Mark Bell's Power Project - How To Get Jacked without Tracking Part 3 - Sleep! MBPP EP. 746

Episode Date: June 8, 2022

In the third installment of the Jacked Without Tracking series we dive into the most important aspect of all of this, SLEEP! You can do just about everything right, but if your sleep is compromised, you will just be spinning your wheels. Join The Power Project Discord: https://discord.gg/yYzthQX5qN Subscribe to the new Power Project Clips Channel: https://youtube.com/channel/UC5Df31rlDXm0EJAcKsq1SUw Special perks for our listeners below! ➢https://thecoldplunge.com/ Code POWERPROJECT to save $150!! ➢Enlarging Pumps (This really does work): https://bit.ly/powerproject1 ➢https://www.vivobarefoot.com/us/powerproject Code POWERPROJECT for 20% off Vivo Barefoot shoes! ➢https://markbellslingshot.com/ Code POWERPROJECT10 for 10% off site wide including Within You supplements! ➢https://mindbullet.com/ Code POWERPROJECT for 20% off! ➢https://eatlegendary.com Use Code POWERPROJECT for 20% off! ➢https://bubsnaturals.com Use code POWERPROJECT for 20% of your next order! ➢https://verticaldiet.com/ Use code POWERPROJECT for 20% off your first order! ➢https://vuoriclothing.com/powerproject to automatically save 20% off your first order at Vuori! ➢https://www.eightsleep.com/powerproject to automatically save $150 off the Pod Pro at 8 Sleep! ➢https://marekhealth.com Use code POWERPROJECT10 for 10% off ALL LABS at Marek Health! Also check out the Power Project Panel: https://marekhealth.com/powerproject Use code POWERPROJECT for $101 off! ➢Piedmontese Beef: https://www.piedmontese.com/ Use Code POWER at checkout for 25% off your order plus FREE 2-Day Shipping on orders of $150 Follow Mark Bell's Power Project Podcast ➢ https://lnk.to/PowerProjectPodcast ➢ Insta: https://www.instagram.com/markbellspowerproject ➢ https://www.facebook.com/markbellspowerproject ➢ Twitter: https://twitter.com/mbpowerproject ➢ LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/powerproject/ ➢ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/markbellspowerproject ➢TikTok: http://bit.ly/pptiktok FOLLOW Mark Bell ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marksmellybell ➢https://www.tiktok.com/@marksmellybell ➢ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MarkBellSuperTraining ➢ Twitter: https://twitter.com/marksmellybell Follow Nsima Inyang ➢ https://www.breakthebar.com/learn-more ➢YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/NsimaInyang ➢Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nsimainyang/?hl=en ➢TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@nsimayinyang?lang=en Follow Andrew Zaragoza on all platforms ➢ https://direct.me/iamandrewz #PowerProject #Podcast #MarkBell

Power Project family, how's it going? Now, on this podcast, on almost every single episode, we talk about sleep because sleep is important for your workouts, for your recovery, for your nutrition, for your fat loss, for your muscle gain. Literally everything comes down to getting great sleep at night. That's why we've partnered with Eight Sleep Mattresses. Now, they have something called the Pod Pro Cover. Now, this cover is something you can put over one of Eight Sleep's mattresses or your existing

mattress, and And temperature regulates through the night so that you get the best sleep possible at every phase of your sleep. Most people think that you need to have your room temperature at 68 degrees Fahrenheit, but our temperature is different. I sleep hotter than most people. You might sleep cooler. So that's why the Eight Sleep mattress for yourself and your partner, either side of the mattress can have its own temperature regulation. And the cool thing is that the 8Sleep app watches your temperature through multiple nights and it'll literally change the way the temperature is set based off of the way you sleep.

It's crazy. It's literally the Tesla of beds. Andrew, tell them about it, dude. Yeah, dude. This technology is insane. It's like the most high technological, can't even say that word, piece of equipment that I have in my whole house. So you guys got to head over to 8sleep.com slash power project. That's eight spelled out. So E-I-G-H-T sleep.com slash power project. And you guys will receive $150 off of your Pod Pro cover

or your Pod Pro cover and mattress combo. And I must say that that mattress is actually extremely comfortable. They didn't skimp out on anything on this product. Again, 8sleep.com slash power project links to them down in the description, as well as the podcast show notes. What was that Greg Doucette thing you were watching? Oh, so I guess Alpha M did a video on like, uh, basically like how to get like a six pack. And then Greg Doucette just, he said that he said he had some good things and some bad things, but where we stopped watching it was, uh, alpha M was talking about getting rid of dairy. When he gets rid of dairy, he can notice right away that like his body fat will drop. But

Greg Doucette's like, it doesn't like calories in calories out doesn't matter like you can't really talk about like this being a good or bad food or good or bad drink milk or dairy being good or bad like it doesn't matter just it's just calories yeah i think dairy is a uh it's something that's going to encourage you to eat more, right? Like milk is really good. Cream, half and half. Cheese is really good. Something that's going to encourage you to eat more food. It's way easier to eat a burger or multiple burgers that have cheese on them

than it is without. And I think most of the time you see bodybuilders and people like that, they'll pull dairy from their diet. Bodybuilders have weird ideas on what dairy does and doesn't do, but I don't think it necessarily makes you fat, but it could be something that could encourage you to eat more food. I'm so getting Flying Dutchman today. I know since you guys are talking about dairy,

I started thinking about cheese, and then we just had the conversation yesterday about Flying Dutchman. I haven't had it in a minute. And Andrew trying to sell us on that fucking fat free cheese all the time boo hey everybody that's listening collectively on the count of three boo andrew and his fat three free cheese man one two three guys guys come on give me a chance it's okay who the fuck threw a tomato damn it damn that was a little harsh i don't know i wasn't expecting anybody to throw anything Guys, come on. Give me a chance. It's okay. Who the fuck threw a tomato? God damn it. Damn, that was a little harsh.

I wasn't expecting anybody to throw anything. Cabbage and shit. Dude, I mean, maybe I'll follow you guys for the filming of Smelly's Kitchen, and I'll use your oven, and I'll cook you guys a low-fat pizza. And you'll be like, all right, this ain't as bad as we thought. I'm going to be so mad. I'm going to probably like it. And I'm going to be mad at you. Why is this so good? Yeah. I'm going to be so mad. I'm going to probably like it. And I'm going to be mad at you. Why is this good?

I don't actually like this. But it'll be like 100 grams of protein. And it's going to be delicious. That's true. That's true. I'll eat your fat-free cheese just so I can try it. The thing is, I'm a high-fat guy anyway. But I know it's probably going to be pretty good and I'm

trashing it for no reason. I wonder, how does something like that, how does it come out? Like cheese is supposed to have fat and if it's fat free, then what the fuck are you? Cause you're not cheese. Yeah, that I'm, I'm with you on that. I don't know what it is. Okay.

I'm not going to pretend like, no guys, but it's just, I don't know. It just keeps the calories down and it resembles pizza. That's fair. No, that, amen. I think that's a great idea, especially if you're not on a high-fat diet or you can't handle that much fat and you want to still enjoy some pizza with some cheese. Well, you have your imitation cheese. It can be dangerous, though, because you can eat that and eat another one. If you're not careful, because with the absence of a lot of fat,

it just doesn't fill the holes as well as a full fat whatever. Yeah, you're not satiated. Even though you're getting all that protein, it doesn't satiate you as much? No, you just have to make the decision. I'm going to eat this one pizza. I'm not going to eat this one while cooking another one.

And if you do that, then yeah, you're okay. But, you know, it's like let's just say the amount of calories equates to a New York strip. It's like that New York strip is going to fill you up more though. Like I'm not going to argue that. I'm not going to argue that. Is it going to be as fun to eat a plain New York strip by itself as a high-carb, low-fat pizza? No. But you just have to make the decision.

I'm going to call that shit imitation cheese from now on. Like how they have imitation crab. I think, yeah, right, because I won't order stuff with imitation crab. I just can't do it. I don't know why. I just don't know what it means. Oh, God. Oh, man. That, because like. I won't order stuff with imitation crab. I just can't do it. Wait, why? I just don't know what it means. Oh, God. Oh, man. That was really off.

But it's not fake. Like, is it fake, fake stuff? Or is it like other fish stuff put together? I don't know. I actually don't know what imitation crab is. It's delicious, though, usually, because like a lot of times it's in a roll that has a bunch of other stuff in it. That could be pretty tasty. Imitation.

I mean, imagine we're like, hey, try some of this imitation chicken. That's beyond chicken. Let's try this Piedmontese imitation bavette. It's like, nope, I'll pass. That sounds like a good idea. That's what beyond beef is. that's what beyond meat beef is it's imitation beef what is imitation crab i have to know now before we get into this i'm trying to see if they like label fat-free cheese a certain way where it's like um you know like they call it

like uh like someone like the jellies like they call them spread or something like or honey that's what it is like if you go to a restaurant and like uh um what's um like chicken restaurant what's it called um doesn't matter but they have like honey for their biscuits kfc something yeah exactly yeah no i'm thinking the other one oh come on popeyes there it is they have like honey spread it's not like honey like but it's like because it's it's not real they added sugar it's just sugar and water and like honey. But it's like because it's not real. They added sugar. It's just sugar and water and like food coloring syrup. That's awesome.

We found it guys. Imitation crab is made with surimi, a paste made out of finely shredded or polarized fish. After the fish is minced it's heated and pressed into shapes that resemble meat from a crab leg. The resulting imitation crab looks similar to the original crab in its coloring and texture.

This is all the shit that they couldn't sell. Pretty much. And with that said, chorizo is the best type of burrito out there. That's true. But chorizo has like, it's all the other shit. Yeah. A lot of other stuff with lots of spices in there, right? Yeah.

Chorizo and eggs, though. Chorizo and eggs. So. Chorizo and eggs. So good. Burritos. Oh, my God. Well. We are hungry. It's late in the day.

Late-ish in the day. Yeah. But we got something good for you guys today. I think this episode right here, this is one of those things that can help everything that you do as far as your- Did you poop? I'm curious. Yeah. Oh, you did a good one.

I did. We were on a walk and you were like... The phantom hit me out of nowhere, man. And I forgot because then we went into Tesla and... Okay, you know what? Before we get to the topic, man. I almost shit my pants in that Tesla. I thought I shit my pants when I hit the accelerator.

I really thought I shit myself because I think I was sweating. So my booty crack was a little bit wet. And I was like, i i just shit in marx tesla but no thank god i didn't dude i've been in corvettes i've driven turbocharged cars that just shit on all of them it's hard to get back into another car after you're in that thing it was the plaid yeah so people know it's the plaid it's like a rocket ship the 40 to whatever we and first off okay guys if you have a friend that has a tesla or especially the plaid one you got to let that friend let you drive yeah or you just need to go to the tesla dealership and let them let you take it for a spin because i think they kind of have to let you if you say i

want to buy it you can test drive that shit and if you hit that accelerator it your heart everything just goes to the back of your body and you go to the back of the seat dude i just i'm sitting there again like you you you feel that initial kickback in the car you're like whoa that was great like damn that thing really picks up speed but then you you catch up. I couldn't catch up. Like, I couldn't catch my breath. I'm like, fucking see me. He's still flooring it. I'm like, come on.

Like, I'm going to catch up eventually. And when I say catch up, it's like almost like when you get in a cold plunge where you're like, your breath gets taken out of you. You're like, let me catch up. That's how it was. And I'm like, we're still picking up speed. Like, this is not slowing down. Like, the torque is, the torque band is like forever.

That's the technical term, torque band? band uh just yeah don't worry about it like normally like uh like the rpms and stuff yeah so like uh in certain cars like you hit you know 8 000 rpms or 9 000 if you're a honda and in that like power band right there like that's where you pick up like the most like giddy up right like that's where you're gonna the most giddy-up, right? That's where you're going to notice that biggest kickback. We're in a Subaru around 3K when the turbo kicks in. With that shit, we just kept going. I'm like, are we going to fucking slow? We're not.

We ran out of road. It's so cool, man. Okay, so people say, and I would imagine, because that's going to be the next car I get, but people say, you know, once you get in some of these nice things, it doesn't bring you happiness. And I agree. It doesn't bring you happiness. But I can imagine that flooring that every day will bring me copious amounts of joy.

It's a fucking roller coaster that you get to just go out and drive. Dog, that's so sick. drive yeah dog that's so sick they say uh the best things in life are free but the second best things cost a lot of money yeah you know i thought you know i think a good saying for car people for that i thought it was going to be something the best things in life for free but the second best things are fast because that god damn it has some has some pickup on it doesn't it yes speed and the annoying thing is like that felt crazier than the slingshot like the little three-wheeler and i know um jeff alberts jeff alberts wasn't like gunning it like he's not trying to hurt anybody or get in trouble but like yeah dude even i've been on motorcycles and like it's like not even

close like this is ridiculous it is a spaceship like it's like not even close like this is ridiculous it is a spaceship like it's not supposed to be spacious is it really so it is over a thousand horsepower okay yeah 1020 and then it uh you know it's like a golf cart right like the accelerator like it doesn't have like a gas pedal and it doesn't have like rpms that it searches for as you're trying to floor it or whatever it has nothing to switch into it just is already going so it's just however long it takes and i'm sure they can make it way crazier than that if they wanted to and then that's the other thing so like thinking of like a turbocharged car supercharged car naturally aspirated like if you gun it the way

we did it'd be like fuck like i'm pretty sure i'm gonna have to check on something like i just i hurt the car all right there's a lot of friction there's a lot of combustion going on in that it was just like hey guys what else do you want to do today we did it like eight ten times i did like five or six times you did like five or six times quick question um does that tesla uh the plaid one because you know how they say there's ludicrous mode so was that the fastest that that thing could have gone or was there another mode that was faster than what we did i don't really know uh necessarily about like ludicrous mode in that car i think that car is ludicrous already okay yeah i think so but um it also does have like another level which i never even messed with.

You can put it in launch mode or something, and the car's got to rest for two minutes as it powers up. Oh, my gosh. And then you hit the gas, and you go like zero to 60, I think, in 1.7 or something like that. Yeah, well, according to this YouTube video, it can do it at zero to 60 in 1.5. Yeah, there you go. So, I mean, we were going zero to 60 in probably two seconds you know it's was not that much further behind its normal like mode or whatever that's so cool what in the hell dude that's so cool craziness when do you guys stop drinking caffeine in the

day do you guys have like a cutoff point you got a strict a strict rule about like i don't want to have it passed i i do and i don't um yeah if i look down at my watch and it's like two o'clock i'm like no i'm not gonna do like there's no way um there's other times where like we i don't have like a back-to-back with guests or something and it's like if i can feel that like i didn't get a good i don't know good or whatever it may be. And that's not even a good excuse to have it. But if I just feel like, all right, do I have to get to this finish line right now? Then I will have it. But after three o'clock, there's no way. Like I would never have caffeine after 3 PM myself. And I always tell other people like, Hey, like past lunchtime, don't be messing with caffeine. You know, if they're, they're asking for advice, right? Like if there's, you know, like, Oh, I can't sleep well, hey, like past lunchtime, don't be messing with caffeine. You know, if they're, they're asking for advice, right? Like if there's, you know, like I can't sleep well, like, well, okay, let's actually just get rid of all the caffeine and see how well you can sleep. Cause it's always like, oh, I'm not tired. We'll stop taking all these things that are keeping you awake. But that's a whole, I mean, not a whole nother topic, but like, yeah. So after 3 p.m. for me, it's definitely hard.

No. And I will try to not have any after 12. Yeah, that's the that's the same with me. I'll attempt to not have any caffeine past noon. And most days, that's how it is. Same situation with you. If like we do have to hit up another guest and I'm just not feeling the energy isn't there. I'll do like maybe one of those small bottles.

It has like 45 milligrams of caffeine or whatever. The Fit Aids? The Fit Aids. Yeah, they have like 45 milligrams of caffeine. So I'll take a little bit of that. But because of how important sleep is. And I want to mention this too because a lot of people are like, well, you know, I can have caffeine at 5 or 6 p.m. And I can still fall asleep.

Same here. I'm the same. Exactly. I'm the same person. I could have a cup of coffee at 8 p.m. and still fall asleep by 10 or 11 p.m. But the thing is, even though you're asleep, your sleep quality isn't as good as if you kept the caffeine away from that because of the half-life of caffeine. Yeah. I think some people, they work out a little bit later in the day. They work out at like 4, 5, 6, sometimes even later than that. Some people work out at like 8 p.m. And on their way from work to the gym,

they're having a pre-workout, which I guess sometimes you got to do what you got to do, right? Right. It puts you in kind of a compromising spot. I think one of the things to think about when it comes to caffeine and it comes to like figuring out your sleep, you want to try to search for like the minimum effective dosage.

And I heard Andrew Huberman talk about this before, and this is something I noticed just with myself more naturally, was that it really didn't make sense for me to wake up and have coffee like right away. Like it just – I'm kind of groggy anyway. Like, and I think that you should be. I think that the sensations that we're looking for throughout the day, I think a lot of them are maybe like misinterpreted. You hear people talk about being happy and feeling good and like being excited.

That's not real life. You're not just going to be like super happy and euphoric all day, every day. It just doesn't work that way. You're not always going to have energy. And I think that sometimes like there should be a little grace period for most people. Maybe some people, maybe when some people wake up, they wake up and bam, they're just really, really ready to go. I mean, my penis is ready to go. The rest of me is like, yo, I'm still kind of groggy. So I think you should give yourself a few minutes, if not maybe an hour or two, to be awake and then have your cup of coffee. Because I don't think that coffee should ever be utilized or caffeine

should, I hate the word ever. I don't think it should be utilized often as a replacement for you feeling tired. I don't think it works great that way. And I think a lot of people listening right now are like, yeah, I know what you're talking about. Like that wired and tired feeling. That's a shitty feeling. And I don't know about you guys, but when I've had that, feeling. And I don't know about you guys, but when I've had that, I have felt more stressed that way. And then I'm, I can be really restless at night. That's because like the whole day was just off. Like it was, you know, I was, uh, wired and tired and kind of, uh, I don't know, the day was kind of a lot because I was already tired cause I didn't sleep well. And I tried to fix it by drinking something and it just, it never worked the way that I thought it was going to work.

Sometimes you're just going to be a little fatigued and a little tired. You know what? I agree with you. After I heard Hooperman talk about that on one of his podcasts, I started to do that, meaning I didn't drink coffee once I woke up. I drank maybe 60 to 90 minutes after and I did feel a little bit better. But I did get back into the habit. Now I have been having coffee like 20 minutes after I get up. Like the routine is usually getting up, going downstairs, making the coffee, making the food for the dogs, drinking the coffee,

right? But I do need to go back to waiting a bit because I know when I was doing that, I did feel a little bit better. So that's something that I'm going to try to start doing again because- It might feel a little more better. So that's something that I'm going to try to start doing again because. It might feel a little more useful for people. Yeah, I agree. I agree. When I did do it, it was better. So that is one thing.

Staving off caffeine for about an hour, 90 minutes after you wake up can help you out a little bit. Yeah. And I noticed that when I do, because I've been, I'll wake up, do everything I do. And then as I'm leaving to come come here that's when I have my cup of coffee like on the road so it's with I mean it's at least an hour and a half after I'm awake but I did try it I tried caffeine like right when I got up because I can lean on that and it'll help me take a shit way quicker because it just like boom instantly comes out yes but what I noticed was like it was a lot harder for me to get into the cold plunge because I was way more anxious. I was way more like questioning myself like maybe I'll do it when I get home.

Like, you know, doing all these things where it's like, dude, yesterday I was fine. Like I didn't get right in, but it wasn't like this big old hard, difficult argument in my head. And like I was like shaking before I even got in there. And I'm like, I think it was the caffeine. So it went right back out of the routine. A contrast shower, by the way, after you mess around with some cold plunging just feels like total baby talk. It feels like jump change. It feels like way too easy.

Nice. I did one the other day because Andy and I were going to a restaurant or something, and it felt great to take a hot shower. But then I was like, ah, it would kind of be nice like get woken back up a little bit again and get recharged. And so I contrasted the shower back and forth a bit and I was like, this is so easy. This is ridiculous. Yeah. Didn't give me like the chills or nothing. I was like, this is awesome.

That's the same thing that happened to me because my cold plunge chiller that I have to get replaced. So I've been able to cold plunge for like the past six days so i've been just cold showering and and now i go into the cold shower i'm like the fuck is this like it's still a good practice is it true that your dick doesn't even shrink now it's just perpetually smaller because of the cold plunge you know i have a that's a huge classic dick well that's a huge advantage of the cold plunge andrew tell them how they can save it yeah you guys gotta head over to the cold plunge.com and at checkout enter promo code power project save a bunch of money but you guys are savages i i haven't tried it but i and as i was prepping because i knew it was going to be delivered like i gotta get used to this stuff

so i tried the the contrast or you know whatever and it sucked i could only do it for like 30 seconds and i'm like like dying in there. Doing the cold plunge to me is easier than the cold shower. I'm not sure if it's because I have the access to just turn the water hot or I can like, I don't know.

I think it's also because the temperature in your cold plunge right now is like 58, right? Yeah, 57, sir. Yeah, to get me. once you get that bitch to like 50 45 and you do that and then you go back to your shower you'll be like oh yeah it's pretty easy because that's all right yeah i'll just keep it in the cold plunge at 57 the cold plunge is it's a crazy thing uh because what what does it go up to? Like 65 or something, right? I think it just goes up to 60. Actually, maybe the ones we have can go warm, I guess.

If you have the heating element, it can go up to, I don't know. They do have a hot and cold plunge that can go up to 90-something degrees. Anyway, 60 degrees is cold. 60 degrees is very freaking cold. But it's so interesting how when you have it for a little while, how used to colder water. I mean, it doesn't take that long to start getting more and more used to it. Yeah, I still remember the first time I went from 59 to 58 degrees. And whatever, I don't know how accurate it can be to where it's like one degree.

Maybe it was more than that. But my skin was like all pink. I was like in pain. I'm like, ah, this is cold. But now I can do that you know just fine like i can yeah it's not comfortable but like i can do it and not freak out i just put it as cold as whatever the hell it goes to and i think it was like 37 or something i want to say yeah it's like 37 or 30 and i was like what can be the difference you know i was like at 42 the other day i'm like let me just go just go in. It was very, very difficult.

It was very difficult. So then I jacked it back up. I think it's like more like 45 now, but that's still hard. It's still difficult. What I did notice about it though is that having like a good amount of water in there really makes a big difference too. Because mine is indoor, so I'm trying not to splash everything all over the place. It's actually way hard to try to get into when it has less water in it

because then when I go to lay back, all the water's not getting on me at first and then I have to submerge myself down and I'm like, no! But meanwhile, if I just kind of fall back when it's filled up more, then I just get the full submerging right away. Yeah, I kind of I've been I'll say I'm taking pride in how smooth I can get into it now, because before I would just like plop down and then like shoot my legs forward and they would shoot me back.

And like the water would like I can watch it splash out, splash right out. And what happened was just like, huh? I was like, the extension cords right behind me. I was like, and I'm just dumping water all over this shit. I'm like, it's probably not good. So I'm like, let me calmly get in. And now I kind of, like I said, take pride in getting smoothly in there and not looking like a baby. But, you know, for everyone who, okay, so if you have a cold plunge, it is a hell of a wake up.

Like I, I mean, I know I have the habit of drinking coffee in the morning, but if I didn't, God dang, a cold plunge. Cool. Amazing. Wakes you up immediately. But a cold shower to that shit, you know, that will also get you up and going in the morning. So, you know, if you want to stave off your coffee for a little bit, go into that cold shower. Contrast shower it. You're going to feel good. You're going to be awake. You're going to get going. Even just debating whether or not

you're going to do it's going to get your heart pumping and wake you up. Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. But you know, on the sleep side of things, my cold plunge is outside. But what I try to do every single morning is I have to put the dogs outside, right? So I'll make sure to also go outside and look at the sun. I try to look at the sun all the time because what that does is that resets your circadian rhythm. It's like you see it's daytime. Your body recognizes that. You get all these different things that are starting to move and like, okay, this is the start of your day. And then it gets your rhythm consistent so that you probably will fall asleep at the same time. I noticed that when I started doing that,

getting morning sun, just looking outside just for a little bit, a minute or two, I start getting tired at the same exact time each day. You know, it's like, it's not like, I feel tired at midnight or 11. It's like, I'm always feeling tired at 9.30 p.m. every single day. And I know it sounds like we're selling you some witchcraft here when we say that it does multiple things, getting cold plunge, but it's helped me get to sleep because I don't usually use mine in the morning. I just feel like with the way my schedule is, it's kind of hard for me to get it in in the morning, but I do want to actually, you know, get into the cold plunge. So, uh, it works perfectly for me later on in the day. Um, and it feels really easy to get into later on in the day. Like I really want to get in there. Uh, so it's been a good way for

me to kind of break in, to get in there, but I'll go in the cold plunge. I take a shower and I, I watched TV with my wife the other day and I put on like sweat pants and like a hoodie and it was like a hundred and something degrees outside. After you cold plunged? Yeah. Oh, shit. After I cold plunged, after I showered. The shower didn't even warm my button dick back up again.

Yeah, no. You see in the mornings when I cold plunge, I'm over here podcasting. I was watching TV sitting there shimmying and shivering, but it has been something that's been helpful, uh, for my sleep a ton. Yeah. I want to say too, as we get into this episode, um, some, some of you guys might be listening to me like, ah, the sleep stuff. It's like, I get a decent amount of sleep. It's not a big deal. Let me tell you, like if you have a fitness goal or if you have goals in general, there's this thing within like hustle culture and work culture and entrepreneurship culture where it's like,

you know, I'll sleep when I'm dead. I have too much work to do. Don't waste time sleeping. Got to wake up and grind before everybody else. I get it. And working hard is super necessary, but you can work hard in a more efficient fashion and you'll be more productive if you're well rested. It is not a pussy thing. It is not a weak thing to get enough sleep because in the hours that you now need to work, you'll be more focused. You'll be more efficient. Your mind will be sharper. Your communication will be better. Your mood dealing with people will be better. When it comes to exercise, you're not going to get in, like sleep will help you not get injured as much because your body's going to move better. You're

going to have better reflexes. And the way you stick to your diet, it's going to be easier because as we know, you're not going to have these wild cravings as much if you're well rested. Yeah. It'll be easier to make choices. It'll be easier to handle stress during the day. Muscle gain will be easier. Everything will be easier. Your hormones will be in better alignment towards whatever the thing is that you're working towards. So it just does so many things that it's not a great idea to mess with your sleep in a negative way. And if you are someone that likes to get after it and likes to get up early, there's absolutely no problem with that. You just have to make sure that you go to bed early, just like a little kid. Are you going

to bed early enough? Each person is probably going to be a little different. I don't know how much I believe or buy some of the information about like it has to be eight hours. I think that that might be something that makes people kind of worried and makes it hard for them to sleep. But like whatever amount of time you can get to sleep that represents something more or better than what you used to do is the aim, and I think it's something that you should look into. Something so simple in terms

of sleep would be just to get yourself an eye mask. An eye mask is so awesome. I've been wearing an eye mask for probably like a decade and I'll whip that bad boy out on planes. Like, I don't care. I got no shame with that one. I'll just put it on. Having the room that you're in dark is really important, but it's very difficult to have it like dark, dark. I even have, I got like blackout shades. I got all kinds of stuff, but none of them actually block out all the sun. And if you don't want to spend money on a bunch of curtains and shades and try to figure out this weird configuration of how to make your room pitch black, then all you got to do is throw something on your eyes to help block out the sun. So that's been huge for me. Those are very inexpensive.

I have to add on to what you mentioned. So you've mentioned eye masks before. I ended up buying one on Amazon Amazon and it was decent. I used it for a bit, but I stopped because it wasn't super comfortable. Blue Blocks, I ended up getting their Remedy eye mask. And what's been happening has, I know I told you guys how my circadian rhythm has me wake up every day at like 6.23 on the dot. Well, now I'm waking up at 7.16 on the dot. And it's because what happens in my room, I don't have blackout shades.23 on the dot. Well, now I'm waking up at 7.16 on the dot. And it's because what happens in my room,

I don't have blackout shades. So when the sun starts to come up, my room gets a little brighter and I wake up at that same, I used to wake up at that same time, but using the eye mask, I naturally sleep more and I feel more rested when I get up, when those eye mask comes off.

So some people are going to look at that and be like, oh, now you're getting up later, blah, blah, blah. But I appreciate having good sleep. And if it allows me to sleep a little bit longer and more efficiently, that's what my body needs. And I'd rather take that extra, what, potential hour of sleep to be more productive and sharper during my days. And I have noticed that I am thinking clear. I have a little bit better clarity. And I know we're doing all these things where we're always like, yeah, I feel better. I feel better. But truthfully, like I do feel a bit better with that extra sleep that I'm getting. The eye mask that you bought, is it just a little bit more expensive than some

of the regular ones you can get? Well, that's the one. Yeah, that's the one from Blue Box. The remedy mask. It's more comfortable and stuff stuff it's more comfortable because i had this one from amazon that was like 20 something dollars and it's versus other eye masks like normal eye mask it's more expensive but it wasn't as comfortable as this one and it didn't stay on as well as this one at night um this one it has like spaces in the eyes um and it's not like directly just smashing your eyes. It has some space. Yeah, the real cheap ones aren't great because they don't allow – I think your eyes need to kind of breathe. It sounds kind of funny. But your eyes, like they – you don't want anything on your eyeball.

I don't think ever really. So when your eyes are closed, I think it's good to have that space. I have an eye mask that's probably a little similar to that. And I do wake up, you know, getting a little freaking eye boogers out of my eyes, but not nearly as bad as when I had like a cheaper version. Wait, so wait, when you had a cheaper version, you have more eye boogers? Oh, yeah. Yeah. It was just like gross. I don't know. I don't know if it's because like something was like in my, you know, on almost on my eyeball or what it was.

Yeah, that one is super comfortable. We don't have a code for you guys, but they're a great company. So if you guys want to get some eye masks from them or anything else, check out Blue Blocks. Yeah, B-L-U-B-L-O-X.com. And actual glasses like that that have that annoying ability to change the color of everything that you're looking at at night can also help a lot. What have you noticed for yourself? What I noticed, and I'll talk a little bit more about it, is like I have blue blockers, and they're also from Blue Blocks. But initially, there is this annoyance of wearing the yellow-tinted blue blockers because everything you look at is now tinted. Like you're trying to watch some TV, you're trying to look at your phone, and it's tinted blue blockers because everything you look at is now tinted like you're trying to watch some tv you're trying to look at your phone and it's tinted but by using it consistently man

i people have say oh it doesn't work blah blah i get tired quicker like i truly start to fucking doze off way quicker when i quicker when i have my blue blockers on versus when i don't it makes a big difference for me too and i found myself like I have them on and then I'm trying to like look under them and like read my phone and stuff. And I'm like, ah, you know what? Just put your fucking phone away. So at the very least, it's just a cue that like your day is over. So whether they work from like a real scientific standpoint or not, I don't know how much it

matters. It's like a placebo effect, you know? Like you know that you're getting ready for bed, you put them on, it's part of the routine. Then what's going to come next after that is you're probably going to like brush your teeth, use the bathroom, maybe get into particular clothes,

maybe get naked, who knows what you're going to do when you go to sleep. But that's, it's a cue, you know? And so for me, I don't know how much of the blocking of the light, what it's done to me, like in terms of hormones or something like that, but it's definitely helped. I put them on for about an hour before I go to bed. And it also makes watching TV like not as enjoyable because the TV is like weird colors, but you can watch TV

still. So yeah, I found it to be really useful. It's like, I'll try anything because like my sleep sucked for so many years. I do want to rewind and add this. Along with getting morning sunlight, I'll also do my absolute best to get out obviously during different parts of the day, but I try to get out before a little bit before sunset and take a walk and get some of that sunset and also get out at night. Um, because it's like, there's also learned this from Hoover men, as far as the circadian rhythm, he had this great doctor on that talked about it. Um, but your body starts to get triggers at the

sun is setting. It's time to wind down and get ready for bed. So it's one of those, you know, there are these things you get to help you get your day started. Cold plunge, coffee, movement. Well, there's also a cooling down or a wind down routine. And one of those things that I do to wind down is I get outside during sunset. I try to take a walk. My body knows what's happening. Your body is super smart. It's really wild.

Oh, yeah. Imagine if you got up every day and you just kept seeing the moon you'd be like what the fuck i think isn't it alaska yeah there's certain areas that don't have any daylight for yeah x amount of days or whatever that shit and it crushes everybody it's really it's difficult yeah yeah no um i i used to mess with the uh the the blue blocking glasses but having a prescription, sometimes it's just annoying. But I can't say I did or I didn't notice anything. Yeah. But that's only because when it's time to go to sleep, I'm out pretty quickly.

I'm pretty lucky to have that. Yeah. But what I don't have is I wouldn't stay asleep. But what I don't have is I wouldn't stay asleep. You know, I'd get up every so often until, like I mentioned recently, I have the combination of the Breathe Right strips, mouth tape, and air purifier. And then, of course, the eight sleep mattress, which is amazing because trying not to sleep on that thing is really difficult now. But with the combination of those four things, I'm able to stay asleep quite a bit longer. And, you know, we talked about it in the prior episode, but how is it that you, um, built up to the mouth tape? Cause you know, we talk about mouth tape, but you, you added in certain things that have been super helpful.

Yeah. So at first, you know, just like a lot of people, I was very resistant to it. Like I was like, there's no way, like my nose is always stuffed up at night. Like I can't do it. But what I noticed right away was when you tape up your mouth and your only way that you can get oxygen in your, in your body is through your nose, your body's like, well, shit, we have to clear this out now. And like, I noticed that like my nose would clear up pretty quickly after I put on the mouth tape. Um, there was like, I, I, I used the, uh, Somni fix because it has that breathing hole or whatever. I tried not to use it, but you kind of, you feel like claustrophobic for a little bit and it's just like, Oh my gosh, like I'm not going to be able to do this.

But then eventually you break through it. Um, so initially the, the, the brave, breathe the right strip didn't work for me. And when I say didn't work, I mean like it didn't help my snoring at all. Like it's still like snored like crazy and it irritated my skin. It was kind of weird. The mouth tape by itself, it helps suppress the sound of me snoring, but I still snored and I still woke up in the middle of the night having to go pee quite a bit. Uh, so I, I stuck with it,

but it didn't quite like solve my sleepless issues. Um, and then I got an air purifier and then I brought back the breathe the right strips. And now the combination of those three things has really helped like a ton because I'm no longer snoring, which is insane because I've been snoring my whole life. And, um, this morning I woke up and I was just like, man, I haven't been waking up in the middle of the night peeing. Like, I'm not sure if I'm just completely out, out, and my body's like, fuck it, we're not getting up. But that, or I know when you tape your mouth

and you're not breathing through your mouth, it's like a natural diuretic or something like that. I think, not diuretic. Is that the right word? No, no, no. When you're breathing through your mouth, it's a natural diuretic? I'm not sure if that's the right term, but whatever it is. Yeah, diuretics help you pee.

Okay. So then it helps you not pee when you're breathing through your nose. Yeah. So by doing that, I haven't been getting up in the middle of the night to pee, which is freaking cool. I think when you're not sleeping well, you will wake up frequently to pee. And when you pee, you won't even have to pee that much. And so you know that you're sleeping deep.

Either if you don't wake up at all, obviously that would be good. But if you wake up and you pee and it seems like, seems like it goes on for like four minutes, that's how you know you've been sleeping pretty damn good. Like the Austin Powers pee. Yeah. Yeah. Oh my gosh, that was in the morning for sure. You know, that is one thing that a lot of people mention though.

One thing is like, I ask people quite a bit. Do you wake up with a dry mouth in the morning? Like, is your mouth dry? Because, you know, we talk about using mouth tape, but you should be able to sleep with your mouth closed. So, you know, if you don't use mouth tape and you're waking up in the morning and you don't have a dry mouth and you're typically breathing through your nose, good for you. You don't need to do the mouth tape thing. But a lot of people wake up and their mouth is super dry. We did have a dentist on that came in. I mean,

Patrick McGeehan talked about this, but you also had a dentist on that came on and talked about individuals who mouth breathe and their sleep a lot, get more cavities, you know, because of the drying out of the mouth and all these things like, you know, different things that aren't in the mouth because you're breathing like this all the time. Like it can lead to a lot of dysfunction. So we're not like you've mentioned, Mark, I can lead to a lot of dysfunction. So we're not, like you've mentioned, Mark, I'm pulling this out of our ass. We've had experts come on and talk about it. So it's just something to think about. Yeah, it's a huge deal. And the mouth tape has helped me a ton. And there might be people that like, just, I don't know, they'll just never

give it a try. But I just think if you have an issue with your sleep, just why not try many different options and kind of see what starts to work. Maybe the Breathe Right strips will help. Maybe, you know, maybe just trying to get to bed at a different time. Something that I noticed for myself is like, I have like multiple waves of getting tired.

Like normally it would be really uh out of character for me to feel tired like during the day but that's pretty rare um i might like be less inspired to do something versus another day or something like that but uh for the most part i don't feel like i have an energy problem during the day but sometimes at like around 7 or so, 7 and 8, sometimes I'll feel pretty tired. And I will like just ignore that because I'm like it's not time to go to bed. But nowadays I'm like, you know what? Let me use that cue. I should actually just start to get ready for bed.

It doesn't mean I go to bed at that time. It means that I start to – because I like to be prepared for the next day before I go to bed at that time. It means that I start to, because I like to be prepared for the next day before I go to bed. So I might lay out clothes or think about like, what am I going to wear the next day? Or what do I need to bring with me for tomorrow's show or for what we're doing tomorrow? I look at my calendar and stuff like that. So I start planning for the next day. That actually helps calm me down as well. Although sometimes I can get excited about the next day, but for the most part, it helps me be at peace because I like know what I'm going to be doing, when I'm going to be doing it. And I feel prepared. Sometimes not being prepared can make you super restless. So being prepared

for the day is something that helps a lot. But I've noticed that I will sometimes push off that first time that I feel tired and I'll ignore it. And then it'll be like two hours later than I'm, when I'm supposed to be going to bed and now I'm not tired at all. And I like re-woke myself back up again. And then if I try to go to bed when I don't feel like going to bed, it ain't going to happen. So it's important.

I do think that there is an importance of like trying to get on a schedule and trying to have specific times. But also I think sometimes those times will be augmented a bit, especially when you have family and you have certain obligations to go to and things like that that might keep you up later than you'd like. But for the most part, waking up at 6 or waking up at 7 every day, going to bed between 9 and 10 or whatever the time is, that time slot that you have is, that is a really, really healthy practice and something that I think a lot of people should try to work on. You know, one thing I want to add on to what you're mentioning there is it is more beneficial

to try to sleep around the same time. And it can somewhat be something difficult for couples because there might be someone who hears this, whether you're the woman or the man, and you're like, okay, I'm gonna try to get on a consistent schedule. But your spouse may be a person that doesn't sleep at the same time consistently. Maybe some, some nights they stay up till 2am and some nights they go to sleep at midnight, but they're just, they, they don't care that much. Right. And when you start doing this, maybe it's difficult because they're doing that. So it might be a good idea to try to maybe educate them if you can on why it's going to be helpful for them.

Because I'm lucky enough that my significant other is someone that is very regimented with their sleep. And they somewhat pay attention to the benefits, but I really know the benefits. So actually even it's beneficial for me as somebody who knows how important it is. And I'm just like, God, she's sleeping on time. I got to get to sleep on time because I'm actually the one who sometimes is like, I want to stay up a little bit later. But this person's like, I'm tired. I'm going to sleep. So I'm like, you're right. So it's a good idea to try to get them in on it with you if you can. And if you can't, whatever. But if you can, it might be a little easier.

Yeah. I always say that my son has sleeping windows. So like the window is usually from like 7 to like 830. Yeah. Somewhere in there, he will go to sleep. If we miss that window, we're kind of fucked for another two hours because he is like bing, bing. He's wide awake till like close to 10 11 o'clock yeah and that's a huge bummer so like when we get him to bed at his normal time around

eight o'clock um i just always say i'm trying to chase his sleep like like i shouldn't even be up anymore if he's already asleep because when i wake up he's kind of the reason why i either wake up or when i get up i'm like I don't want to move him. You know, like, so it's weird. Cause like, he's the reason why I stay in bed or get out of bed because he's either up or asleep still. Like this morning, I tried not to wake him up. Every time I try to sneak out of bed, he would kind of start to wake up. And this was after a long day yesterday where the night before he didn't get, he got really, really bad sleep. So yesterday was rough. He was just like really irritated the whole day.

So I wanted to make sure he got plenty of sleep. As I'm trying to get out of bed, he's waking up. So I'm like, no, I'm just kidding. I'm not going anywhere. I'm still here. And then, all right, he's asleep. I'll try to get up. Nope, just kidding.

I'm not going anywhere. So I stayed in bed pretty late today, which kind of messed up my morning. But yeah, I always say that I'm trying to chase his sleep because it's like, there's really no point for me to be awake past, you know, his bedtime. Your output is also super important, you know, having good, strong output every single day. So, you know, be aware of that. Like, I think that everyone always feels like they work really hard, but you know, maybe you track that for a couple of days. I think that everyone always feels like they work really hard, but maybe you track that for a couple days. Maybe you look at what it is that you're doing and how much

real activity is there in there, how much real physical activity is in there. Because if you run and you lift or you do jiu-jitsu and you work out or you worked all day and got a workout in, you should be pretty tired. And I'd also say be very you know, you worked all day and got a workout in, it's like, you should be pretty like,

we should be pretty tired. And I'd also say like, be very cautious of trying to rely on any sort of like drug or anything to get you to sleep. I know there's some people that there's some information about melatonin that's coming out. that's super interesting. But regardless of stuff like that, I just don't know. I don't know if it's a great idea to rely on anything. I think I could always, I could make a, you can make an argument that there's a time and place for just about anything. So if somebody is really having a real hard time, maybe they see a doctor or something like that and they go through an intervention of that. There are a lot of people that suffer from sleep apnea, so that is something.

If your partner is like, you sound like you're going to die in your sleep because you're not breathing, you can actually die in your sleep from that. That's the way that the famous football player Reggie White died. He died in the middle of sleep, choking on his own saliva or vomit or whatever it was. It's a horrible way to go. And it happens to a lot of people.

But there's millions of Americans that are undiagnosed with sleep apnea. This is not just a disease that's for people that are heavy or people that haven't been paying attention to their fitness or their nutrition or their diet. There's a lot of people that suffer from it. Reasons on why you get it, who in the hell knows why. There's a lot of speculation on why you get it. But again, I just want to go back and just say, be very cautious in trying to really rely on anything. For me, coming from being 330 pounds, luckily I've never, I shouldn't say never, luckily I didn't fall into the trap of trying to rely on anything to get to sleep. There's been times where I popped like sleeping pills on planes and stuff like that. But that's just for fun.

It didn't work. It fucked up. Me and Jesse, like we just, we got totally crushed by it. And then we were so sleepy and out of whack for like the next two, three days. It was rotten. But what I wanted to do coming down from 330 to the weight that I am now in talking with Stan Efferding and Brian Shaw and some of these guys that are using sleep apnea machines, after I figured out that it was very difficult for me to adopt or adapt this machine to help me sleep, I was like, you know what? or adapt this machine to help me sleep, I was like, you know what? I'm just going to continue to lose weight and continue to get in better shape until I figured this thing out. And I'm

not going to use a sleep apnea machine. I'm just, I'm going to rid myself of sleep apnea. Now, I don't know if I have officially rid myself of sleep apnea, but I think I've done a really good job of it. And I think that I, I, I know for a fact that I'm sleeping through the night a lot better. Um, I don't wake up in the, I don't wake up nearly as many times as I used to. I used to wake up like probably every 90 minutes or so. Every 90 minutes, all the time, every, every day for, I don't know, 10 years or so. That's crazy, dude. So that does not happen any longer.

I still wake up probably once or twice, but nothing worse than that. And I cured it by doing what? I don't know. I lost a lot of weight. I walk. I run. I actually think that running has helped quite a bit just from the like breathing variability. People talk about heart rate variability. And I think there could be some utility in learning about heart rate variability as well.

But I think breathing variability, being able to breathe really like easy, maybe some nasal breathing, like during certain exercises that I'm doing in a gym and trying to control my air when I'm doing something that otherwise would have most people breathing intensely in and out of their mouth. So that has been something that has helped a lot. But it's been a wide range of stuff all the way from diet. Like I can't be like carnivore diet, you know, cured me of my sleep apnea or losing weight. You know, it wasn't one thing. It was a giant mashup of a lot of things. And guess what? I still got to practice all the same things that we're talking about here today. I don't get a free pass to, to not do that. I still need to have those disciplines. Yeah. A thing I want to add into that is it's, it's, it's great how you're mentioning, like it took a while and you've done a lot of things.

One of the things that I started to do, you remember when we went down the mewing rabbit hole years ago, like three tongue and all that stuff. And the, no, I still have the fouling gum, which I still chew every now and then. And, but, but for a while I was, I was hardcore and this was like four and a half, five years ago. I was hardcore paying attention to where's my tongue in my mouth when I'm chilling. Sometimes I noticed that my tongue wasn't chilling at the roof of my mouth. So I would be super conscious all the time of literally sucking in some saliva and making sure that my tongue was always perpetually resting at the roof of my mouth.

Because when we learned i know it was psychotic that's where your uh your tongue is supposed to go right it's like just like you just swallowed some liquid right like you just so if you swallow some saliva or drink some water and you swallow your tongue is actually supposed to be resting at the top of your mouth pushes up a little bit like suctions up yes and for a lot of people their tongue is not resting there So when they're sleeping and the tongue's at the bottom of their mouth and they're breathing through their mouth and you hear them choking, they're choking on their own tongue. So I would do that. I would also, I bought thalium gum, which is this really, really hard gum because it trains your masters and your jaw so that you can actually build more muscle there and it expands the airway. And a lot of people have breathing problems, we've learned, and we've had guests that have come and talked about it on the podcast.

Because so many years of mouth breathing, their jaws, their master, even the roof of their mouth and the space they have at the roof of their mouth, it is smaller. So because it's smaller, they have breathing dysfunction. And what I was just trying to do was I was doing this Falmingum stuff. I was doing this mewing exercise with my mouth, all to try to increase the size of my airway and just breathe better. So we'd done all that shit. Forward head posture, mouth open, you know, and kind of like, don't be a mouth breather. Whatever you do.

But as ridiculous as it might sound, um, you know, people from hundreds of years ago didn't need to get their wisdom teeth pulled out. Yeah. And like, why is that? Like, is this, is this an evolutionary trait where we no longer need those teeth? Um, is that something that happened to us or is it because we don't chew hard things the same way as we used to growing up yeah and you think about like when if you were i hate to always bring things back to ancestral stuff because it's kind of annoying sometimes you're like fuck that we've got modern times like i want to use a phone you fucking asshole you know you want to use like you want to use the technology that we have. It's wonderful to have it. Yeah. But like if you were to eat an animal, you had to like dismantle that thing, like literally dismantle it.

Before we got sharp knives and before we had cool stuff to really be able to quarter the animal properly and get it all sliced up into this perfect thing that we can chew a lot easier, you would take a bone, like if just like you would with a chicken thigh, you would bite into it and you would not only bite it, but you would pull it away. So you're getting the training of your, your teeth, your jaw, your, even your, your hand and your neck, all the muscles of your neck. It's like, how do you get that from eating chips? Yeah. How do you get that from eating chips yeah how do you get that from eating soggy cereal soft baby food right where these kids aren't being able to chew that's why what you're doing with the radius is why yeah i know we do we do so cut up the meat pretty small but that's just because like i mean he's choked like way too many times for me to be

comfortable with like just giving him like a full-on ribeye yeah like i don't know it's we're still babying him but he's going yeah well an interesting thing is if you gave him if you gave him like a really big piece he would only be able to do so much with it you know oh yeah he could kind of like learn for himself and like kind of like kind of gross but he could like gnaw on it yeah pull on it yeah probably get his feet in there and everything i know that'd be funny um well we gave him like a like an orange slice and because like i was eating him so i had like salt all over him and so he he got it and he just like he went all crazy but he kept like gnawing at it and you

can just see his like little teeth marks like combing through the orange uh what i was gonna say is um i i will mess with um it's from Tony Hughes' company, Enhanced Athlete Sleep Juice. What's in it? All kinds of stuff, dude. I don't know. Obviously, melatonin being like the main driving thing. Do you use it often? No, no.

I definitely don't. But when I do, man, I remember like all my dreams. Like they're pretty vivid. I'm out, like out, out. Like I don't have a hard time falling asleep. But when I take that within like half an hour, like if I'm not in bed, I will fall asleep wherever I'm at. Like if I'm sitting down and we're like trying to watch TV or something, I'm just like out. So it's fun and it is very tempting because when I go to bed, like I'll take some nighttime vitamins and I'll see it and I'll be like, ah, I was like, maybe I'll do it again tonight. And then the next night it's like, I probably shouldn't. Obviously it's going to be like, oh, it's not habit forming, but it can be, you know, it's a slippery slope we'll say. But man, it is, it is nice to just be completely out cold. I think that's great. It's cool. But it's something to be careful with because, I mean, I know people who built the habit of using melatonin before sleep. And now they can't sleep before melatonin. My ex needed Benadryl like four or five nights a week because she couldn't fall asleep

or she had insomnia without Benadryl. And she formed that habit young. I'm just like, God damn, like you need to use Benadryl every night? So like, you know, we're going to try. What else is that doing to your body? Yeah, dude. You know, and that's why we're trying to give you

all these habits, right? These things to do during your day, like exercise, you know, tire your body out, habits, right? These things to do during your day, like exercise, you know, tire your body out, right? All these little things to do so that when nighttime comes, you're not one of those, like, I think a lot of people that say, Oh, I got insomnia. They might not have some habits that are good, but they might not also be expending energy during their day. And now it comes to night and they still have all this energy. Well, that's one of those things where, you know, if you're, if you're using your body,

you should be tired by the time you had your head has to hit that pillow. And I just really quick, cause I don't want to put out bad information, but I was just looking up the ingredients for sleep juice. It only has 0.5 milligrams of melatonin, which I'm like, Oh shit, I was way off, but it does have five HTP has kava kava powder, green tea extract.

Let's see, L-theanine, magnesium, has a good amount of magnesium, some vitamin B6, and a shit ton of other things. But, man, this stuff really freaking works. One other thing that you guys can look up, when you mentioned theanine, look up the Huberman sleep stack. I think it's L-theanineanine i forgot i have it at home but i haven't used in a while but that could be something you guys try to um and he he says you know he he suggests it to people who have a really hard time getting to sleep but it could be

something that i don't think is too habit forming and you could try out on rough nights that you can't get to sleep instead of going to sleeping pills, which just knock you out. It's not like you're sleeping. You're just knocked out. Um, the Hooverman sleep stack. I don't know if you can put it up. Magnesium, theanine, apigenin, glycine, and GABA. But man, GABA is pretty potent in my opinion. GABA? GABA. From, from what I checked before, I don't know if maybe somebody added some stuff to that or it is, but it was theanine, magnesium, and then what else? Apigenin. Apigenin. Those are the only three.

Those are the only three that I purchased and used. The GABA and other stuff I don't fuck with. GABA makes me stop breathing. Jesus Christ. Maybe don't fuck with GABA. That ain't good. No. I personally have never had any of those things really do much for me.

But maybe I was expecting too much from them as well. I think sometimes when we're trying to supplement, we try a particular like intervention or just thinking like this should solve all my problems. Like hopefully this fixes everything. But most likely, like I'm saying, I think it's going to be probably a wide range of things that's going to assist you with your sleep let's not forget the power of positive thinking and the power of positive thought and just stop saying that you're bad at sleeping things like my brain doesn't shut off no one's brain shuts off thank you know, the brain's staying on all the time and we have weird dreams and weird thoughts and weird things going in and out of our mind. But from a more

weird point of view or a philosophical way of thinking about some of this is like, how well are you treating yourself? How well are you treating the people around you? If you have a lot of love and you have a lot of nice things going on and it feels like maybe you just haven't sat down and really thought about it. I think that's a case for me sometimes. I'm not always literally, I love and care about everybody that's around me. I tell people that often, But I don't sit down and just be like, hey, this is fucking badass. Like more recently I have. But I think I've always been so into like getting the next thing and like moving on to the next thing that even though I might not feel stressed out by it, it's like an internal thing that's going on constantly of me wanting to get the next shiny thing, do the next cool thing, do the next, because I do want to get my message out

there more. I would like to make more money. I would like to be more famous. I would like to continue to have my career fulfilled, cemented. I don't know what any of it means or why. I don't know why. I don't have any idea why. But I know that it feels good and I know that I would like more of it. But also just being happy, being grateful. Like this has been really cool shit. Like a company sends us fucking water because we have a dope show. Another company sends us fucking meat.

We got meat, we got water. It's like, we don't need much else. There's a lot of incredible things that happen. And I think if you're to slow yourself down a bit, you probably have a lot of really awesome things to be grateful for, to be thankful for. You probably have an amazing mom or an amazing brother or an amazing child you got some amazing shit going on and if you can kind of be at peace with some of that it should be a little easier you hear people say that they'll say i don't know how that guy sleeps at night right they say about like you're like backstabbing son of a bitch right i don't know that guy sleeps at night so i'm not saying that you got to sleep tonight. So I'm not saying that you're- Sleeping on a bed of lies.

I'm not saying that you're living your life that way, but maybe you're just not super appreciative of all the stuff that you have going on already. I want to add in, I was reading through this book with Paula Quinn's questions and answers from this library of books we have here. And one of the things that Paula Quinn- I didn't see your name.

Did you check it out officially? Did you write the name down? I should. We should have a little checkout system because I've checked out about four books. You're supposed to only do one at a time. I'm sorry. But Paula Quinn had people write down things that they were grateful for and happy about, especially people that didn't have a problem sleeping.

He's like, every night, pull out especially people that didn't have a problem sleeping. He's like every night, pull out a notebook and just start writing, just write. He, and he was, he said how that, that would be something that without fail would help his clients be able to start falling asleep and getting more restful sleep.

Chill out, bro. You got a lot of good things going on. Yeah. That's what he had people do. And that is actually a really, really cool practice. If you're having a problem winding yourself down, there's a lot of other things you do, but that's something pretty cool.

So how do we, like, I don't think we've been doing that great of a job with tying this into getting jacked without tracking. So when it comes to sleep, like what are some of the things that people can look forward to once they start kind of tackling that stuff down as far as like getting jacked. Yeah, dude, we've talked about this before, but when your sleep is optimized, your diet becomes an easier thing for you to be consistent with because number one, you mentioned hormones, Mark, while ghrelin, your hunger hormone doesn't secrete as high during your day. All right. So you don't generally feel as hungry as often when you're well rested. Leptin, your hormone that helps you feel fuller, secretes more when you actually feel full. Because when you're not rested, your stomach is like a bottomless pit. You will crave more food that you typically overeat. Now, like it's on overdrive. I've noticed that whenever I've gotten really bad sleep, I get these cravings that I haven't felt in such a long time.

So if you're now trying to stick on this diet and you're trying to be pretty structured with your eating, but you're not taking care of your sleep, well, your diet and your sticking to the protocols you've set up for your food is going to be harder for you. But if you have good sleep, you don't need to think about that, right? Because it's going to be something that is intrinsic. you don't need to think about that, right? You don't need it because it's going to be something that is intrinsic. But if you don't, now you're like, oh, you have to fight against those cravings rather than your body doing what it should be doing. Yeah. Cause like you hear people like, oh, I could never be that strict on a diet. It's like, well, this makes it way easier, right? This puts it on easy mode when you get sleep. It's, it's literally like, okay, it's what we should be doing already. But if you want to look at it as something,

it's like giving yourself a crutch. And if, if like, let's say you, you, it's what we should be doing already. But if you want to look at it as something, it's like giving yourself a crutch. And if like let's say you have a broken foot, you're not going to try to just walk on both feet. You're going to have something that's going to help you out. Your sleep is that thing that's going to help you walk. And if you don't have it, you're going to be trying to adjust and do all these fucking things while limping around because you're not well rested. I think the body has like some lag time to it. So I, I kind of, uh, have this theory or idea that, uh, we work two or three days behind, behind. And I don't think, and I think that there's some good reason for it. Like, I think that if you get one bad night of sleep, I don't think it puts you in too much of a hole, although research may show otherwise.

But one bad night of sleep, one night where you slept five hours and you go and you do some stuff the next day, there's people who are like, yeah, man, I went in the gym and I only had five hours sleep, but I still pulled 700. It actually felt easy. Well, how's that person going to feel two, three days from that point? They're going to really probably – that shit will catch up to you after a while. And I think that when it comes to lifting, you know, we can go in here and we can have tremendous output. And then the body is trying to have all that register. It's going to all the different cells. It's going, it's ping-ponging around in your body.

And your body's like, hey, let's turn some of that into this. It looked like you did a lot of damage. I don't know what the fuck you did in the gym there, but that was a big one. Your body will produce hormones to try to protect it. It will throw protein in the right spots to help rebuild stuff. And you'll begin repairing from that day of working out. But that day of working out really hard on Monday doesn't really register in the body until a handful of days later. Now it's like Wednesday

and you're like, whew, you get that delayed onset muscle soreness. So I think the body in general works that way, whether we're talking about learning or whether we're talking about growth from building up muscles, whether we're talking about trying to become faster or stronger, I think there's a delayed response. And I think when it comes to something like sleep, you may not notice it right away. You may not notice it all the time, but it could be that thing. Ron Penna was talking about how it was like you're walking around with a backpack and somebody's throwing 10 poundpound bricks in it every couple days. So it's like, oh, and Simi, you did great sleeping a handful of days, but Thursday night was bad.

Here's a 10-pound brick. And you go and you walk around. You do your jiu-jitsu and all your other stuff. And then you have another night that's fucked up. Here's another 10-pound brick. another 10 pound brick and maybe there's points where somebody is able to uh they don't really know whether you can like sleep it off or or if you can get it back or or or what but it does feel like your body does feel like it balances itself out at some point uh but there's a lot of people walking around with a lot of bricks in their in their backpack from not sleeping and it's just

extra weight that you're carrying around. Yeah, and Sima only sleeps two hours. Yeah, he's got a lot of energy. That's like level 99. You have to build up to the sleeping for two hours because I get in all the recovery factors. I get in everything. It's like the one meal a day.

You just get those two hours. They're the equivalent of like... That's money sleep. Yeah, yeah. But I built up to that over like four years're the equivalent of like money sleep. Yeah. Yeah. But I built up to that over like, like four years, four or five days. Yeah. Um, but I was going to say though, Mark, like in regards to like sleep debt or whatever, like, yeah, we don't know if we can pay that debt off, but for sure, like if you're going to have a, like a really hard workout where

you're like trying to build muscle, you're trying to do everything. You can't make up for a bad night of sleep. Like you, you, you can't have a really good work, have a bad night of sleep, really good workout, and then try to be like, Oh, I'm going to actually rest up and catch up on that sleep. Like, no, like it's already too late. The proper way to do it is to have the really good night of sleep and then the really good workout. That's actually the more optimum way to do it because you can't go back. Like, I don't know if that makes a lot of sense to everybody, but like you just, you can't make up for a bad night of sleep. You have to get it beforehand. I totally agree on that. And if a

lot of you, a lot of people are like, Oh, you know, uh, what are the best ways or best recovery tactics? Fucking sleep. The amount of recovery that goes on, the amount of like repair, brain, everything that goes on when you're having a good night's rest, that's going to be the money thing that allows you to make progress in the long term, whether it be gaining strength, gaining muscle, losing fat, whatever you're trying to do. Your sleep is just barreling you in the right direction. And if you sacrifice that on a consistent basis for something else, some people sacrifice sleep for working out. I mean, shit, I'm not telling you to, you just got to have better time management. You got to get that sleep in and manage your time in other areas better so you can still get that workout in, but don't sacrifice sleep for

that shit. Don't. Alcohol, marijuana, those are big things that people ask questions about when it comes to sleep. I would say that, you know, if you struggled with your sleep and you smoke a little bit and it seems like it helps you go to sleep and you don't really currently have any symptoms, I would just say like, maybe it's something that you try to work. Maybe it's something you try to get some distance from at some point again i don't know how great it is to like really rely on stuff but also i would also say this a lot of people know themselves better than a doctor or better than a scientific research paper can say um but just don't use it as an excuse to be like a total burnout and like getting high as fuck and like passing out i don't think that that's i think be like a total burnout and like getting high as fuck and like passing out.

I don't think that that's – I think most people would agree like that doesn't seem very rational. Same thing with the alcohol. If you have a little bit to drink with dinner and it helps you relax and unwind from the day, I would say whatever negative impact that either one of these things would have, it's still a net positive if it's helping you get to sleep and for some reason you have trouble. Again, I don't think it's good to be dependent upon any of these things. It's good to have your natural body do it. It's good to get in touch with your circadian rhythm and do a lot of stuff that we mentioned here today.

But also, maybe for you, maybe you do feel better when you do that, but do you know what it feels like to not do that and to have other good habits in place? That's what I would love for you to explore and look into. Absolutely. I used to like have a little bit of wine mixed with like my diet ginger ale at night. That's my ghetto drink. I'm going to say it sounds very white. Fuck you. It is kind of.

But the thing is we know that alcohol is very close to sleep. Fuck you guys. We confirmed that you were black on the last show. Mark gave me my black card.'s like here you go here's your black card oh i'll have an extra one of these laying around here well you didn't make gangster raps so i mean come on um but this is the thing alcohol really close to sleep is going to affect your sleep negatively we know know that. So it could help you unwind, but don't let that glass of wine turn into three. Don't let that can of beer or bottle of beer turn into four because it helps you sleep. where you're knocked out, but you're not actually getting restful sleep that helps you recover.

Yeah, you're sedated. You're sedated. So keep that in mind. And then the weed thing. Every now and then I'll smoke at night, but I won't smoke a lot, right? Because there hasn't been research or anything. Some people swear by it or whatever,

but it can be something that's habit forming. Okay, so be careful with that. Like try to get in the actual habits, the things that don't take substances for you to be able to get restful sleep. And like one thing that you were mentioning when we had Chris Kodowski on, the body work, the smashing, the loosening up of all those tissues and stretchings included. I know a lot of people that do a little bit of stretching. I do some stretching before bed because it helps you unwind.

It's one of those things that actually loosens up your body, right? Helps you feel less stressed. And when you feel looser and less stressed and relaxed, you're not going to be surprised when your body's relaxed and it's like, okay, let's shut down. But if your body's fucking tense and you're like trying to sleep like that, that's something that could be super helpful so you can grab a supernova or something at home and smash some of those tissues up like we talked about do a few stretches and that's another thing that can help

you potentially fall asleep treat yourself like a kid you know like remember like uh they got kids sometimes like napping in school like in kindergarten and stuff like that. Remember the teacher would shut down the lights and everyone would talk real soft. All that stuff. All those things can be really useful. You're just trying to chill the hell out from the day. One thing we forgot to mention was food. So you might want to just pay attention to how much you eat before you

go to bed. I don't really know a lot of people that like really smash food and go to bed right away. Um, but I would say that 90 minutes would be a really good goal. Uh, again, some of these things that we mentioned, they can be annoying, like because of the way that you live your life and the habits that you already have. Um, and if you eat right before you go to bed and you don't have any problems, you don't seem like you have any issues, there's probably not a lot of reasons to look into it. But if you currently struggle with your sleep and you wake up often and stuff like that, start to look into that. I think Ron Penna was talking about 90 minutes, maybe two hours or so. Some people will notice the resting heart rate when they monitor their sleep is a little bit lower, meaning that they might be getting into like a little bit deeper sleep because they didn't eat so much food before they went to bed.

So stuff like that I think is important for myself. to bed. So stuff like that I think is important for myself. I like to eat a little bit before I go to bed, but it's usually like I'll have dinner at like six or seven. And then the last thing I'll have is like a protein shake. And that's like eight or nine. I go to bed at nine or 10, depending on the day. That kind of thing. That's, yeah, no, I noticed that too. Like I, there were a few times where I'd eat right before sleeping. Not, It's not ideal. So wait a few hours. That's super helpful. But one thing I'll mention that we didn't really – we don't actually need to go too deep on this, but temperature is a big deal, right? I always set the thermostat to 68, 69 degrees.

There has been some research to show that that's pretty helpful. It's like snowing in your room. Okay. I thought it was because I said 69 because I heard... Anyway. That too. So I'll set the thermostat to 69 degrees because people tend to get more restful sleep the cooler the room. We're fortunate enough to be able to all have eight sleep mattresses that control the temperature of our mattress. So I have the temperature on my mattress always set to cool. And I do notice that I do have more restful sleep that way because when I didn't have that mattress and I was sleeping on a normal mattress that I couldn't control the temperature

of, I'd always wake up really sweaty. I'd wake up with wet sheets sometimes, but now go sleep, wake up. My sheets aren't drenched in my own sweat. So the mattress is also, or the mattress topper is very, very beneficial to keeping the temperature controlled and helping me have a better rest through the night. So that is something that I think is going to be, could be very useful. A lot of you guys have already gotten the mattress toppers. So if you want to chime in the comments and let me know, or let us know how that's affected you positively, let us know. But the eight sleep is really a game changer for the temperature aspect of sleep quality. But the eight sleep is really a game changer for the temperature aspect of sleep quality.

Yeah. If I ever eat too close to bed, that's when I sweat the most. So I don't know what that officially is all about. But like that was huge, like eye opening. But then another eye opening thing was like when I was leaning out was like if I got a bad night of sleep and I wanted to take a progress picture, I'd be like, oh my God, I took like 10 steps backwards. I'm a fat piece of shit. Like I would get so down on myself. And then I'd have a really good night of sleep.

I'm like, oh my God, it's working. Wake up looking leaner. So much leaner. Like from one day to the next, all because I got really good sleep. And I was just blown away. And like, man, if you can stack multiple nights up, it's like, oh, shit, this is going to be awesome. Like, that's huge. Yeah, I never noticed that. Yeah, with the temperature, they say that you're supposed to get your body temperature down like a degree.

And so if you don't have access to a sleep mattress, maybe you just take a shower or something like that. Being clean before you go to bed is helpful. Like the summertime here in Sacramento, it's like you end up taking like 9,000 showers. Even if you didn't do an activity, you're like, fuck, I just have to take a shower because trying to go to bed that way can be kind of irritating. So getting that body temperature down, I think is another big factor. Andrew, take us on out of here, buddy. Absolutely. Thank you, everybody, for checking out today's episode. Please drop us comments, questions down below in the comment section. And make sure you guys like today's video and subscribe. If you guys are not subscribed already, we would really appreciate that.

And you guys can follow the podcast at MB Power Project on Instagram, TikTok, and Twitter. My Instagram, TikTok, and Twitter is at i am andrew z and sema where you at i think there's a memorial day sale going on for eight sleep so by the time they hear this though it's too late oh really yeah oh shit it's already friday today i don't even know what the memorial day is so my bad yeah i suck at that stuff anyway it's like wednesday by the time they hear this i think discount for eight sleeves down below in the description check it out along with our discord which communities wild and popping over there check it out in the description box below at and see my ending on Instagram and YouTube on TikTok and Twitter mark I'm at Mark Smiley Bell strength is never weak this week this never

strength catch you guys later bye