[MUSIC PLAYING]
JOE: Thank you,
everybody, for coming.
It is my pleasure to
introduce Dr. Michael J Breus.
He and I met now
about six months ago--
MICHAEL BREUS: Yeah, I know.
JOE: --at Health 2.0.
And he, more than
anybody I've ever met,
is a charismatic evangelist
for the power of sleep.
And he is able to bridge the
divide between technology,
industry, academia more
seamlessly than anybody
I've met.
And that's why he's helping
us set up this Sleep Week.
He's been responsible
for many of the ideas
around evangelizing--
that our team has around
evangelizing sleep at Google.
And I'm-- we'll give it off to
him so that he can talk to you.
MICHAEL BREUS: Perfect.
Thank you so much, Joe.
I appreciate it.
All right.
So how's everybody doing today?
AUDIENCE: Good.
AUDIENCE: Pretty good.
MICHAEL BREUS: Who
in the audience
got a fantastic night of sleep
last night, got as much sleep
as they could possibly
want, and have woken up
feeling completely
energized and ready to go?
One person.
Two, three people
out of several.
OK, so we know that sleep
is a big deal, especially
at a place like Google.
So that's what I'm
here to talk about.
But you know, if
you've been watching
during the week--
and first of all,
thank you everybody for
participating in Sleep Week.
It's been pretty amazing.
We've had some incredible,
incredible speakers--
Smith Johnson, flight
surgeon for NASA, Fred Maxik,
one of the preeminent
leaders-- over 400
patents in the lighting
industry, so light and sleep
and how do those kind
of work together.
We've also been very
fortunate to have
sponsorships through Sleep
Score and through Sleepio.
So we've had some
really great opportunity
for people to see
new technology,
check it out, have a
lot of fun with it.
So today, I'm going to
talk about something
that's a little bit different.
I'm going to talk to
you about something
called circadian rhythms,
and what do they mean--
Joe's favorite word, circadian--
and what can we learn from them
to be able to help
us not only be
able to sleep better at night,
but in our daily living.
And so my newest book is
called "The Power of When,"
and it looks at a couple
of different things.
But before I start,
I thought what
I would do is really
talk to you about what
is sleep and sort
of how does it work
to give you kind of the basic
parameters from which to work.
So this slide looks a
little bit complicated,
but it's really not.
So it turns out that there
are two distinct systems
in the brain for sleep.
One of them is a drive,
kind of like hunger.
So I'm hungry.
I'm hungry.
I'm hungry.
I eat something, and that
hunger begins to dissipate.
The same holds true with sleep.
What we find is that there's
something in our brain
that makes us
sleepier and sleepier,
and it's called adenosine.
Adenosine is actually
a byproduct of cells,
so when a cell eats
a piece of glucose,
something comes
out the back end.
Part of what comes out
the back end is adenosine,
and adenosine works its way
through the bloodstream,
gets into the brain, and it
goes to a very specific receptor
site specifically for adenosine.
And as that builds
up, we get sleepier
and sleepier and sleepier.
Now why all this talk
about neurochemistry?
Well, it turns out that if you
look at the molecular structure
of adenosine, and you look
at the molecular structure
of caffeine, they're
off by one molecule.
Right?
So here's what happens is
when you're getting tired,
and you're putting down the
coffee or the energy drinks
or what have you,
that actually goes,
and it fits really nicely
into that receptor site,
and it blocks the adenosine.
But then once your brain
burns through the caffeine,
the adenosine comes
flooding in, and that's
where you get that
caffeine crash,
because it's all that adenosine
and that's actually now made
its way through the floodgates.
So that's sleep drive.
We want adenosine to raise
at a very consistent level,
get to a certain point.
Usually, around 10:30,
11:00 o'clock at night,
it kind of reaches
its max, and that's
when most people fall asleep.
But that's not the
only aspect of sleep.
There's also a circadian rhythm.
So the circadian
rhythm is a lot--
it's really your
biological clock.
And what I mean by that is
kind of like with hunger
as well, so you ever
notice how you get hungry
with breakfast, lunch, and
dinner about the same time?
So the same holds
true with sleep
is you have this
circadian system,
and this actually makes
you want to get sleepier
at particular times
irrespective of adenosine.
So how many people in
here, by a raise of hands,
have ever had the situation,
where you're exhausted?
You are absolutely dog tired.
You've had the worst,
horrible, crazy day,
and you're physically-- all
you can do is crawl into bed.
And you get into bed,
let's say, at 8 o'clock
at night, because you're
just so exhausted.
How many people
in here have ever
had that situation
occur for them?
OK, literally
everybody in the room.
Now let me ask you this.
Do you fall asleep?
Almost never.
Your brain just starts going
and going and going and going.
That's a situation where your
adenosine is very, very high,
but your circadian
rhythm is off,
because you went
to bed too early.
One of the number one things
that my insomnia patients do
is go to bed too
early, which sounds
completely counterintuitive.
Like if I've got
insomnia, and I'm tired,
maybe I can get in bed
and catch up on my sleep.
It doesn't really work that way.
Same holds true for
the drive situation.
So how many people in here
have had a nice, big dinner,
and they've sat
down on the couch
just because they were
watching a little TV,
and before they knew it, they
were out for about an hour,
took an unscheduled nap?
Then when you go back and go
to bed at your normal bed time,
what happens?
You can't sleep, because
you've actually reduced
sleep drive at that time.
Your circadian rhythm
is ready to sleep,
but your drive is
down, because you
got rid of some of that
adenosine during your nap.
So we've all had
both of these systems
kind of go a little
kooky for us,
and so the goal here is
to be able to get people
to understand the drive,
understand the rhythm,
and when those two are in
balance, that's when we sleep.
So it turns out that all of our
hormones lead a circadian life.
So what is circadian?
It's a 24-hour cycle, but
yet every hormone in our body
is very, very predictable.
So if you look here on
the slides, you can see,
for example, cortisol follows
a very predictable schedule.
So does adrenaline,
and so does melatonin.
Kind of interesting-- melatonin
is almost the exact opposite
of cortisol.
But it actually
corresponds very well
with core body temperature.
So as core body
temperature lowers,
we see melatonin rising.
These are very, very predictable
situations in the body.
So why is that
important, and how can we
use that to leverage
it for ourselves?
Well, has anybody in here
ever been called an early bird
before?
Like to get up really
early, 5:30, 6 o'clock?
OK.
How about night owls?
I'm actually the night
owl side of things.
So interesting.
Yeah, I know you are too.
So it's interesting when you
start to think about that idea.
So when you think about an
early bird or a night owl,
if we actually looked
at their melatonin,
it actually falls under
the same wave form--
however, at different times.
So if we look here,
and we see the red,
that's an early
bird, and the blue--
that's a night owl.
It turns out that even though
they have the same melatonin
curve, they're happening
at very different times
in their own
24-hour cycle, which
is very, very interesting when
you start to think about it.
So Michael, you're telling
me that if I'm a night owl,
and I wake up at 7 o'clock,
6:30 in the morning,
what's going on?
My melatonin faucet is
still running, running,
running, whereas if I'm
an early bird, it's not.
So this is why, for all of you
people who are night owls--
raise your hand again
if you're a night owl.
This is why mornings suck.
Bottom line.
There's nothing fun
about getting up
in the mornings for you
people because of this.
Your melatonin is
actually still going.
It's still moving
in that direction,
and that's where that
morning fog is coming from,
whereas for all of
you early birds,
mornings are a breeze for you.
However, doing
stuff late at night
doesn't always work out so well.
So what I did was I
created a quiz for people
to be able to tell,
because by the way,
there aren't just two of these
what we call chronotypes.
So first of all, has
everybody in here gotten
an opportunity to take the quiz?
No?
OK, so if you
haven't-- you have, OK.
So if you haven't had a
chance to take the quiz,
go to thepowerofwhenquiz.com,
and it's available right now.
You go on there, and it takes
like literally two minutes
to do it.
And then you'll be able to
learn what your chronotype is.
And I'm going to go through all
of the different chronotypes
right now.
But the quiz is a
little weird, because it
doesn't take into-- it doesn't
ask you some of the questions
that you might imagine.
So it takes into account
things like personality.
For example, there are
certain chronotypes
that are more introverted
and certain chronotypes
that are more extroverted.
It takes into account
things like sleep timing
and preference, which
would make sense.
That would be kind of one of the
things that we should look at.
And then it takes into
account sleep drive.
So it turns out that all of this
is genetically predetermined
based on something
called your PER3 gene.
Believe it or not, there are
over 80 different markers
for sleep in the
genetics of the--
if you looked at the
whole microbiome,
and you looked at
all of that area,
you would actually find
that there are actually 84,
I think it is, genetic
markers out there
looking at the human genome.
But the PER3 gene
is the one that's
the most really in there for
what we're talking about here.
And it has a lot to
do with sleep drive.
So when you're taking
the quiz, that's
what the questions
are going to be about.
And it'll give you what's called
a personalized ChronoCategory,
or what I call a chronotype.
So it turns out that
there's four, not two.
And if you look
historically, we've
always known about the two.
Actually, there have been
quizzes and assessment tools
around for quite a while looking
at the early bird and the night
owl, but not necessarily
people in the middle,
and also not necessarily
people with insomnia.
So it turns out that
people with insomnia
actually have a very
different genetic makeup
in certain cases,
and a lot of it
is actually genetically
predetermined.
So it's important for you
to be able to understand
and recognize that you
might fall into one
of those categories as well.
So what I thought
I would do is go
through each of the
chronotypes while people
out there taking the
quiz and learning
what their chronotype is.
That way they can
get an understanding
of some of the things that
are going on with them.
So first one are
what I call lions.
So I replaced the vernacular
of birds to mammals.
So first of all,
why did I do that?
Well, because I'm a mammal.
I'm not a bird.
And I really thought it
would make more sense
to look at different mammals.
And by the way,
these animals all
actually have the chronotype
that we're talking about.
So lions have a tendency to--
their first kill is at dawn.
They wake up very, very
early, and that's where
they do most of their hunting.
But my lions as a group,
not as the animal,
but now as all of us would be,
are pretty interesting folks.
They make up about 15%, 15%
to 20% of the population.
And these are my early
morning optimists
with what we consider to
be a medium sleep drive.
These are my go-getters.
These are my COOs.
These are the managers.
These are people who are
really good at asking people
to do certain things and
trying to move people
through a process.
They're likely to prioritize
health and fitness.
These are people who like
to do the marathons, who
like to do the triathlons.
These are your CrossFitters,
your Tough Mudders,
people like that.
But they also have a very
interesting tendency.
They like to make a
plan almost every day,
and they like to stick to it.
So they like to do the
first thing, and then
the second thing, and then
the third thing, and then
the fourth thing.
They do not like to
derivate whatsoever.
So how many people
in here, by the way,
are a lion or an early bird?
So does any of that kind
of ring true for you guys?
Is that sort of something that
sort of makes sense to you,
that you have a tendency to get
up very early in the morning,
follow that plan, be
able to kind of be more
on the leadership side?
Is that something that people
find that resonates with them?
Also, we know that these
people have a tendency
to go to bed really early.
So these are my
8:30, 9 o'clockers,
because they're getting
up at 5:30 in the morning.
So it's not an uncommon
situation for these people.
Now I've had a lot of people
who are lions turn to me,
and they say, I feel so guilty,
because I can never make it
through dinner and a movie.
Dinner is fine, but the
movie-- forget about it.
I am out cold.
I had one person tell me
at my most recent lecture
that they actually go
to the movie early,
so they do like a
5 o'clock movie,
and then they go to
dinner afterwards,
because it's the only way
that they can actually
see any of the cinema
that they want to see,
because otherwise, they're
out cold every single time.
So let's talk about bears.
So bears make up about
50%, 55% of the population.
So one in two people is a bear.
Now before I talk
about bears, remember,
you can actually lean
more towards the line,
yet still be a
bear, or lean more
towards what I call
a wolf, and still
be a bear, because there are
hybrids that are out there.
But these are my
people who actually
have a very healthy
sleep drive, and they're
what I call solar sleepers.
So these people have a tendency
to follow our main schedule.
By the way, being a bear is
the best chronotype to be.
Most people actually tell
me that they would rather
be a lion, and they have
what I call lion envy.
I'm not sure if that's
really the best way to be.
The world really operates
on a bear's schedule.
And so that's why we have
9:00 to 5:00 work schedules.
This is why carpools and buses
go in their certain schedules.
This is why literally
everything that we do kind of
runs in this sort of what
we call a solar schedule.
So it's much easier
for bears in general.
They get the work
done in society.
They have a tendency
to really be
able to accomplish a
whole lot, as well as
they have a tendency
to be extroverted
and very open-minded.
So these are the
people that it's
great to hang out with and have
lunch, because they've always
got the funny story to tell.
They kind of know
the gossip that's
going on in the office
or something like that.
They've probably been the ones
who are watching "The Bachelor"
and talking about it
with you incessantly,
that kind of thing.
But they're a lot of fun,
really interesting people,
and again, they make up
a large bulk of society.
And I said most of society is
built around their schedule.
So wolves-- how many people
are late night people like me?
OK, so I'm a wolf.
I don't go to bed
ever before midnight.
It's very, very rare.
If it was up to
me, I would sleep
until 7:30, 8 o'clock each day,
if that were even possible.
And I certainly wouldn't
go to bed at midnight then.
I'd go to bed at
2:00, because I'm
that kind of a night person.
And it's very
interesting when you
start to think about it,
because the world was not
built for night people,
unless, of course,
you're a shift worker.
But all of us get the
tag of being lazy.
We get the tag of, you're
not a morning person,
and people seem to
schedule meetings for us
at ungodly hours of the morning,
and it never seems to work out.
But we happen to be
very creative thinkers.
So wolves are actually
my introverts.
They're very interesting.
These are the most creative
people that I have.
They crave novelty
and risks, and if they
do bother to make a plan,
they never stick to it.
They'll do the first
thing on the list,
then the sixth
thing on the list,
and then the fourth
thing on the list,
and so they get distracted
very, very easily,
yet they still get a
lot of things done.
I would say these are
my authors, my actors,
my musicians, people like that.
They become deeply
loyal friends, too.
These are the people
that will happily
stay up all night
with you and talk
with you, because they can.
It doesn't bother them
to stay up all night.
And they're really great people.
Dolphins are my
problem children.
So did anybody in
here take the quiz--
were they a dolphin?
Do they want to raise
and their hand admit?
OK.
So my dolphins are my people
who don't sleep very well.
They have difficulty either
falling asleep or staying
sleep most of the time.
Not every dolphin is like this,
but I do have that happen.
These are highly, highly
intelligent people,
but they have very erratic
sleep schedules, like I said.
And sometimes they've
already tried multiple things
to help them with their sleep.
And so a lot of this
vernacular comes from my work
as a sleep specialist.
So I'm an actively
practicing sleep doctor.
I've been practicing
for 17 years.
And my specialty is insomnia.
And one of the things
that was interesting
is I had a patient come
to me, and she said,
I'm a terrible sleeper.
So I started walking
down the road
of cognitive behavioral
therapy with her.
And we tried just about
everything, and nothing worked.
And it was a complete
and total failure,
which is kind of rare when
you start to understand more
about the reasoning behind
what goes on with people
who have sleep problems.
And so I brought
her in, and I said,
let's try to figure
out what's going on.
And she said, well, it's not
that I can't fall asleep,
and it's not that I
can't stay asleep.
She said, it's that I
sleep at the wrong time.
And so then I started
thinking about my kids.
So my daughter is
here with me today.
My son and her have the
exact same sleep pattern.
If it was up to them, they
would go to bed at 2:00,
and they would
sleep until 12:00.
And this is what happens in
our house on the weekends.
Anybody in here have teenagers?
So yeah, you know exactly
what I'm talking about.
It's incredible.
And so they're wolves.
And so I started to
think about this patient.
I discovered, you know what?
She's actually a wolf.
And so what I did
was I asked her boss,
can we change her work schedule?
And he was like,
well, you better
do something quick,
because in about a week,
I'm going to fire her.
I was like, no pressure.
Great.
Fantastic.
So I go in, and I said, all
right, let's go with this.
And we changed her work
times so that she came in
at around 10:30,
but she would work
until about 6:30, 7 o'clock,
so just a shift in her work
schedule.
And after a week, I
called the boss back,
and I said, how'd it go?
He said, I don't know what you
did, but this is fantastic.
He said her work
product is better.
She doesn't fall
asleep in meetings.
It's like a miracle.
So I'm like, oh.
I said, are you
going to fire her?
He's like, no, no, no,
we're not going to fire her.
Well, great.
So I called the husband.
Well, I actually called her
to tell her the good news,
and the husband
picks up the phone.
And he said something to
me that I'll never forget.
He said, I like my
wife better, which
I thought was a really
strong statement
to make, number one, to
somebody he had never
talked to you before.
But what he was
telling me was is
he now understood a lot
more about her as a person.
And so the power
of when has a lot
to do with when somebody is
on and when somebody is off
and how all of these
hormones work together
in order for people to
understand these things.
It's really a communication
tool more than anything.
And what I find is as soon
as one person takes the quiz,
they have everybody in
their family take the quiz
and start learning more about,
how can I communicate better
within my family?
So again, highly
intelligent, my dolphins
are superintelligent people.
They do have a tendency to be
a little obsessive compulsive,
and sometimes that
gets in the way
of their levels of
productivity, because they
want it to be perfect
at every juncture.
And that was a little
bit like this woman.
But it turned out that
she wasn't a dolphin.
It turned out that
she was a wolf,
and once we are able
to change her schedule,
it actually worked
out quite well.
So who cares about
all this stuff?
Remember, if you know what your
chronotype is, and then you
know what your
hormones are going
to be doing throughout
a particular day,
I can actually match
the times of day
when your hormones are
at a particular level
where it would be optimal
to do that activity.
It's actually a matching game.
It's super simple.
So this sounds too
good to be true, right?
How could he possibly be able
to do something like this?
Well, so I've actually
got over 350 studies
backing me up on this.
Now I didn't do 350 studies.
What I did was I aggregated
data from around the world,
and it turns out that this is
an area called chronobiology,
and it's been studied for
15, almost 20 years now.
And so we've got a
tremendous amount of data
at our fingertips to be able
to see, hey, what can we do?
What can we do better,
and at what time
would it be better to do it?
So what I thought
I would do is I'd
take a couple of topics for you
and show you how that works.
Now in the book,
"The Power of When,"
there's 50 different topics.
So what I did was I went through
my day of every single thing
that I did during the
day, and I wrote it down.
Then I asked my
wife to do the same.
Then I asked a couple of
friends to do the same,
and we came up with roughly
50 different activities.
But I thought I would
do some on health
and then some in business so
that you could get an idea
sort of what's been going on.
So I'd start off
with these topics,
and you'll find them
actually quite interesting.
So first, let's
talk about caffeine.
So I've been walking around
Google's campus, and one
of the things that I
noticed is you're never
more than probably
like 50 to 100 feet
away from a source of caffeine.
That seems to be a theme here.
And there's a lot of
coffee being drunk here.
So I get it.
Caffeine is the most abused
substance in the world,
and it's the most used
substance in the world, which
is kind of interesting.
But did you know that
there are actually
times, where you can
drink your caffeine,
and it will actually
give you more energy?
That's probably pretty
interesting to you.
So it's all based on a
couple of different things.
One is what's called
your cortisol rhythm.
So cortisol is the
fight or flight hormone.
That's the thing that if you're
in trouble, it kicks in gear
and helps you get out of there.
Well, it's also the hormone
that helps pull your body out
of a state of unconsciousness.
So when you wake
up in the morning,
your cortisol levels
are actually quite high.
When you go to sleep at night,
you want your cortisol levels
to be quite low.
So thinking about
that for a second,
if our cortisol
level is high, and we
look at how powerful cortisol
is versus caffeine, what we now
discover is that
cortisol is like cocaine,
and caffeine is like weak tea.
So it really does almost
no good to add caffeine
on top of an already elevated
system that's full of cortisol.
However, if you wait
approximately 90 to 120 minutes
after you wake up, your natural
cortisol level begins to dip.
And that's when, if
you have caffeine,
it actually helps elevate
that cortisol level back up
and give you that
level of energy.
Previously-- so by raise of
hands, how many people in here
have coffee in the
morning as the first thing
that they drink?
So that's bad.
OK, let me tell you why.
When you're at sleep at
night, in your breath,
you actually breathe
out almost a full liter
of water every night.
And so you wake up dehydrated.
Caffeine is a diuretic,
so when you drink coffee,
all you're doing is actually
not adding fluid to the system.
You're actually making
it worse, and your system
wants to actually get
rid of even more water.
Very first thing that
you should be doing
is drinking a 12 to
16-ounce bottle of water.
If you can, make it not
cold, but lukewarm, something
that was probably by
your bedside at night.
But you want to rehydrate
the system, number one.
Caffeine doesn't
help you with that.
But waiting 90 to
120 minutes later,
it actually works
out pretty well.
The second thing has to do
with your metabolic rhythm.
So caffeine has a half life of
between six and eight hours,
and so when you're talking
about something like that,
you want to stop caffeine
by about 2:30, 3:00.
Otherwise, it can have
an effect on your ability
to fall asleep or get into
deeper stages of sleep.
So I'm sure that there are
plenty of people in here
who will tell me, Michael,
I could have a cup of coffee
at 10:00 at night--
I've got a couple of
people in the front row
here that are smiling--
and I could fall right
asleep, no problem.
That's true, but
that probably means
that you're sleep deprived,
incredibly sleep deprived,
depending upon the
level of caffeine
that you could be bringing in.
So one of the things
I could say to you
is if I put something
on your brain
to monitor your brain waves
as you're falling asleep,
what I could probably
show you is because you've
got so much caffeine onboard,
you're actually not getting
into the deeper stages of
sleep, and that's where
it can become very problematic.
So the worst thing in
the world you can do
is drink coffee in the morning.
So for my chronotypes, this
actually works out really well.
So this is our
first test is trying
to figure out when should each
of these people have caffeine.
So dolphins will probably
want to have it--
and I had a couple of dolphins
here in the audience--
probably at 8:30 to 10:00,
and then you can have it again
between 1:00 and 2:00.
Lions are going to be a little
bit earlier, because remember,
lions have a tendency to
wake up early in the morning.
Bears-- a little bit later.
And then wolves, really--
and this is a
problem for us wolves
is because we're so
tired in the mornings,
and society makes
us get up earlier,
we're just pounding
coffee constantly.
And what you'll find is that
all you're really getting
is side effects from it.
You're really not
getting the energy boost
that you're looking for.
So I ask wolves to actually have
caffeine much later in the day,
but not too late,
because that's really
when your energy systems
are going to be kicking in.
And then you really actually
don't need it as much.
So I'm going to give
everybody a bonus hack,
and I call this the Nap-a-Latte.
So let's say that you only got
4 and 1/2 to 5 hours of sleep
the other night, and you got
a big presentation to give.
You got something
else that's going on,
and you've really got
to be on your mark.
So here's what I want you to do
is take a six-ounce cup of drip
coffee, which has the highest
caffeine content, about 100,
110 milligrams.
Put in three ice
cubes to cool it down.
Slug the whole
thing really quick,
and then take a 25-minute nap.
You'll reduce the amount
of adenosine in your system
so that you're not as sleepy.
The caffeine locks into
those receptor sites.
You're good for four
hours guaranteed.
JOE: I do this about
three times a week.
MICHAEL BREUS: So Joe here
has commented that he does
this about three times a week.
And it really works.
It's really pretty impressive.
I use this with all
my Fortune 100 CEOs.
I use it for whole
executive teams.
Three times a week
is about the maximum
that you want to use it.
You don't want to be
using it every day, Joe.
But it's true, and it works
really, really well, especially
on those days where you really
haven't gotten the quality
sleep that you were looking for.
Also, it turns out
broccoli is one
of the things that will
actually help pull caffeine out
of your system.
I've seen two
studies to show this.
I don't know exactly what the
mechanism of action is there,
but it turns out that if
you've got too much caffeine
in your system, steamed
broccoli with dinner
can actually help pull
some of that caffeine out
of your system rather quickly.
So is there a right
time to go running?
How many people in
here are runners?
I know Nick's a runner.
OK, so we've got quite a few
people in here are runners.
So this is very interesting.
There are different rhythms
in the body that tell us
when is a good time to run.
So it depends on what you want
to accomplish with your run.
So if you want to
burn fat, you actually
want to run more in the
morning on an empty stomach--
not a dehydrated stomach,
but an empty stomach,
because your body's got to
get the fuel from someplace,
and so it's going
to pull it from fat.
But what if you're a
performance-based runner?
Like what if you're training
for a marathon or CrossFit,
or you're doing a triathlon
or something like that?
It turns out that there
are better times of day
for performance than
you might expect.
And these are actually
based on chronotype.
So lions are actually
best in the late morning,
which would make sense, because
they're early morning people.
Bears in the afternoon.
Wolves are best in the evenings,
and dolphins are actually
good in the morning, because
dolphins use exercise
to help relax them and
help kind of give them--
take that level of
anxiety and lower it down,
although one thing I have
noticed about my bears
in general is if bears don't
exercise in the morning,
they just won't do it.
So it's pretty interesting.
They might do better
in the later afternoon,
but I promise you that 9
times out of 10, they're
not going to do it if they
don't exercise in the morning.
So I'd rather you exercise
in the morning, so maybe
as a bear, you might burn
a little bit more fat
than you might from a
performance standpoint.
But what about
training for strength?
So we talked about cardio, but
what about strength training?
So strength training
is very interesting.
So when you look at the
muscle growth rhythms that
are out there, it
doesn't really matter
when you train if you want
your muscles to get bigger.
But if you want them to
actually get stronger,
there actually is
a rhythm based on--
God bless you.
Actually, God bless all of us--
based on-- that got the
biggest laugh so far.
All right.
Good to know.
So he timed that just
perfectly for me.
So when you look
at muscle strength,
it turns out that there are--
it's a testosterone ratio.
And so when we have
more testosterone,
we actually can have
better strength.
And so looking at lions, bears,
and dolphins, and wolves,
we actually know what their
testosterone rhythms are.
And that's part of the
reason why they can actually
lift more weights
and actually be
stronger by doing their
exercise at different times.
So we've talked about caffeine.
We've talked about exercise.
It is St. Patrick's Day.
I guess we have to
talk about green beer.
So let's talk about
alcohol for a second.
So it turns out that your liver
produces this thing called
alcohol dehydrogenase.
And what it does is it
actually helps filter
through and get that
alcohol out of your system.
Guess what.
It doesn't really happen
very much in the mornings.
So if you're having brunch
and having mimosas and Bloody
Marys, you really need
about half the amount
of alcohol in the
morning that you
would normally to get the
same effect in the afternoon
or evening.
So that's kind of interesting in
terms of your tolerance rhythm
will change.
You are much less tolerant.
Alcohol has a much bigger
effect on you in the mornings
than it ever will in the
afternoons or evenings.
But then there's this
thing called happy hour.
And so what is happy hour?
Happy hour is
really interesting,
because when you look at it
from a biochemical standpoint,
this alcohol
dehydrogenase really
kicks into gear
about 4:30, 5:00,
and it goes really
hard until about 7:00.
So a lot of the
alcohol establishments
over the last 100 years or
so had figured out this,
and they know that you'll
actually be drinking more
during this period of time.
And that's why they give you
free food or reduced cost
food to drive you in
to then drink more,
because your body can
actually handle drinking more
at that point.
Now what ends up
happening is sometimes
you may drink in a
little bit of excess,
and then you end
up with a hangover.
So there's something
called the hangover rhythm.
And so this is
actually, again, when
is your body able to pull
the alcohol in or out.
And when you take all
these rhythms into account,
there's a couple of
things that you can learn.
So this is what I call
strategic drinking.
So if you go by your
chronotype, here's
what you will learn is
that dolphins are actually
good between 6:00 and 8:00.
Lions, again, a
little bit earlier.
Bears-- kind of in the middle.
And then wolves-- we can
party all night long.
And so it's kind
of interesting when
you start to think
through the idea
of chemically or
biochemically speaking, what's
going on in your body.
How could that
possibly have an effect
on whatever it is
that you're ingesting,
whether it's caffeine,
alcohol, you name it?
And then I also brought in
a couple of hangover hacks
for people who are wolves,
who have a tendency
to drink late at night.
A couple of things to think
about-- one glass of water
for every alcoholic beverage.
Number one, it slows down
the sheer volume of alcohol
you're putting in your
system, but remember,
alcohol is a diuretic.
And sort of once
you break the seal,
and you go to the bathroom
once, you're done.
You're just going to go to the
bathroom, go to the bathroom,
go to bathroom,
so you really need
to rehydrate as best you can.
I've seen two studies to show
that coconut water before bed
seems to help.
I have no data other than
these kind of-- and they
were anecdotal case studies.
They weren't really
anything really good,
so give it a shot if you want.
If you can, stop drinking
about three hours before bed.
It takes the average human
body approximately one hour
per alcoholic beverage
to digest through it,
and so if you had two or three
beers or wine with dinner,
then if you stop it
like, let's say, 8:00,
then you would go
to bed at 11:00.
Then it would be
out of your system.
Remember, there's a
really big difference
between going to
sleep and passing out.
And so we want to be careful
about the passing out phase.
Also, it turns out that
alcohol really pulls out
of your body magnesium
and vitamin B,
so taking those in the
morning can actually
be very, very helpful.
And then just time--
the whole idea of hair
of the dog that bit you
is never a good idea.
So don't start drinking early in
the morning, because remember,
your tolerance rhythm
is going to have
a pretty big effect there.
When should you go to bed?
This is a question that
I get asked all the time,
because I'm the
sleep doctor, so,
of course, that's the
question that people
are going to ask me.
So it's really interesting,
but most people
don't know their bed time.
They have a socially
determined wake up time,
but they don't
actually know what time
they need to go to bed.
Like when was the last time
somebody told you to go to bed?
When you were like
10, 12 years old?
So what I know is that most
people have this socially
determined wake up time.
It tends to be around 6:30.
So in our house,
we wake up at 6:30,
because the kids are
getting ready for school.
And so I know it's
6:30, and so we
know that the average
sleep cycle is
approximately 90 minutes long.
We know the average person has
five of these sleep cycles.
So 5 times 90 is?
Come on, guys.
450.
Nobody said there
would be math, right?
OK, 450.
So if we take 450
minutes, and we divide it
by 60 minutes an hour,
we get 7 and 1/2 hours.
So if you do the math, it
gets kind of interesting.
If we take with our
lions and with our bears,
we take 90-minute sleep
cycle, five sleep cycles,
and roughly 20 minutes
to fall asleep,
they have roughly 470 minutes to
count backwards from their wake
up time.
And then they know
what time to go to bed.
Another interesting
fact-- wolves and dolphins
don't get five cycles.
They have a tendency
to get four cycles,
and it takes us
longer to fall asleep.
So the total minutes
for a wolf or a dolphin
might be closer to 400,
where the total minutes
for a bear or a lion
might be closer to 470.
Eight hours is a myth.
OK?
Eight hours is a myth.
Very few people need exactly
eight hours of sleep.
I personally am a 6
and 1/2 hour sleeper.
I have been almost
my entire life.
I go to bed around midnight.
I wake up around 6:30,
because I'm a wolf.
There's nothing wrong with
sleeping only 6 and 1/2 hours,
if you wake up, and you feel
energized, and you feel good.
If you wake up, and you
feel bad, then guess what.
You might need more time.
So try running this
experiment at home for a week.
Take your socially
determined wake up time,
and if you're a dolphin or a
wolf, count back 400 minutes.
If you're a lion or a bear,
count back 470 minutes.
And if you're waking up within
five minutes of your alarm,
then guess what.
You figured out how
much sleep you need.
Some people, their sleep
cycle isn't 90 minutes.
My sleep cycle is
actually 80 minutes.
So that's why it works that way.
Now I've got the good fortune
of being able to test it out
in sleep labs, and I keep
something by my bedside that
measures my sleep every
night called an S+.
And so I actually know exactly
what my sleep is all the time,
and if you're
interested in that,
we can certainly get you the
information about that as well.
But try out this experiment.
You might be very, very
surprised at what you learn.
So what's the good bedtime?
So I actually plotted
it out for everybody,
but it's in the book.
And again, you can figure it
out based on your chronotype as
well as your sleep score.
So I have wake up
times and bedtimes
various throughout the evening
so that people can figure this
out.
So what about sex?
So this is a
question I get asked
every single time I
do something is, well,
is there a right time for sex?
Is there a wrong time for sex?
So my daughter's
in the room, so I'm
going to ask her to put
her hands over her ears
so that she can't hear anything.
Thank you, Carson.
I appreciate you doing that.
13-year-old daughter
in the audience--
what are you going to do?
So is there a best time for sex?
So it turns out that
there are actually--
you don't really have to keep
your hands over your ears.
It turns out that 72% of
people have sex between 10:30
and 11:30 at night.
Now that makes sense, right?
You're in with your partner.
You're not wearing
nearly as many clothes.
You kind of look like,
hey, you interested?
Yeah, sure, why not?
OK.
And there you go.
Kind of interesting
when you look
at your hormone distribution
at that particular time of day.
So this is actually when
your hormone profile is worst
to have sex.
You have low levels
of testosterone.
You have low levels of
estrogen, low levels
of progesterone, low
cortisol, and high melatonin.
I can't think of any
worse particular time
to try to have a sexual activity
when all of those hormones
are working against you,
not in the right direction.
So what am I going to do?
First of all, we did this--
we looked at this,
and it turns out
that lions actually have
their strongest desire
in the early morning hours.
Not a big surprise there.
Dolphins reported a
very calming effect
from having sex in the morning,
and wolves just stayed up later
and ended up having sex,
because, again that's
what their kind of whole
chronotype wants to do.
And men prefer sex at
any time it's offered.
This is not a joke.
This was true.
So it turns out that men
would-- if it was offered,
it didn't really matter
what their chronotype was.
They were ready to go.
So what happens if you
are one chronotype,
and your bed partner is
a different chronotype?
Right?
So I created a matrix in great
algorithmic Google fashion
to be able to tell people,
and I have an early evening
time and an early morning time.
So you heard it here from the
sleep doctor and the power
of when.
Everybody should try having sex
Saturday morning at around 8:00
or 9:00 o'clock in
the morning just
to see if it's any
better than at night.
And you might actually
be very, very surprised.
There's a whole chapter
on this in the book,
and I actually also
have a separate matrix
for heterosexual couples,
then for lesbian couples,
and for gay couples, because
the hormone distributions
are very, very different.
So check it out.
I think you'll find
it quite fascinating.
So now we're going to
move on to productivity.
So speaking of sex, we'll
talk about productivity.
So what are we going
to talk about here?
There's a lot of really
interesting things
that are going on now.
I'm actually being
asked by companies
to come in and chronotype
the entire company,
because one of the things
that they're finding
is they say, well, I've got
a preponderance of wolves
in my creative department,
which makes sense,
because that's what wolves are.
They're my internal,
introverted,
more creative people.
And some idiot is having a
meeting for them at 9 o'clock
or 8 o'clock in the morning.
Well, none of them
are even awake.
They can't even think
at that period of time.
So chronotyping the
company, and then working
with the scheduling
department, and then looking
at the content of those
meetings turns out
to be incredibly interesting
for levels of productivity.
And we're starting to find now
that people are getting more
and more productive simply
by using these types of tools
at their disposal.
So let's talk about
brainstorming.
And so I know that
there's time spent here
for people, where you have a
certain amount of time each day
to think about something
different or a different kind
of project or
something like that.
Well, if you kind of are
trying to come up with ideas,
sometimes that's
not always so easy.
How many people in
here feel like they've
had their best idea when
they were in the shower,
on the treadmill, going for
a run, something like that?
So there's a reason for
that, and it's called--
well, I'm going to tell you
all these different rhythms.
That one in particular is
called the distraction rhythm.
So have you ever
noticed how when
you're doing one thing,
and then all of a sudden,
a new thought comes
flying into your head?
So if your body is distracted
with a physical activity,
whether it's a shower
or going for a run,
you actually you have a greater
likelihood of these ideas being
able to come to you.
The connectivity rhythm
is very interesting.
So there's only
certain times of day
where your right
side of your brain
likes to talk to the
left side of your brain,
and there's a lot
of more interaction.
It happens to be
earlier in the morning.
The novelty rhythm is
something else as well.
So you ever get into
a new situation,
meet a new person,
and all of a sudden,
you've got so much
in common with them,
and they think like you,
and you think like them,
and all of a sudden, you start
tossing ideas back and forth,
and before you know it, you're
really connected with them?
That's actually how I met Joe.
We met.
We started talking.
I was like, oh, my god.
You like sleep.
I like sleep.
And we started talking
about it, and then
all of a sudden, here I am at
Google talking about sleep.
So what happens is it
spurs on new ideas,
so having those new experiences
can be very, very important.
And then there's something
called the REM rhythm.
So most people don't know
this, but you move information
from your short term memory
to your long term memory
during REM sleep.
That becomes
critically important,
because you create an
organizational substructure
in your brain to
deposit information.
And then you have connections
between these pieces
of information to retrieve
them to solve problems.
So most of your problem
solving can really
occur while you're unconscious.
So first of all, if you've
ever heard the old adage of,
sleep on it before you make
a big decision, it's true.
In our house, we never
make a major decision
without sleeping on it, because
there's so much information
that's got to be compiled
and kind of microprocessed
within my head, it's
really hard to do that.
So being able to give
yourself that time
becomes very, very important.
So I call these moments
of groggy greatness.
And so the worst time
to try to brainstorm
is between 11:00 and
3:00, because that's
where you've had lunch.
You actually have a small spike
in core body temperature, which
releases a little
bit of melatonin,
so it's not necessarily
always great,
although for some of my
bears, that can actually
be a decent time as well.
But it just depends.
Sometimes they have
something else going on.
But my dolphins-- and you notice
how early these times are.
So for my lions,
4:00 AM to 6:00 AM.
Well, hopefully, you're
not awake at 4:00 AM.
That's kind of where
the REM is coming in.
But right after you wake
up, one of the best ways
to do something is take
a topic, and put it
on a piece of paper and
a pen, and then put it
by your bedside.
And when you wake up in the
morning, the first thing you do
is look at that
topic and write down
everything you can think
about about that topic.
Within five to seven
days, I guarantee you,
you will come up with an idea
that you've never had before.
Again, it's because of
this microprocessing that
gets to go on in your head.
And that's not the only time.
The second time happens
to be in the afternoon.
Now if you notice here,
Dolphins between 2:00 and 4:00,
and I'm talking over
here that you shouldn't
go between 11:00 and 3:00.
Dolphins are different,
because their level of anxiety
is much higher.
And so they can actually funnel
in and get to that moment
a little bit earlier
when most of us can't.
But again, what I did
was I lined up the times,
and so you actually
have two times of day
where brainstorming is going to
be better than any other time
during the day.
Now how many people in
here by a raise of hands
have ever noticed that there
are certain times of day
that they do things
better than others?
So this is what I'm
talking about here
is if you're trying
to force a brainstorm,
it doesn't always work.
But if you know what times
you're able to naturally get
there, give yourself a shot.
You might be surprised
at what happens.
The same holds true for
being on in terms of being
able to be alert and focused.
So I'm sure a lot of you have
to present ideas to people
and be able to talk to
people and tell people
all the kinds of things
that you're working on
and things like that.
Well, it turns out that there
are certain chronotypes that
do this better than others.
Lions, they love to
be in front of a room.
Not a big surprise.
My COO is my kind of
leaders of the pack.
Not a big shocker there.
Dolphins-- not as much.
They can do it, but
they would much rather
be in the back and kind of being
able to do their own thing.
Wolves would actually prefer
to go to happy hour as opposed
to give a major presentation,
which is what I would prefer
to do most of the time.
And bears are actually
happy to be in the audience
and learn from the presentation,
not necessarily have
to give that presentation.
But there are actually rhythms
for attending a presentation.
So let's say you want
to schedule a time,
so actually, the most flexible
time is between 2:30 and 3:00
in the afternoon.
The second best time is
between 10:00 and 11:00,
so not when somebody
just gets there,
but after they've had a
chance to kind of settle in.
The least flexible time, as
you can see, 9:15, worst time.
Second worst time
is 12:00 to 1:00.
So these are data that come
from a-- there was a software
program called Meet with Me.
And they had over half
a million meetings,
and then you had to click that
you were attending the meeting
or not attending the meeting.
And so these data actually are
full on, straight up objective.
Turns out Tuesday afternoons
have the highest flexibility
for meetings, and
Monday mornings
have the lowest flexibility.
Not really a big surprise.
Who wants to have an 8:00 AM,
Monday morning meeting, right?
Nobody.
Nobody wants to do that.
And also, it's really
hard to start your week
off having that kind of
meeting and things like that.
Now aside from assigning
when the presentation be, how
about giving the presentation?
So you want to have your
energy rhythm, so when
are you at your peak?
When are you going to
be most articulate?
When are you going to be
able to focus the most
and give the most information?
And then engagement-- when
is your audience going
to have an interest in
what you're having to say?
So I actually created,
again, another matrix
based on chronotypes.
And what you'll find is
that different people
are on at different times.
This is why when I
chronotype a company,
it gets really interesting
really quickly,
because we've got the
presenter, and then we've
got the audience.
And making that
match appropriately
turns out to be a
really interesting way
to increase levels
of productivity.
A couple of things
about audience
engagement that you
may know or may not
know-- roughly 30 minutes after
you start, one in seven people
will be zoned out.
I can see people already
starting to get there.
After 45 minutes, one in three
will basically become a zombie.
And then you do have
something that's
called cognitive
backlog that occurs.
So right now, I've
given you-- you're
like drinking from
the fire hose.
I've given you so
much information.
Don't expect to remember it all.
Check out the book.
Don't forget that
this is all being live
streamed, and it's going to
be up on YouTube for people
to watch.
So don't try to take it all in.
But you can't get that much
information in your brain
at any one given time.
Best and worst
times to present--
this is, again,
based on energy level
for my different
chronotypes and worst times
for everybody in general.
So even if you don't know
everybody in your audience,
these are the times
that you want to avoid,
if you possibly can.
So what about making a decision?
So it turns out that there are
on peak times, where you're
logical, very low risk
in your decision making,
and off peak times, where
you're far more emotional
and high risk decision making.
These are actually influenced
by sleep deprivation,
your personality, and what
we call the procrastination
rhythm.
So everybody in here's
probably familiar with
the procrastination rhythm.
It turns out that this is
actually by chronotype,
and so some of my chronotypes
are world champion
procrastinators--
those would be the wolves or the
late night people like myself.
The people who are not
big on procrastination
turns out to be the lions
and the early morning people.
It's kind of interesting.
So when is the best time
for you to make a decision?
So these are the times during
the day that you're actually
going to make the most
clear-headed logical decision
based on your endocrine system,
based on when your hormones are
hitting the different highs and
lows throughout the day, which,
again, is pretty
interesting when
you start to think about it.
Could I reschedule?
Could I rejigger my
schedule one way or another
to be able to allow me
to make better decisions,
to be able to be more
productive, things like that?
So can you hack your chronotype?
So the answer is yes, you can.
I'm not sure you
want to, but you can.
So the strategic use of
light, caffeine, and melatonin
can do this, because here's
the thing to remember
is if you're a wolf, and you're
living in a bear's world,
all you are is jet lagged.
And these are the
components that we use
to help people with jet lag.
So if you want to, you can
actually utilize light therapy.
I know we had Fred Maxik
talking earlier this week
about how to use light.
And you can have melatonin
in the evenings, caffeine
and light in the mornings,
and you can actually
shift yourself.
You can actually make
yourself into something
that you weren't genetically
predisposed to be.
I don't recommend it,
but it is something
that, unfortunately,
some of us have to do it
whether we like it or not.
And so thinking
through these ideas,
you don't necessarily want
to go against your genetics
if you can possibly help it.
How do you make yourself
a morning person?
This is the second
biggest question
I get after sex is,
how do I change myself
to become that morning person?
So here's a couple of ideas
that you can try, if you'd like,
at home.
So first of all, going to
bed at the right time for you
every night-- again,
it's in the book,
but it's also based
on your chronotype.
Number two, never hit
the snooze button.
So by a raise of hands,
how many people in here
hit the snooze
button at least once?
Come on.
Don't lie.
OK, keep your hands raised.
Keep your hands raised.
Twice?
Three times?
Four times?
All right.
So we ended at three.
I was giving this
lecture, and I had
somebody at seven times
for a snooze button.
So let me tell you why
the snooze button is
the single worst
invention in all of sleep.
So it turns out that
the average snooze
is between seven and
nine minutes long,
and your body physically can't
get into a deep stage of sleep
at that point.
And we know that REM sleep--
remember from the creativity
stuff and the
brainstorming stuff--
the bulk of it happens in
the last part of the night.
So what you do by
hitting the snooze
is you actually knock down
your levels of creativity
and brainstorming.
I'd much rather you
just set your alarm
for the last possible
moment that you
have to wake up, because you'll
get a lot more better quality
sleep.
Get direct sunlight for
10 minutes in the morning.
So once you've reached
over, and you've
grabbed your bottle of water,
because you're dehydrated,
I want you to walk to the
window and get some sunlight.
Do me a favor.
Put on a robe.
I have to tell this to people.
Lots of time, they
don't think about it,
and then the neighbors
get a big scare.
Remember to drink
your water, and let
there be light and music.
So it's very, very interesting.
How many people listen
to music in the mornings
when they're getting ready?
So that's a great thing that
you do, and it works really,
really well.
And you should use high
energy, high emotion music,
so music that you love to dance
to that really gets you going
is fantastic, because then
you're using a secondary sense.
You're not just having
light, but you're also
having sound to help wake
your brain up in the morning.
So one of the things that--
so in our house, my son
listens to music almost
every single morning.
My daughter doesn't
necessarily like it,
and when it's too
early in the morning,
because she can sleep in a
little bit longer than he can.
And so the rule in
our house is at 6:30
is when you can actually
fire up the music.
And I walk in there, and he's
singing, he's dancing around,
and he's 15 years old.
To get a 15-year-old to get
up at 6:30 in the morning
and be any level
of consciousness
is almost an impossibility.
So by having that
light that's coming in,
and then also having
the music, it really
has a tendency to help you out.
Exercising your body
and mind is always
going to be good, even if you
can only do 10 pushups or 15
pushups in the morning.
Do something to get
your heart rate up.
If it's dancing around,
don't dance in the shower.
Dance outside of the shower.
We don't want anybody
slipping and falling,
but at the end of the
day, doing something
to get that level of
energy up is good.
If it's Saturday morning,
that's the perfect time for sex,
so go ahead and try that.
You never know.
It might help wake you up and
make you a morning person.
The other thing I
want to talk about
is a cool, not cold shower.
So this is something that I do
every morning or most mornings,
and it's a meditation
technique that I do.
And I teach it to
people all the time.
So you stand in front,
where the showerhead
is right at your
head, and you have
it hit you literally
square between the eyes.
There's like a waterfall
of water that comes down,
and it covers your nose, so it's
actually difficult to breathe.
So you have to
open up your mouth,
and you have to concentrate
really hard on how you breathe.
And if you sit there
for about a minute,
you can't think of anything
other than your breathing.
And so it really focuses you in,
and you really come out of this
really in the moment.
While you're doing
that, take the nozzle,
and turn it to get a little
cooler, a little cooler,
a little cooler.
Don't make it cold.
Just get it cooler.
What happens is the blood
shunts into your trunk,
and it actually causes
your heart rate to go up,
and it actually helps
wake you up even more.
So by using this meditation,
and then when you turn off
the shower, you are bam.
You are in the now.
That's a great time for
journaling and for creativity
or just getting your day going.
And then start your day
with a fairly decent-sized
protein-rich breakfast.
Protein and good fat is going
to be much better for you.
I was actually able to come
around to some of the cafes
here, and they've got some
fantastic options here
at Google for you to be able
to do something like that.
You want to avoid
carbs in the morning,
even though they
taste really good.
There's a lot of data to show
that carbs make you sleepy.
And so if you're a wolf, and
you don't do well at mornings
anyway, a bagel is
about the worst thing
that you could possibly
put into your body,
because all your body wants to
do after something like that
is sleep.
And so with that, I will
open it up for questions.
You can ask me
questions about timing.
You can ask me questions about
sleep, whatever you want.
AUDIENCE: You were
just mentioning
about some protein-rich
breakfast options,
and what would those be?
MICHAEL BREUS: So
if I was looking
for a protein-rich breakfast,
I might consider something
like an omelet with avocado
would be a great option,
because you get the good
fat from the avocado,
and you get the
protein from the eggs.
A lot of people-- for
example, a lot of my people
who are night
people like wolves,
they have almost no
appetite in the morning.
So for those people, a protein
shake or a protein smoothie
would actually work
out pretty well.
AUDIENCE: Yeah, I hate
eating in the morning.
MICHAEL BREUS:
Yeah, and so do I.
And so the only thing I
can literally choke down
is a smoothie, barely.
So that's what I do.
AUDIENCE: Thank you.
AUDIENCE: Just
curious, is it just
the genetics 100% that
decides the chronotype,
or are there any external
factors or social factors?
MICHAEL BREUS: So
it's the genetics
that determine the
chronotype, but it's
the external factors
is whether or not
you can follow the chronotype.
Also, it changes over time.
So as an example with
my daughter, she's 13,
so she's going to
be more of a wolf.
But as she gets older, she
might be more of a bear.
She might be more of a
lion, things like that.
We also know that as we
get even older, like when
we hit senior years like 55,
65, that kind of age range,
then we also start to see
people go one of two routes.
They either go in
towards the lion,
so you see a lot of people
having dinner at 5 o'clock
and getting up super early,
or they go towards a dolphin,
because they become
more medically frail.
There's more medications
on board, which
can be disruptive to sleep.
AUDIENCE: You said
that for bears.
afternoon exercise is best.
But if they don't
exercise in the morning,
it's not going to happen.
That's totally me.
Why is that the case, and how
is it different for the others?
MICHAEL BREUS: So
it's interesting
when we look at
exercise in particular,
but there's also a motivation
factor, an adherence
to exercise.
And so there's some
data to now suggest
that if you do something
for between 21 and 25 days,
it becomes a habit.
And so what I found with my
bears is if they're not willing
to do it in the
afternoon, which, again,
is where their strength
rhythm is coming from--
not necessarily fat
burning, but strength,
not necessarily muscle growth--
then I can convince
them sometimes at least
to do it in the morning.
And then slowly, I try
to get them to do it
towards the afternoon,
and they actually
find that their
performance is better.
AUDIENCE: What do you
think about napping
during afternoons in general?
MICHAEL BREUS: So
generally, I love napping,
unless you're a dolphin.
If you're a dolphin, or you
have any level of insomnia,
napping is about the worst
thing that you can do,
because it, again,
lowers that sleep drive
and makes it difficult to sleep.
But a 25-minute nap
works really well,
and the Nap-a-Latte works
really well, if you try that.
But I'm a big fan of the nap,
but you want to keep it short.
Anybody here ever take
a nap and feel worse
when they got up from the nap?
That means you napped too long.
So if you're keeping it
to that 25-minute range,
you only get about some
stage 1 and stage 2 sleep,
and it makes it
easier to wake up.
Yes, over here.
AUDIENCE: So if you had
to do just one thing,
and you were stuck
between forced
to get up too early
for a long commute,
forced to stay up too late just
to keep on top of the house
and help the kids with homework,
not a lot of options of change
schedules, so it's really
overconstrained like,
I think, many of us,
what's one first thing you
do to make it better?
MICHAEL BREUS: I would
keep your sleep schedule
the same on the weekends
as during the week,
because what ends up--
so you're crunched from
both ends is what you're--
the description that
you're giving me is I've
got to stay up late
to get stuff done,
and then I got to get
up early, because I've
got a decent sized commute.
So you've got this here.
So lots of people
in that scenario
try to catch up on
sleep on the weekends,
and what ends up
happening is they
actually shift their circadian
clock and make it worse.
So I'd rather you keep your
schedule as consistent.
So if you wake up at, let's
say, 6:30 during the week,
I'd ask you to wake up
at 6:30 on the weekends
as well, which I know
is not a popular idea.
But what you'll find is you
can fall asleep more quickly,
and you'll be able to
get into deeper sleep
faster and stay there
longer the more consistent
your sleep schedule is.
So that would be
the first thing I
would say is keep your bedtime
and wake time consistent.
The other thing I would do is
look at your coffee intake,
and see if you can
tweak that a little bit,
because if you've got a commute,
and you're riding a vehicle
or something like that, maybe
carpooling might be better,
because your reaction
time is definitely
going to be slower, for sure.
AUDIENCE: My
question, though, is
what's the effect size
here on some of these?
You're seeing better,
and I basically
want to know how much better
my sex is going to be.
MICHAEL BREUS: OK, so you
wonder how much better
your sex is going to be.
So that's a great question.
So it really looks more at
does-- so in sex in particular,
it's looking more at desire.
And so when is desire around?
And so it's hard to
quantify exactly,
but here's one of the
things I can tell you--
and it's great that you
chose sex in particular--
is we know that a
preponderance of men
wake up with an erection.
And so if that's
the case, clearly
mother nature is
saying, this is the time
that you need to be doing
this particular activity.
So what I would say is I'm
going to actually put it back
on to you, and so what
I'm going to ask you to do
is I want you to run
the experiment for me,
and then let us know if it's
increased your sex life any
more or less, and
we'll see what happens.
But right now, the
data isn't that clear.
But when we look at these things
and we say things are better,
what we're finding
is anecdotally,
a tremendous number
of people are--
I get hundreds of emails
of people saying, holy cow,
this really is interesting.
And I don't want people to
change their whole lives.
I want them to get their sleep
schedule down, and then just
pick one thing from the book.
There are literally 50
different activities.
Most people look at
the sex part first,
but if that's what you
want to do, go for it.
But you'll be surprised
at-- it absolutely
is incrementally better.
AUDIENCE: What is your
opinion on polyphasic sleep,
and how does it differ
from adaptive sleep habits?
For example, habitual napping
at a set time per day.
MICHAEL BREUS: So
for those of you
out there that don't know
what polyphasic sleep is,
so this is an idea, where
you can get your eight
hours in about four and 1/2.
So everybody's ears perked up.
Oh, how do I do that?
So what you end up doing is you
have a core amount of sleep,
usually three sleep cycles,
about four and 1/2 hours.
And then you take
25 to 35-minute naps
at very particular times
throughout the day,
and that can be the most
extreme situation, where
you would actually
reduce total sleep
time by about 200 minutes.
Here's the pros and the cons
of doing something like that.
Yes, you do get more time,
but you don't really.
So here's what goes
on is, first of all,
you're awake when almost
everybody out there is asleep.
So there's only so many things
you can do on the internet
to talk to somebody in
a different country,
where you're kind of
done with that aspect.
It turns out you
get very lonely.
Also, if you have any
proclivity for depression,
it comes out in spades,
because what you're doing
is you're really sleep
depriving the body.
Now the body can handle
only so much of that.
Everybody that I've
ever worked with who
wanted to do a
polyphasic sleep schedule
stopped within three months,
because you can't even
do dinner and a movie.
You can go out, and then
your hour and 1/2 to 3 hours
is up when you have
to take your next nap.
And so it really becomes
socially very difficult to do.
AUDIENCE: Probably a lot of
new moms and dads out there.
MICHAEL BREUS: Yes.
AUDIENCE: Advice for them?
I remember something--
nap when the baby naps,
but what are your top three
tips for new moms and dads?
MICHAEL BREUS: So new moms and
new dads-- so first of all,
this is--
and it all depends
upon your baby.
So we had two colicky babies.
So both of my kids
had tremendous reflux
to the point where
we had to have them
on compounded Prilosec
to be able to keep them
in a good spot.
And so their sleep was
erratic until we did that.
We actually did that
fairly early on,
and we about got both of our
kids to sleep fairly easily.
There's a great
program out there.
It's called Baby Wise.
That's what we
used in our house,
and it's an eat,
sleep, play program,
and it's really about the
consistency of the schedule.
Kids' sleep invariably
doesn't get messed up.
It's their parents that don't
keep a good, strict sleep
schedule.
So when Grandma and Grandpa's in
town, don't keep them up later.
If Grandma and Grandpa's
flight got in at 8 o'clock,
they don't get to see
the kids that night.
You don't keep them
up for that situation,
because you end up with,
what is termed in our house,
a meltdown.
And that's a whole lot
of no fun for everybody.
So the more consistent the
schedule is, the better.
That's number one.
Number two, if you do have
a situation where you've
got a child that isn't
sleeping particularly well,
you should use what I
call an on-call system.
So one partner has
Monday, Wednesday, Friday.
The other partner has
Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday.
And then Sunday,
you flip a coin.
So if the baby is
crying, that individual
is responsible for that as
opposed to both people waking
up, not getting enough sleep.
So that has a tendency
to work, or if you've
got one person who's a lion
and one person who's a wolf,
you can take different
shifts that way,
where the lion can get up early,
and the wolf can stay up late.
That has a tendency
to work as well.
So it's really about managing
your time surrounding
that situation, and checking out
that Baby Wise is pretty good.
AUDIENCE: But Tom
from the other side
of Mountain View
says, how long does it
take to train your body
for a new sleeping routine?
MICHAEL BREUS: So
it's interesting.
If it's a sleeping
routine that works
with your chronotype
and your genetics,
then it doesn't take very long.
It'll adapt in usually
five to seven days.
If you're trying to go
against your chronotype,
so let's say you're a wolf and
you're trying to be a lion,
it can take months to
be able to do that.
And to be very
honest with you, it's
not going to be
particularly successful.
You really should try
to stick-- that's why
it's great to be a bear,
because bears kind of have it
in the best spot, because
they can kind of move.
And remember, you can be a
bear that wakes up a little bit
early or a bear that stays
up a little bit late.
So if you're following
your chronotype,
it's not hard to
snap back into it.
But when you're going
against your chronotype,
it can take a long time, and
it isn't necessarily very
successful.
Well, thank you all very much.
I really enjoyed being here.
[APPLAUSE]
