26th January – Daytime Sunshine
☀️Get some daytime sunshine. Exposure to natural light in the daytime, especially in the morning, can help improve sleep. Exposure to light signals the brain to reduce and stop producing melatonin, which is the hormone that makes us sleepy. The less melatonin in our system, the more awake we are. Normally, as the day progresses into evening, melatonin levels build up and make us feel ready for sleep. 🌤Getting bright light in the morning helps drive melatonin levels right down, and helps keep the sleep-wake cycle going. ☁️Even on a cloudy day, natural light is over 10times brighter than even the brightest indoor lighting. 🌥When we don’t get enough bright…
- 30 Days of Healthy Living, Lifestyle Medicine, Living Lifestyle Medicine, Mental Health, Mindfulness, Stress Reduction
25th January – Do something you enjoy
Do something you enjoy. Just because. De-stressing, relaxing, chilling out… it sounds like it should be so easy, doesn’t it? Just do… well, nothing, right? But ‘just relaxing’ is not as easy as it sounds for some people. I am definitely not very good at doing nothing. And, ironically, the more stressed you are (and therefore more in need of relaxing) the harder it is to settle and turn off. This is because when we are stressed our brains are busy churning out lots of stress hormones, like cortisol and adrenaline for example. These stress hormones put our bodies into “fight or flight” mode so we are revved up, jittery,…
24th January – Time Restricted Eating
⏰What is time-restricted eating (TRE)? Time restricted eating means eating only between certain times of the day, which is your “eating window”. There are lots of similarities with Intermittent Fasting, and the two terms are often used synonymously. How does it work? The physiology of eating is very complex, but in very simple terms our body is either in a “fed” state, where food is coming in, insulin levels are high, and excess energy coming in is stored. Or a “fasted” state, where the body uses previously stored energy to run. By having healthy balance between the ‘fed’ and ‘fasted’ states, our metabolism works more efficiently and healthily. TRE has…
