Last night we hosted our Fat Loss For Women Seminar and Coach Kim talked extensively about sleep and stress.

At one point during the talk, she posed a question...

Raise your hand if you get less than 7 hours of sleep per night?

How many hands do you think went up?

The answer...

Every single one of them

For some reason, that blew my mind.

It's funny, we talk about exercising on a consistent basis and eating right, but in reality, none of that matters if you're only sleeping 5 hours a night.

It's a vicious cycle....

You wake up tired.

Because you wake up tired you oversleep and don't have time to prepare your meals so you grab an unhealthy breakfast option on the go.

You're tired at work so you're not productive at all, you don't get anything done, and that stresses you out.

Because you're tired and stressed you make some poor choices such as grabbing candy out of the bowl in the office.

When you finally get out of work you're so tired because you didn't sleep the night before that you don't have the energy to go to the gym, so you don't workout.

You go home, cook dinner for the family, and catch up on the day.

You stay up watching your latest sitcom and then lay in bed on your phone.

Because of that, you can't fall asleep, and the cycle repeats itself.

I get it. I've been there.

But man, you have to realize how much sleep plays a part in this picture.

It's not just a bunch of floating pieces, it's a jigsaw puzzle where all the pieces fit and work together.

So if you're not getting enough sleep that could be the core reason as to why you aren't seeing the results you've wanted.

Here are my top five strategies for getting better sleep:

Plan out your day the night before: After dinner, spend 5-10 minutes planning out your next day. It will make you prepared, and thus you won't be playing catch up the next night.

Limit screen time: I think science says 2 hours before bedtime, but set a goal to just reduce what you're already doing. If you're on your phone an hour before bed right now, try shutting it off a half hour earlier.

Journal: This is similar to the first one, but if you find your mind is always going when you're lying in bed, it helps to just have a notebook next to you to dump your thoughts out onto paper before going to bed.

Meditate/Breath: This is something I'm trying and still new at, but it seems to be helping. Our lives are so fast paced we sometimes forget to just sit and breath.

Prioritize YOU: I know it's hard. I know you have a family, a spouse, and your being pulled in a million directions, but dammit, when was the last time you put yourself first? Treat your mind and body right so you can be at your best for everyone else.

I sent this out early today, that way hopefully you're not reading this at night, but if you are GO TO BED! :)

Dedicated To Your Success,

Doug Spurling