. It's
an idea of how do we do it in a
realistic way. So I'm a mom of fourteen year old
wins right, there is no way if you were to
say here's the deal at eight o'clock. You know, I
want everybody. I want everybody to just be relaxing, and

(13:26):
I don't. There's not a chance that is going to
work right at all. Right, So that's where we rely
in those first three quarters and helping people really sort
of master that. And yes, we have to sort of
play that first that fourth quarter with that bedtime routine
as well, but man, you've got a whole lot more control.
And nobody talks.

Speaker 3 (13:46):
About it and tell us about the balloon in the
first three quarters because I have taken this technique and
applied it, and I'm here to tell you it works.
It was a profound unlock for me.

Speaker 1 (14:02):
Oh I'm so glad to hear that. And I'm Italian.
I talk with my hands and I'm super visual, and
so when I thought about a sleep baloon, I'm like,
this is exactly what it is. Right. So if you
think about every morning you wake up with like a balloon,
just a deflate a balloon. Whatever. Your job during the

(14:23):
day is to fill that sleepaloon as big and taught
as possible with and I won't get into the morning
sleep chemicals, but you're filling those with sleep chemicals throughout
the day and then you use them at night. It's
the same thing every single day. I don't have to
teach sheep how to do this or kyle Is how

(14:43):
to do this. We all sleep the same. But it's
really understanding how do you fill that sleep baloon? And
that sleep balloon starts first thing in the morning, and
we fill it by using our senses, filling it with
light and really sort of you know, I always do
a visual because I always forget, but it's what do
you hear, what do you see, what do you smell,

(15:05):
what you taste, and what do you touch? Right, as
long as you focus on those five to fill that
sleep baloon during the day, you will win at sleep.
You will win at the fatigue game. You will win
at the sleep game. But we don't talk about it, right,
Like nobody's talking about when did you get life this morning?
Or hey, when you're driving in the car to pick

(15:27):
up your kids for a bus line, just open the
sun roof, right, Like, you don't have to go out
and I'm in Chicago, so we don't get some twenty
four to seven obviously, so but it's that idea. But
I can get sun by making sure that my desk
is positioned by a window. Right. I can make sure
that if I'm in a conference room all day, or

(15:48):
if I'm presenting all day or at a workshop all day,
when I go to take a call, I can step
out of a room and stand by a window and
understand the importance that life plays in it. Right, I
can understand that if I'm running meetings, I'm having mints
at meetings in my boardrooms. Why because I'm stimulating people's
sense of taste while they're just listening to what they're doing.

(16:11):
It's not taking time away from the meeting. We're not
like spending twenty minutes talking about the mints we're eating, right,
But we're adding cinnamon sticks to our teas, We're adding
lemon to our water, all things that we can do
and nobody knows. But what it's doing is it's building
that sleep looom. By stimulating those senses, it makes it

(16:32):
as big and tight as possible. And then you use
that at night and it gets you through the night,
and then the next day you build it up again
and it's the same thing every day.

Speaker 3 (16:42):
It's brilliant. It's brilliant, and it's so doable. Yes, if
you start to have a different relationship with it, is
it's an all day thing. It's not oh my god,
I gotta go to bed in fifteen minutes. I'm on
my phone and the other thing that I'm noticing And
I'm guilty of this too, but very often from a
business perspective, you kind of get into this habit of

(17:07):
like how much can I do on how little sleep?
And it's almost like you become like a warrior. Oh well, yeah,
I only got three hours sleep, or I had to
fly here, I was out with clients till this time.
And so it's become an acceptable arrangement that we have
with that's not the priority. The priority is the business deal,
the getting to the end of the quarter or or

(17:29):
dealing with something. And hey, that's the high price, especially
in the space that I play in with executives, that's
the price you pay is that you may get less
personal time, but you're the expense. So how does that
show itself in a lot of the work that you're doing,
whether one on one or with organizations, and what are
you offering as a remedy to that so we can

(17:52):
change that behavior.

Speaker 1 (17:55):
Well, the good news is that it's starting to become
a conversation again, right. I think the day of you know,
I'll sleep when I'm dead, it doesn't play well anymore
in today's age. It really doesn't, right. And so you know,
if you look at performance, if you look at athletes,
if you look at if you watch any part of
Olympics or any professional athletes all across the world, they

(18:18):
have sleep coaches. They will talk about their sleep, they
will talk about how they do not And these are
the people who are meant to be the highest performers
in the world. And so I tell people, if you
think that you are performing higher than an Olympic athlete
and that by you not doing what they're doing is
more helpful than what they're doing, right, it's just not

(18:39):
the case. Right. They prioritize sleep why because they are
more productive and they perform better and there are less
errors and all the things that they do in their world.
In a business world, it applies the exact same to us.
We perform better, there's less mistakes, right, we feel better.

(18:59):
But it's it's a strategy. And I think so often
we think about sleep as like wellness, right, and people
you know sometimes are like, nah, you know, it's wellness.
It's a strategy. It's a business strategy. Right. So if
you know, I talk to people about you know, we'll
look at budgets sometimes and we'll look at how much
they're spending on certain things. And you know, we look

(19:20):
at training, huge thing, absolutely necessary, right and so, and
people don't balk at it certain types of training. It's like, well,
we have to train them on our systems, we have
to train them on our culture, we have to train
them on performing all those things apps and I agree,
And so I use the analogy of a car. So
if I'm driving a car and I'm sleep deprived in

(19:42):
any way, and I'm sure many people can relate to this, right,
and I go to press the break, I'm I'm slower
at pressing the brake because I'm compromised. So I don't
press the brake as quickly as I need to when
I'm sleepy or when I'm tired. I don't need more
training on how to drive a car. I know exactly

(20:03):
how to drive a car. You can put in fifteen
hours of remediation on how to drive a car when
I am rested, I could drive that car all day
long and you will not see issues in my performance.
And so what we're trying to do is we're trying
to like train people out of sleep issues and they're compromised.
And so all of the training you do as an

(20:24):
organization or a business, if these individuals are already sleep compromised,
they won't retain and they won't be able to act
on what you're training them on. And whether it's client relations,
whether it's a new system you're putting in place, an
operating system, it doesn't matter. They don't need more training
on that. They need to really sort of have a clear,

(20:45):
uncompromised brain to be able to absorb it and then
use it right right.

Speaker 3 (20:51):
You know, I'd love for you to expand upon other
things you're seeing in your work. I mean, there's got
to be trends and patterns, and obviously you know the
state of the world. It's hard. It's hard to be,
it's hard to be in life these days. And I'm
so curious to hear what what are you noticing. Are
there Are there any kind of patterns or a has

(21:12):
you're picking up that you think would be really powerful
for us to hear and understand.

Speaker 1 (21:18):
Yeah, I think in the business culture nowadays and with people,
people are not settling anymore for people not caring about
how they're doing in life. They're just not okay with
that as much anymore. I think, you know, before it
used to be more like, you know, produce, produce, produce, produce, produce.
We don't care when you go to sleep, I don't

(21:40):
care when you wake up. We don't care how you're doing.
And we're finding that people leave positions like that that's
that's not what they're looking for. And so we're just
seeing trends where people really want to feel understood, people
want to feel cared for, right, and so you know,
when it comes to you know, one of the things
that we find over again is that when people feel

(22:02):
like they can they have goals and that they're achieving
goals and those sort of things, we find them wanting
to stay places longer, right that they're working towards something,
that they're meeting goals, and you have a thirty percent
higher chance of reaching goals when you sleep. And so
it's it's this pattern of when we see people leaving

(22:23):
organizations and leaving companies because they're not feeling valued right,
or they're being pushed in a way. And you know,
the thing that I think is so important is you
got to walk the walk. And you and I talked
about this a little bit before, just in terms of
walking the walk. Right. So you know, if you're somebody
who says, hey, I care about your goals, I want
you to be more productive, you know, I want you

(22:46):
to perform, I want you to be better, and I
send you an email at two am, I'm not walking
the walk as the leader of the organization or the business. Right.
What I'm basically saying is that this is a lip service. Right,
I'm going to teach you this. I'm not going to
do it though, right, right, right. And so some of
the trends we're now seeing too, which is good, is

(23:07):
that leaders in these businesses are starting to see I've
got to start walking the walk, right. And so whether
it's they're delaying those emails so that they don't come
out until later, or if they're sending a message right,
they're scheduling it so that it's you know, sent at
a certain time. We're really sort of seeing a lot
of these organizations that are gaining competitive edges are doing

(23:28):
it by how they're sort of you know, walking the
walk with their people.

Speaker 3 (23:34):
Are there common misconceptions that people have between sleep and
mental health? Is there are there things that you're you're
detangling for people to say, no, here's what it is.

Speaker 1 (23:49):
Yeah. So sometimes what you know we'll get is you know, oh,
I'm a good sleeper, right, or you know it's fine,
and we know now the statistics now we're two out
of three Americans are struggling with sleep. Right. So I
always say, you're literally one human away from a poor sleeper.
So even though you may be a great sleeper, right,

(24:12):
your spouse may not be, your children may not be,
your friends may not be. And I cannot tell you
when I go to these do these workshops and these conferences,
the amount of inurls individuals who come up to me
and say, I'm a good sleeper, but my wife right,
or you know, I'm a horrible sleeper and you know

(24:32):
it drives my spouse baddy, you know, or man, I
can put my head on the pillow and you know
it's just you know, everybody has a sleep story, right,
and so sort of this misconception is it doesn't affect me,
or it's not in my world, and it is everywhere.
It is everywhere, and when we don't prioritize it, when

(24:52):
we don't look at it, or when we think that
sleep starts at eight pm. To me, that's the biggest misconception.
It doesn't start at APM. It starts the moment you
open your eyes and understanding when you need to be
opening your eyes and when you open your eyes, what
do you need to be doing when you open your eyes?
And so that conception of I'm just sort of helpless
to sleep, right, there's nothing I can do about it.

(25:14):
You know, I haven't slept for well for twenty years,
just that powerlessness misconception or my brain runs at night
and I can't stop it. Just those misconceptions of powerlessness
when it comes to sleep, that's what I see more so.
And the truth is that people have so much power
about with their sleep and with their fatigue. If they

(25:36):
start sort of understanding.

Speaker 3 (25:37):
This, Yeah, well, I'd love to tease that out a
bit more. Because we talked about the balloon idea. What
are there strategies, hacks, best practices that you can offer us.
Everybody get their pen and paper out. I'd love for
you to just riff, like, what what do you think
some of the best strategies are.

Speaker 1 (25:58):
So if people remember nothing from this, which I hope
that's not the case, but if they remember nothing, I
want them to remember the importance of light. Light, light, light,
light light. If people are listening, write it down underline
a highlighted circle it, scream it, tattoo it. I don't
care what you do with it. But the importance of
light is because there is a part of our brain

(26:19):
that one of its main functions is just sort of
sensing that if you think about us before phones, before lights,
or like we've slept since humans, right, it's a human thing, right,
And so we are schedules and our bodies. We have
two systems at play. So we have a circadian rhythm

(26:41):
clock and that's a twenty four hour ish system that
we all have. We don't get more, even though we
might want it. And that works on things like routines
and sunlight, and that works on timing of meals and
all those sort of things. The other system we have
is that sleep driver system. And that's the sleep mom right,
that's the one that we're creating the sleep pressure to

(27:03):
help you fall asleep. And one of the things that
starts at balloon off is light. So the moment you
wake up, for you to make sure you open those
blinds and make sure you are getting sunlight in is huge.
And as you're going through your day, really check in
with yourself and say, like, so, I have a water

(27:23):
bottle over here, I make sure it's really cold. Why
it's a simple strategy, But right when I touch it,
not only is a stimulating taste because it's colder and
I add LeMond to it, but it's also tangible. I
can feel the cold, right, So I'm stimulating my sense
of touch and my sense of taste at the same time.
And I'm doing that while I'm giving presentations. People do

(27:46):
it at board meetings. They can do it during meetings. Right.
You don't have to stop and be like, hold on
one minute, I am going to drink this, which is
a part of my sleep shirt. Right, Just drink your drink, right,
Like add a cinnamon stick to your tea, right, drink
those mints. I always have things like around me. I
have unburned candles because they tend to smell better. I
think my kids took my other candle. But I always

(28:07):
have stuff like that. I have lotion that smells right
and why so that during the day, I can be
on a call doing this or a podcast putting lotion
on my hands. Nobody would know. I can smell it,
I can feel it. It's building that slee balloon. So
we can do things all day long. Right. We can
look at sort of watching what we're eating and what

(28:29):
we're drinking throughout the day. We can look at sort
of that timing of sunlight, which is key. Right. We
want to get as much sunlight as we can because
that's sort of the that's the big booster for that balloon.
And we just really want to focus on anything sensory.
There's no right or wrong when it comes to sensory.
So if you want to you know, if you have
a meeting, if you're on a phone call and you

(28:51):
want to go outside, great, go outside and don't put
choose on. Feel the grass under your feet right stand there,
take the call. But since you wise, you're building that
sleep alone, but you're integrating it into your day. You're
doing you're not taking time away from the responsibilities that
you have.

Speaker 3 (29:10):
How does alcohol play in It's a great.

Speaker 1 (29:13):
Question, that's like, that's the that's the one of the
most kind of questions.

Speaker 3 (29:17):
Or like, hey, can I still have my wine?

Speaker 1 (29:20):
Yeah? Right, a hundred present. So okay. So the deal
is we know that alcohol it's got you know, about
an eight ish or so our half life, right, Like,
it stays in our system, you know, for it can
stay in our system for a little bit. So the
problem we have is the earlier we drink it, the better. Right.
So what it'll do is it can put us to

(29:44):
sleep well, but we don't see those after effects of alcohol,
which is when it's still in our system after a
few hours. It can really affect our rem sleep and
our deep sleeps, and that's where we get the restorative sleep.
So people think, why drink in it? Next me. Yeah,
but we don't think about the idea of how long
it can stay in our system, and that sort of

(30:04):
metabolism can different can differ for different people, right, But
when it comes to alcohol, I always just encourage people.
I don't want to say day drink because that doesn't
sound right, but right like too close to bedtime, and
it's really going to mess with those restorative stages of sleep. Now,
the other thing I know is that people are gonna drink, right,
like any sort of executive retreat, right if you if

(30:29):
you know, I can give this, and then sure enough,
six o'clock is happy hour, right like you know that
it's you know, eight o'clock is dinner and wine. Right,
you know I'm still people. You also have to live
life with these sleep strategies, right, so you know, have
a glass of wine, right, have your beer if you're
you know, doing your thing. If we don't have to
do it every day, that's going to help our sleep.

(30:51):
But don't catastrophize it, right, So go out live your life.
Have the glass of wine. No, it's probably going to
throw off your sleep, right. But the good news is
the very next day you get the same sleep balloon. Right,
So don't get in your own way, right, don't compensate
for last night's poor sleep or drinking by messing up

(31:12):
today's sleep balloon. So just get back on track, get
the sunlight, get up, get moving. But we tend to
get in our own way with it, and then really
sort of mess up today's sleep balloon because of yesterday's
sleep baloon.

Speaker 3 (31:27):
I would love for you to share with us some
success stories of either people organizations that you've worked with.
I'd love to hear how this is really coming to life.

Speaker 1 (31:39):
Yeah, that's a great question. That's my favorites. Oh. I
adore the follow up responses. I get where people used
the language of their sleep baloon, like just like when
you said right, like it's a common language. And when
people email me and say, here's the deal, I moved

(32:01):
my desk. I have a large CEO of a very
big company, and he and I were talking the other
day and I said, you need to move your desk right. Like,
I'm like, where's the window. I don't even see a window,
Like we've been working again, where's the window? Right? And
he was like, oh, it's over there. I was like, great,
step one, right, move your desk towards your window, right,
And so he did, right, and he's like, well, I

(32:22):
never thought of moving my desk right. And so after
that he's like, oh my gosh, right, like I noticed
my sleep balloon filling up right, I'm no longer you know,
it's tired or fatigued. Those sort of things. Right, When
when people make those little changes I'll have parents at
bus line right and they'll contact me and say, oh
my gosh, I just told my mom's group right to

(32:45):
open your sun roofs right when you're driving and just
get the sunlight in. And so we see when people
do this, we see heightened productivity, we see less fatigue,
we see people performing better in terms of less errors,
and relationally, we also see people performing better meaning we're

(33:06):
just not as crabby, you know, Like you know, one
of our taglines is better sleep, better humans, period. So
I am such a better mom and wayless crabby when
when I sleep better. And so it's also relational in
any of your companies, right, if you're trying to build
relationships with customers or with your team, we want them

(33:28):
to be more successful relationally. And we've seen over and
over again sort of the success that when you sleep better,
your relationships are better, you're able to communicate better.

Speaker 3 (33:39):
I am curious what about jet lag? Right, So I'm
traveling to the UK next week, and you know, I
have a philosophy on things that I do, But how
do you have a sleep balloon in that environment where
you know you're going to be crossing over time zones
and your body's going to be taxed in a different way.
What what are some things that we could do to

(34:00):
to get ready for that, or even how you deal
with it in the moment.

Speaker 1 (34:04):
Yeah, no, that's a good question. So the keep in
mind that that's sleep baloon. Wherever you travel is still
your sleep loom, right, Like we don't lose it when
we get on a plane, right, And the how you
feel it is the exact same regardless of where you're at. Right.
Where jet lag becomes an issue is when we talked
about those two systems before, that circadian rhythm and that

(34:24):
sleep driver system. When you fly, you really mess up
that circadian rhythm system that's used to Wait a minute,
it's supposed to be this time, right, Like this doesn't
feel right. It's supposed to be six pm. Why is
it super bright outside? Right? Or wait a minute, right,
it's supposed to be nine at night, you know, and

(34:47):
so why aren't we going to bed yet? Or why?
So it's really when it comes to that jet lag
two things. It's one about understanding just the hit you're
going to take. It's normal, right, it's natural. So we
have to understand we have a sleep balloon. We feel
it the same way regardless of where we're at. Like

(35:07):
I said before, that light idea is is so critical.
So you're better off timing light where you're going. Meaning
if you, let's say, get off a plane at let's
say you've you've flown throughout the night and that's let's
say eleven am when you get there, and that should

(35:27):
be bedtime for you. But it's eleven am there, you
want to start adapting to their light, meaning stay up
as long as you can to get that light. Because
that light, we'll start training that system of like, Okay,
there's something weird going on, right, Like we may have
a whole new time zone going on. So the more
that we can sort of sink their light with our

(35:50):
circadian rhythm, the better. But it takes a little bit, right,
I'm a huge fan to of being mindful of you
brought up alcohol right when your body's trying to figure
out where it's at. Right, if we can hold on
the alcohol for a minute just to give it a chance, right,
just to be like, okay, let's try to adjust first.
So I'm much more of a fan of doing things
like water and really hydrating to start sort of getting

(36:13):
your body as aware as it can be of like
something's different here, and then you go straight back to
filling the sleep aloon. Right if it's day If it's
daytime out in the UK, how am I filling my
sleep baloo in the UK? Right? If it's getting dark
in the UK? What am I doing to help build
that bedtime routine? I should be shutting down a little

(36:34):
bit more. I should be turning off some of the lights.
So we just want to start adapting to sort of
the new light dark dark cycle wherever it is we're going.

Speaker 3 (36:43):
I love that. That's really good, very helpful.

Speaker 1 (36:47):
Good.

Speaker 3 (36:47):
What do you think about all the products and services
geared towards sleep, like watches, rings, apps, bedtime stories, supplements,
Like how do they all fit from your perspective?

Speaker 1 (36:58):
That's a great question. This is one of the parts
where I get a little flat because I don't necessarily
agree with some of the trends. So we're seeing now
you know, the aura rings, the you know, the fitbits,
all those sort of things. We're actually seeing technology built
into beds right that monitor sleep and monitor you know,
reum and those sort of things. We have to keep

(37:21):
in mind that they are not as accurate as the
people selling them want you to think they are. They're
just not right. Like when we hook people up to
do sleep studies, right, we're hooking up their brain waves.
We can see everything based on sort of brainwaves and
those sort of things. A lot of times some of
these things are looking at right movement, they're looking at breathing,

(37:43):
they're looking at things that we can actually shift. I
can be awake and you can have somebody in a
very heavily meditated state who's awake, who can appear a
sleep and they're not right. And so you know, I
just I caution people with the idea of you know,
sometimes the data is not as accurate as we think.
The other thing that we're seeing is something called orthosomnia
in our field. And so what orthosomnia is now is

(38:07):
it's an anxiety around basically perfect sleep scores. So now
we've created an issue where we're already anxious that we're
not sleeping. So now we have these devices and we're
not registering perfect sleep scores or we don't feel like
we're in ram enough or stages or whatever, and now
we're anxious about a score, and so we're seeing people

(38:29):
sleep worse now sometimes with these devices because they're not
using it for data purposes, right, Like, if you want
to use it to help you build that sleep baloon,
I'm a fan. Right If it's going to help you
stay on structure in terms of when I go to sleep,
when I wake up, for the reminders on hydration or

(38:50):
movement or any of those sort of things that are
built into that, I'm a huge fan. I think it's
super helpful when we're using it to compare our number
with our friends' numbers or you know, our face group,
you know numbers. That's where I'm not a fan, because
now we just have anxiety around it, and it's it's

(39:11):
it's the bane of my existence right now, because I
just know, you know, people are like, well I only
got this score, and I'm like, but how did you feel?
And they're like, well, I thought I felt good, but
then I woke up in my sleep score. And we're
outsourcing how we feel now to electronics versus waking up
and being like I feel good and being like, okay,

(39:32):
well what do I do to build my sleep baloon today?
So I would much rather have that be the focus
than if we think we didn't get enough rem or
we think we didn't get enough that there's just very
limited control you have in that. And so I really
encourage people shift back to those first three quarters and
really focus on that sleep baloon and use that data

(39:53):
right to help you focus on those first three quarters.

Speaker 3 (39:57):
Thank you for saying that, because I I got rid
of a watch that I was wearing because I would
it would judge and evaluate the success of my day
based on that score I would get, and then I
would try to gamify it. What did I do? I
was trying to replicate it. Oh well, I did really
well here, and I was like, this is completely out
of control, and you were right. I was outsourcing it

(40:21):
and everything kept coming back to heart rate, you know.
Oh oh am my anxious says, I'm anxious. Why are
I not failing? Anxious? Like you know, all of a sudden
again in my head, I'm like, this is not good
for me. But I do know a lot of people
who love it, live by it, can't wait to turn
their watch on before that workout starts. That's great, good
for you. It doesn't. It doesn't work for me, and

(40:43):
so I appreciate your perspective. One of my favorite challenges,
and that's a total reframe. By the way, my favorite
challenges would sleep worrying. I am Olympic level warrier and
my brain is so good worrying and catastrophizing. You actually
have a great expression. You call it constructive worrying time,

(41:07):
I'd love for you to say more.

Speaker 1 (41:09):
Yeah, like I said before, then, one of the main
things that I see is the thinking at night. Right,
we go to sleep and we just can't turn our
minds up. And sometimes it's not even anxiety based. Sometimes
it's just the to do list or things I have
to do tomorrow or but either way, it's that mind
still working. Right, our body lays down and our brain
still is going. And so constructive worry is basically like pregaming,

(41:34):
way less fun. But it's like pregaming if you will,
with your brain. So it's like, let me worry about
it before, let me think about it before. So two
hours before bedtime, sit down, take a piece of paper,
your phone. I don't care how you do. Whatever you've
got right, it could be a post it. And what
you do is you sort of identify what do I
think is going to be in my brain tomorrow right

(41:57):
or tonight? And it can usually we know right either
something that's been there for a while, right, and we
know it's going to show up again that night, or
something new that's popped up during the day that you
know is unsettled or you think about it. Or for example,
my kids have their dentist appointment, you know today. I
know that that was going to be in my mind

(42:17):
unless I figured out when I had to end work
to get to their school, right, And so I didn't
want to figure out any of that how to adjust
my day during a bedtime routine or when I was
in bed at night. So two hours before bedtime, I
sat down, I wrote down when I had to be there,
how far the place was from their school, and when
I had to leave. And then that thought showed up

(42:41):
at night and it said, hey, tomorrow the kids have
a dentist. And I was able to say, I know,
but I've already I've already planned for it. And then
your brand's like, oh, okay, good, you got it, and
it's like, okay, got right. So that sort of constructive
worry is be constructive with what you're thinking about, right.
You don't have to solve it, but come up with
like the next three steps. Right. So if let's say

(43:01):
you're worried about an upcoming meeting, right, then write that
down worried about upcoming meeting. The next three steps You're
not going to solve it. You're not going to go
into the meeting, right, But maybe the next three steps are,
you know, tomorrow, I'm going to pull notes from the
last meeting we had, and maybe the second one is,
you know, I'm going to consult with my colleague because

(43:22):
they seem to have some good ideas on what we
might be discussing. And maybe it's also I'm going to
practice that debreathing that I learned about, because I think
I need to do more dep breathing during my day
because this meeting is really wrising me up. So that
constructive worry is do it before bedtime, and just give
yourself three next steps so that when you go to

(43:43):
bed at night, if your brain brings it back up,
which it usually will, you can say like, hey, we've
already thought about it, and then that will help you
sort of drift to sleep.

Speaker 3 (43:53):
I'm going to add one additional technique. I didn't come
up with this. Somebody taught this to me, and this
is so so effective. So when that worrying brain comes up.
This happened to me last night, is I have a
conversation with I'll just say my higher self. And sometimes
it's like people that have passed away, and I will say, hey, listen,
this is on my mind, and sometimes I say it
out loud, this is on my mind. I need you
to take this off of my mind and then and

(44:16):
I'm sure You're going to process and work through a
solution while I'm asleep, And then i'm I'm I'm a
completely a tuned listening audience when I get up in
the morning, but I need you to take this off
of me and solve for it while I'm here. And
what I will notice is that, let's say I wake
up in the middle of the night and that's happening again.
I will hear those voices and they say, you gave

(44:37):
that to me. Why are you problem solving this? I
got this. You actually asked me to take this off
of your plate. And so I keep reinforcing it, and
it really does work. I love that, and it's and
again you just say, I'm a receptive audience, but it's
in the morning after I've already worked through it. And

(44:58):
a lot of times what happened is with the constructive worrying,
but also through this technique, a resolution will present itself
or you start to just feel better where you're like
it's okay, I can handle whatever's thrown at me.

Speaker 1 (45:12):
Yes, just love that technique. Thank you for sharing that.
That's a phenomenon. That's a phenomenal technique. Thank you and
so and so true. And I think the other component too,
that becomes we don't typically do our best work at night, right,
So to your point, right, like, it is so much
better to give it away at night than to think
whatever you're about to come up with when you're sleep

(45:34):
deprived at night is the solution, right, Like fresh eyes,
you know, fresh hearts, fresh minds tend to be the
best time to make decisions rather than exhausted.

Speaker 3 (45:46):
Yeah, and don't let that part of yourself say, well
maybe if you get up now. Yeah, I know it's
only two thirty. Just start your day now, because we've
all had those moments where you're like, that's crazy.

Speaker 1 (45:56):
Yes.

Speaker 3 (45:56):
So I doctor Limpia, I have one funnel question for you.
This has been such an incredible conversation. I literally have
a full page of notes.

Speaker 1 (46:07):
What do you.

Speaker 3 (46:07):
See as the future of sleep science? And how do
you want to play in.

Speaker 1 (46:13):
So I don't think we're getting away from electronics. I
don't think we're getting away from AI. So I think
that will be a component of sleep in the future.
And my hope to that is that as we're using these,
we're using them for good rather than evil, right, Like,
we're using these in a way that is giving us

(46:35):
the data for those first three quarters, right, because I
think we are very focused right now on AI and
electronics and those sort of things, and so I don't
think it's going away. But my hope is that we
start using it correctly and the way that helps us
sleep rather than hurts our sleep. And we really have
to figure out, you know, if when we're on our

(46:58):
phones at night, helping people understand that when we're scrolling,
when we're looking right, and that's what a lot of
people get into, is these just constant dopamine hits, right,
And so when we're talking about sort of anything related
to the sleep or the future of sleep, people have
to understand that right when we're constantly getting these dopamine
hits to our brain and all day long, we need

(47:20):
this sort of immediate gratification when you go to sleep.
It's really boring to be honest, right, like your brain's like, well, now,
like I'm not scrolling, I'm not looking at anything, and
so then it stays up trying to make connections and
trying to do those things. So that future sleep science
also has to include the understanding of slowing our brain

(47:42):
down during the day as well, when we're able and
just to take a few minutes so that the first
time we're doing that isn't when we put our head
on the pillow at night, because it's just not going
to work. And even if we lay down and I
tell people, don't even use the word sleep, just tell
yourself you're going to rest, you know, take it out,
you know, take it out of the equation and take

(48:03):
the pressure off of it. Because I think that has
to be a conversation as well, is just sort of decatastrophizing,
depressuring sleep and sort of the structure of it and
what stage am I in? And you know, the less
control sometimes we have over it, the better. So I
think that's an important conversation. And I think businesses and

(48:24):
I think organizations really have to understand that, you know,
they have a lot of people right that they are
responsible for and I do believe that it's it's we're
seeing it in a lot of companies organizations where they
are taking this on, where they are learning how to

(48:45):
sort of adapt it into their day and adapt it
into their meanings. Because I think people are really starting
to see now that you can't have a successful business
without addressing it. And so I do think that that
is going to show up. And I think then we
get to take it home to our kids, right, And
so you know, my hope for the future of sleep
science too is that it's not just an adult conversation, right,

(49:07):
this is a kid conversation, right, And so my kids,
I mean, they'll use it against me sometimes, like my
sleep I'm that ful, Like I think I need a
few extra hours that you know, and you're like, good
try that's sconda word, right. But the fact that kids
can talk about it, think that you know, kids understand
how did they set themselves up for better sleep? Right?
Once they understand that sleep bloon idea for them as well,

(49:30):
it's this, it's very similar and once they do that,
you know, breaking away from some of those electronics and
some of those games and getting some of that sunlight
stimulating their senses. We need to do that more, not
only sort of for our future, but to teach our
kids how to do that too.

Speaker 3 (49:47):
Yeah. I love that, and I'm so grateful that you're
doing this work in the world, and it's such an
important thing. I mean, it's it's it's sort of mission
critical and it's again particularly something that is of importance
right now in the world. And I feel so so
grateful that you took the time to be with me,

(50:08):
and I just can't wait to see what happens from
all this wonderful work that you're doing.

Speaker 1 (50:13):
Oh, thank you, and thank you for having the conversation
about it. I think the more people that have conversations
that are invested in somebody's sort of fullness, whether it's
their sort of emotional health, psychological health, spiritual health, that's
how we get to people. That's how we create better leaders,
that's how we create better humans. So I just appreciate
you being open to this conversation.

Speaker 3 (50:34):
Yea to better humans are human. Thank you for joining
me for another episode of the Warriors at Work Show.
If you are interested in learning more about what we
do at the Warriors at Work Show and platform, be
sure to go over to my website Jeanie Kober, and
subscribe to my monthly Warrior Playbook newsletter. I share everything

(50:58):
that I'm up to month by money, as well as
some lessons and insights that I've learned. I'm also interested
in hearing any feedback you have about this conversation or
future topics, so reach out to me directly on JC
at geniecoomber dot com or on LinkedIn. Be sure to
tell your friends and your colleagues about this Warriors at

(51:19):
Work conversation. Subscribe, review and rate us. It's the best
way to get this message out into the world.

Speaker 1 (51:27):
Be well,