Shawn Stevenson

It’s one of the most common problems we face as humans: our sleep patterns can be absolutely horrible. 

Insomnia, stress, depression, anxiety, poor diet, an excess of screen time — we all deal with an abundance of interior and exterior factors that interrupt our sleep. Ultimately, this can contribute to us sleeping too much, not enough, or in extreme cases, not at all.  

Because of this, far too many of us spend our waking hours sluggish, grumpy, and pounding coffee or energy drinks just to get through the day… before it’s time for bed, and the whole mess starts again. 

So, how do we fix this vicious cycle? 

“What IS sleep, actually? We have to start there. So this is this thing we’re chasing after. We’re trying to get more of it. We know it’s important. But sleep is… very strange.” – Shawn Stevenson.

Who is Shawn Stevenson?

As one of the world’s foremost authorities on the science of sleep (in a world that’s constantly struggling with it), Shawn Stevenson has increasingly found his insight very much in demand. 

He wasn’t always an authority on better sleep, though. 

He became one after suffering some severe pain and mobility issues at 20. Upon seeking medical advice, Shawn was diagnosed with degenerative disc disease. His doctors at the time told him that it was progressive and incurable, that he had the spine of an 80-year-old man, and that he could only expect to get worse as time wore on.

But Shawn wasn’t interested in hearing any of that. 

Instead of accepting the doom-and-gloom prognosis of his medical team, Shawn decided to take matters into his own hands. He started taking a more holistic view of his health, and incorporated some significant lifestyle changes – everything from a better diet, to increased physical activity, to the one thing many treatment plans overlook: proper sleep. 

By applying a total-body treatment plan, Shawn was able to not just halt his condition in its tracks, but in some cases, even reverse some of the effects. At that point, he knew he had a mission: to educate the masses on the importance of diet, exercise, and getting better sleep. 

Today, Shawn is the host of the #1 podcast on Apple’s “Health and Fitness” chart, “The Model Health Show,” which covers everything from diet and exercise to relationship advice. His books have consistently topped bestseller and audio download charts. And he’s been hired as a keynote speaker to deliver his message of total-body health to companies like Hilton, US Bank, Google, MasterCard, and Whole Foods.

I had a chance to sit down with Shawn a few years ago to discuss his book, “Sleep Smarter: 21 Essential Strategies to Sleep Your Way to A Better Body, Better Health, and Bigger Success.” But given the depth of the subject, I had more questions than we had time to cover. So I knew I’d have to bring him back to drop a little more wisdom.

It’s All In Your Head: The Science of Sleep

Last time Shawn and I got together, he shared with me a lot of his research about sleep. We’d already covered the basics, so this time we got to talk way more in-depth about the science of how our minds work when we’re sleeping. 

Today, researchers like Shawn can actually track our brainwaves while we sleep, and it turns out that those brainwaves actually go through some pretty interesting changes. Shawn explained that we go from a waking state of beta frequency in our brains to an alpha frequency, where we’re more calm and relaxed — sort of that “flow state,” as he says it. Then from there, we transition into theta, and finally, we hit delta, which is when we’re truly sleeping hard!

But it doesn’t stop there. The delta stage is actually divided into two more stages — non-REM sleep and REM sleep, which is, as Shawn puts it, “when you’re gettin’ your dream on.”

REM sleep is super important for maintaining a strong memory. This is when our brains do what’s called “memory consolidation.” We process the things we’ve learned that day and our brains store all that information to be accessed when needed.

That’s why pulling all-nighters when we need to study is actually worse for us. Naturally, we think, “We don’t know nothing! We gotta study the whole book!” We stay up all night quizzing and testing and trying to remember everything. We skip sleeping for the night and don’t let our brains do that “memory consolidation” that Shawn talks about. When we do that, we don’t allow our brains to store all that stuff we’re trying to learn and it ends up being a lot worse for us.

At first, I assumed that REM sleep was the most important part of the sleep cycle, but Shawn says it’s just as necessary as every other part of the cycle. 

Non-REM sleep is a big deal for our bodies. That’s when we make a lot of a hormone called the Human Growth Hormone (HGH), also known as the youth hormone.

I don’t know about you–but anything with the word “youth” in it sounds good to me!

So this HGH — this youth hormone — has a significant impact on our physical health. It’s what allows us to heal. It’s what helps us to build muscle mass. We literally grow bigger when our bodies secrete this stuff! And we secrete it the most when we’re getting some of that good non-REM sleep.

How NOT to Get a Good Night’s Sleep

Unfortunately, our every day habits can prevent us from getting that good sleep that we need. But the way we live our lives today can make it really hard to get that good sleep we need.

For example, sometimes we drink too much alcohol before bed. Now, alcohol does help us to fall asleep faster, but it also disrupts our REM sleep. That means our minds can’t store our memories like they’re supposed to. Ever had the experience of drinking a little too much too close to bedtime and then forgetting almost everything that happened the previous day? That’s because your REM sleep got disrupted.

And then there are our screens. We’re constantly on our phones or watching TV, especially when we’re nice and cozy in our beds. That is terrible for our sleep. Shawn told me that “Every hour you’re on your device at night, you suppress melatonin for 30 minutes,” and melatonin is that hormone that helps us regulate our sleep cycles.

And there are at least a million other factors that make sleeping hard for us. But we want to be the greatest we can be, right? It’s a new year, a new decade! So I asked Shawn some questions about how we can sleep well and get fit in this new decade.

Fortunately, Shawn had plenty of answers for me.