What Your Wearable Tech And Biometric Data Are Telling You About Your Health

Wearable tech devices have been around for a few years now, and with each update, they get more advanced. These these cutting-edge tools are incredibly useful whether you’re a trained athlete, a workout enthusiast, or simply want to increase your awareness around your overall physical activity. 

Now we can use the data from these devices to track our stress levels for optimizing our immune system.  We can do this by removing triggers that can have a negative effect on our body’s natural ability to fend off disease. 

Wearable devices have certainly evolved from their humbler beginnings as basic step counters, heart rate/activity trackers or reminder systems.  Now they offer an immense amount of specific biometric data that can be actively interpreted for optimum performance. 

This means you’ll have access to a slew of detailed metrics.  These metrics can be analyzed in order to bring some precision into your decisions about your body’s function during both exercise, rest periods, and sleep. You can actually optimize your health in a much more precise way. 

In fact, you can track and manage another key aspect of health: your stress level. Stress and immunity are intertwined. Using the information provided by wearable tech devices through direct awareness of your body’s function means that can offer real-time cues into stress triggers.  And as we all know these stress triggers have a huge impact on your immune system, positive and negative. The more you know about how your body is performing, the sooner you can pivot away from the stress negatives that can have a serious impact on your immune system.

Track Your Physiological Data On A Wearable Tech Device

You no longer have to guess what’s happening inside your body or how to improve your performance. Tracking your physiological data on a wearable tech device, and use it as a tool for specific modifications to your behaviors, diet, or environmental factors, 

Biomarkers – such as Heart Rate Variability (HRV), blood volume pulse, blood and muscle oxygenation, are accessible through wearable tech devices.  These biomarkers add a whole new dimension to your awareness (and adjustment) of your body’s performance. 

The coolest part? Many devices are also hard at work while you sleep, busily detecting important metrics. These devices give you fascinating and useful details about sleep quality and patterns. Both sleep quality and patterns have an incredible impact on your body’s overall performance day or night. What’s more, this information speaks volumes about your overall stress level. All the while, your immune system could be really struggling as a result. 

Let’s take a closer look at biomarkers and the way we can learn extensive detail through current wearable tech devices. 

Learn Your Levels: Establish Your Biometrics Baseline 

The more you know about your body’s performance during activity, rest, and sleep, the more you’ll be able to exert control over improvements that will get you closer to your peak performance.  You can be leverage data that points to excessive stress levels or stress-relieving activities or routines that will strengthen your immune system, too. 

The actionable insights that come from the data on your wearable tech device put the power in your hands. 

Biomarkers related to heart activity, in particular, are some of the most essential data collected from a wearable tech device. This can effectively allow you to see what’s happening within your cardiovascular system. 

You can then monitor new activity to compare values when this baseline activity has been established. Plus, you can locate points of stress that can be reduced thanks to this monitoring process. 

Wearable tech devices that measure your body temperature (even while you sleep, such as the Oura Ring) deliver data related to your sleep performance. By comparing that value to values from earlier nights, it indicates your body temperature baseline and any variations from it. That means that you can use that data to make precise adjustments as needed.

Simply put: remove a lot of guesswork by learning your levels and establishing a baseline. Now you can paint a far more complete picture of your body’s performance. Using this data, then, provides actionable insight to make strategic adjustments in your behaviors, diet, or environment. All of that can improve your physiological performance. 

Wearable Tech Results: What We Can Learn From Heart Rate Variability Data

A person with a healthy heart – and without a pacemaker – has variability in their heart rate, both in the pace of beats and in the interval between the beats. For example, if your resting heart rate is 60 beats per minute, your heart isn’t beating every second on the second. The interval varies just slightly between each beat. 

If you’ve ever seen an electrocardiogram (ECG) reading, you’ve noticed subtle differences in the distance between the beat measurements. This indicates that both branches of the autonomic nervous system are working well in a healthy heart. 

A well-functioning parasympathetic nervous system assists the heart to slow down during rest. If the heart rate and HRV are still elevated while at rest, this may be an indicator that the autonomic nervous system is not functioning properly, creating more stress on your system. Locating and modifying these points of stress is a great way to use the data gleaned from your wearable tech.  It puts a bit more control into your hands. As a result, you can make real-time changes that will impact you right away. 

I’ll give you a great example of how this data can be used. I wear a tech device to regularly track my biomarkers, and I saw a change in my HRV and stress levels that made me look twice. My wife and I like to enjoy date nights twice a week, and I noticed that the next day, my HRV and stress levels were way up.  It took me a minute, but I realized that it was the glass of red wine that I was having with dinner that was causing this effect. So now I opt out of the glass of wine and removed that negative effect.  

Can your Garmin Smart Watch detect coronavirus?

Garmin and scientists from top universities and institutes around the world are actively researching whether wearable devices can help identify early indications of coronavirus.

“The premise is actually quite simple. (1) An elevated heart rate is an early sign of a common cold, the flu or coronavirus. (2) Garmin smartwatches have built-in heart rate monitoring at the wrist. Put the two together and society could have an extremely helpful tool for early indications of the virus on a mass scale.” REF

We are just at the forefront of what we can do with wearable tech and all of the data provided to us.

Wearable Tech Results: What Sleep Data Can Tell You About Your Body 


In the dark ages (or probably even a lot more recently) we used to head to bed and hope for the best, shooting for about eight hours if we were lucky. Perhaps we knew we weren’t sleeping well because we felt like total garbage the next day.  And we had a hard time concentrating on pretty much anything. Or maybe we slept great one night, and not-so-great for the next two nights, and had no idea why. 

It was a pretty good mix of guessing, making assumptions, and blindly trying different things to figure it out. I’ve even heard of some people just kind of resigning themselves to the idea that well, they’re just “not a very good sleeper.” So untrue! 

With wearable tech devices hard at work even while we sleep, sensors that track body temperature, heart rate, blood and muscle oxygenation (among other things) deliver a lot of valuable information. This incredible information can uncover clues for helpful insight that you can then use to troubleshoot. 

The Oura Ring and Garmin Watches are high-performing devices that collect biometric data about your body’s sleep performance.  This is hugely valuable.  You can uncover otherwise hidden patterns that have a serious impact on your waking hours and overall health. 

SLEEP STAGE TRACKING (REM, DEEP, LIGHT)

Tracking your nightly sleep cycle delivers huge insight as your brain makes its way through the three individual stages of sleep. Interruptions within these cycles, plus the actual timing of deep, REM, light sleep, and possible awake time during the night can point to areas that can be corrected. 

Here are a few other key ways that the wearable tech can deliver important data about you. 

  • RECOVERY OPTIMIZATION
  • RESTING HEART RATE
  • HEART RATE VARIABILITY (HRV)
  • STRESS LEVELS
  • CALORIES
  • BODY TEMPERATURE TRENDS
  • RESPIRATORY RATE
  • DAILY ACTIVITY GOAL
  • ALWAYS ON – DAYTIME ACTIVITY TRACKING
  • STEPS AND CALORIES
  • INACTIVITY ALERTS
  • ACTIVITY BALANCE

SLEEP RESULTS:  WHAT TO DO WITH THEM

When it comes to sleep data, any patterns that demonstrate a problem can be used to troubleshoot your way towards a better night’s sleep.  You can make precise adjustments to behaviors, diet, and environmental factors. 

For example, if your device reports a rise body temperature around 2 am for about two hours, this might point to some easy-fix issues in the room. Try wearing lighter clothes to bed but adding an extra blanket, which is easily removable without much effort. Or, add a fan to the equation. Track your new results for the next few days. 

The point is this: listen to what your body is telling you with the help of data collected while you’re asleep. It’s a key step to making the kinds of adjustments that will improve both the quality and the duration of your sleep. 

The human immune system is remarkably flexible and resilient – but as we age, as with everything else, our bodies’ ability to cope with stressors can lead to changes in immune response. That means that what worked for us in our 20’s and 30’s might require additional adjustments. Quite frankly, no matter what the age, sleep is incredibly important for total body health.

Sleep data provides us with real-time information to alert and inform us of both the cause and the effect of sleep issues and the cascading effects on health. It’s in the sleep data these wearable tech devices really shine.

You can read more about using wearable tech devices to improve your sleep quality and quantity here. 

Wearable Tech Results:

How To Use Your Muscle Ox % (or SmOx%) Data

If you work out a lot and you’re using a wearable tech device, take a look at versions that measure another important biomarker: Muscle Ox %. 

Muscle Oxygenation Percentage is essentially the balance between oxygen delivery and oxygen consumption within the muscle tissue. To simplify, oxygen delivery is the amount of oxygen available for use within the system. It’s the oxygen you’re taking in while you work out. Oxygen consumption describes the efficiency of the muscle as it uses that available oxygen. Muscle Ox % varies, but most people will exhibit levels between 50% to 70% when at rest.

Moxy Monitor 

The Moxy Monitor was designed for anyone who wants to maximize their exercise performance. This smart device measures the Muscle Ox % while muscles are under exercise or athletic stress. 

The Moxy Sensor (within the Moxy Monitor System) utilizes light-emitting diodes and photodetectors, creating a spectrometer that measures muscle oxygen. It’s totally portable, water-resistant, and weighs less than a sports watch. The internal data recording allows Moxy to be used even where radio transmission of data is difficult (like underwater). It’s designed to measure muscle tissue through up to 12mm of fat layer thickness.  

So how do you use this information? Glad you asked.  As you’re working out, the Muscle Ox % being monitored is guiding your training process by knowing exactly how your muscles are handling the workout. If the Muscle Ox % is balanced, you’re training at a level that’s steady and sustainable. 

Rising Muscle Ox % levels  mean that your muscles are consuming more oxygen than what’s being delivered by your blood flow, and that means that you’re reaching capacity on muscle activity. 

Avoid Injury Risks With Precision Data

You won’t need to guess if you’re in the danger zone with your workout. Your wearable tech device sends you data that indicates that your muscles are consuming a lot more oxygen than what’s being delivered. This means that you’re training at a pace that’s not sustainable – you’re burning out and risking injury.

You can avoid that by paying close attention to the recovery phase. 

You entered the recovery phase once your tracker reflected lowering levels. Your device is tracking data that points to less oxygen use by the muscles and more available oxygen within the blood flow. This is the safe zone after a training period. 

Tracking this Muscle Ox % data in real-time makes it possible to adjust your athletic training by operating from a place of knowledge rather than a feeling. It means that you can now build peak performance with precision thanks to biomarkers. You can also lower the risk of painful or damaging muscle fatigue that could take you out for a few days (or worse). 

WHAT TO DO WITH THE MOXY MONITOR DATA

You can make precise changes, thanks to the wide range of real-time data about your muscle performance. For example, some athletes discovered that they were lacking in the warmup process, which actually decreased their performance and increases the chance for injury. The physiological data was visible, trackable, and actionable. 

Having your hands on this level of specific biometric detail provides insights on the overall intensity and fatigue level during any workout. Here’s a visual summary of this information.

If you want to learn your levels and establish a baseline for your typical Muscle Ox % during workouts, get started with a basic workout. Choose one that you’re already really accustomed to doing from start to finish, including recovery time. Maybe it’s one of your easier sessions that you can then use as a performance guide to measuring your general muscle and blood flow biomarkers. Pay attention to your sleep factors, Heart Rate Variability and heart rate patterns across the next few days to see how and when your workout routine shows its effects in those areas.

If there’s a data spike that is leading to a negative (such as disrupted sleep, increased HRV the following day, and so forth), adjust the time of day for your workout if that’s an option for you and note the effects of that change. 

Wearable Tech is Just A Start

Wearable tech devices deliver fascinating physiological data, and it can be eye-opening.

What to do if you uncover concerning patterns from your wearable tech device? Consult with your physician – no two bodies are the same. Don’t delay bringing this data to the doctor’s office if you see something that may point to a larger issue. A specific factor could be present, which requires medical attention. 

Today’s technology provides fantastic actionable insights a day-to-day level. 

Hopefully you’re feeling good about your wearable tech device and enjoying the hands-on approach to biomarker data.  However, it may feel like the data is kind of daunting to interpret. I’m happy to work with you in tandem with your new technology. 

Now more than ever, we are looking for ways to improve our health and our immunity, which means that wearable tech devices fit right into this discussion. This physiological data gives us clear insight into what our bodies are doing even during sleep. You might be surprised to find a few unknown spikes or triggers that, once removed, will result in a more optimized immune system.  Which of course means an overall greater sense of well-being.

THE POWER OF WEARABLE TECH, PRECISION PERFORMANCE DATA INTERPRETATION, AND APPLICATION WITH AN EXPERT

Put the power in your hands with wearable tech devices and Precision Performance Data Interpretation and Application with me.  Get started here. 

Together, we can develop your action plan based on the information that your tech device is giving you, and we can get you to peak performance for optimized health.  

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With the Male 2.0 Method, I test your DNA, interpret the results, and create a customized strategy just for you. This plan is specific to YOUR individual genes and lifestyle.  It will improve every area of your life, from your health and professional productivity to your overall longevity and total wellbeing. Male 2.0 gives you the actionable tools you need right now.  It reveals what you need to customize and design your future limitless self.

Click here to learn more about the lifelong benefits of a personalized genetics consultation and epigenetic coaching program.

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I look forward to working with you to take your health goals to the next level.

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COMING SOON TO AMAZON

In Male 2.0™, Dr. Tracy Gapin has turned everything we once thought we knew about men’s health and performance upside down. The old model of how to be “a man” is broken. A man who works himself to death.  Unfortunately, a man who tries to NOT get sick but isn’t really healthy either.  And a man who takes a pill for every ill but is never really cured. That was Male 1.0. Now, imagine being THE MAN ─ owning your performance in the bedroom, the weight room, and the boardroom. Living a fully optimized life. Becoming limitless. This is Male 2.0!

Tracy Gapin, MD, FACS  is a board-certified Urologist, Men’s Health Expert, Author, and Professional Speaker. Using state-of-the-art biometric monitoring, nutrition and lifestyle intervention, Dr. Gapin coaches Fortune 500 executives and evolutionary leaders of business, sports medicine, and high performance. He specializes in cutting-edge precision medicine with an emphasis on epigenetics, providing men with a personalized path to optimizing health & performance. 

The Top Sleep Gadgets To Improve Your Health

Does your brain automatically go to “sleep gadgets” when you think about optimizing your health? Most, often, when we think about optimizing our health we often go to diet and exercise first. But there is another very important (and often neglected) factor that, if left unchecked, can negate any progress you may be making in other areas of your health. Getting your zzzz’s!

This is where sleep gadgets and tools come in. We now have access to sleep activity trackers and apps that are like having a sleep technologist right in your room!

So if you want to uplevel your health, start with your sleep. If you’re not sleeping enough or well enough, your quality of life can be impacted. Quality sleep is critical for physical, mental, and emotional health—both in the short term and the long term.

Your body needs sleep to reset, restore, and repair. It takes this time to form neural pathways that are critical for information retention, memories, critical thinking, cognitive function and regulation of emotions and behavior.

Your body also needs sleep to keep your blood, hormones, and organs healthy. For example, sleep is necessary to heal and repair your blood vessels; failing to do so can lead to heart disease, high blood pressure, and increased risk of stroke. A lack of sleep is also linked to a risk of obesity and weight-related health problems.

Sleep interacts with your daily life as well. Without rest, you’ll be unproductive, unfocused, and unmotivated, which can quickly disrupt every area of your life, from your career to your personal relationships.

Studies show that just ONE night of poor sleep can alter your DNA, change genetic expression and negatively impact your health. You can read more about the importance and role of sleep here.

With the accessibility of new tech at your fingertips, you can now find all the sleep help you need. Let’s explore some of the latest and cutting edge sleep gadgets to optimize your health.

Track your sleep

Most men think they are getting good sleep. But sleep doesn’t just mean ‘8 hours’.

It’s not all about the number of hours slept, but the quality and depth of that sleep as well. Understanding the quality of sleep is critical to improving your health. So how do you know you’re actually getting good sleep if you aren’t tracking it?

In order to make adjustments that will improve your sleep, you need to first understand how you’re currently sleeping. And this is why tracking your sleep is so critical. Did you know one week of “poor sleep” can decrease testosterone levels by as much as 15%?!!

Tracking your sleep helps you understand not just how long you sleep, but also the quality of your sleep. It helps you analyze your sleep patterns to improve your sleep schedule and environment.


The best sleep trackers will monitor how much deep sleep versus light sleep you’re getting, how long it takes you to fall asleep (“sleep latency”), and how often you wake up throughout the night.

You want a sleep tracker that will take into account your movements alongside the external environment of your bedroom to best optimize your nights.

 

 

 

Check out these tools that offer comprehensive sleep tracking:

Oura Ring

The Oura Ring is a small wearable ring looks sleek and unobtrusive on your finger but packs a punch with its wide range of technology. During the day it tracks your activity and calories. At night, it monitors temperature, movement, and heart rate so that you can understand the areas you need to focus on to improve sleep.

Every day you’ll have access to data on your sleep cycle types, the quality of your sleep and the quantity. This ring gives you access to wellbeing trends with daily, weekly, and monthly views of all contributing factors to your sleep, including stress and workout recovery!

Garmin Fenix Watch

The Garmin Fenix Watch is a rugged accessory made for outdoor adventures and also for your indoor rest time. It does a lot of what other smart watches does: tracking heart rate and movement. But it also has GPS, satellite reception and advanced biomechanical measuring for athletic performance.

When it is time to wind down, this watch also has the ability to the ability to track and provide data for light and deep sleep, REM (rapid eye movement), and awake time throughout your cycle. And, many stylish options!

Other Wearables


Of course other wearable watches such as Fitbit and Apple Watch have the capacity to track your sleep cycles as well, however you want to research whether or not it is meeting your needs as each wearable is different. If you have a health and fitness tracker, check to see if it will also track and analyze the quality of your sleep. The more your activity tracker can do, the better the picture of your overall health.

If you’re someone who is nervous about uploading your biometric data to an unknown server and don’t want to use a wearable sleep tracker, you can still benefit from tracking your sleep the old school way – with a journal. Keeping a physical sleep journal or log in a sleep tracker app on your phone can help you recognize you have a problem. Start by tracking when you go to bed, when you thought you fell asleep and any awakenings during the night.

What if your challenge isn’t staying asleep, but falling asleep in the first place? There are a number of factors that might make it challenging for you to fall asleep, from the external environment of your bedroom to your internal mental monologue. Tracking can help you determine where to focus. Let’s now discuss how to improve your bedroom environment to help you sleep better. (See the best wearable tech options here: How Wearable Tech Is Revolutionizing and Personalizing Healthcare)

Fall asleep faster

For a strong majority of us, the trouble with falling asleep comes from the incessant train of thoughts running through our heads. Whether you’re stressed about work, thinking about your to-do list, or wondering if there are aliens on other planets, we all fall into the endless loop of thoughts that make it hard to fall asleep.

So here are some sleep tech tools that can help soothe anxiety and quiet thoughts.

Headspace

A lot of people are finding success with the Headspace App to meditate and drift to sleep. You simply throw in your headphones, turn on the app, and listen to gentle sleep music and guided meditations to help you raise your mindfulness and drift into a calm, deep slumber. What distinguishes Headspace from other apps is the clinically-validated research that informs their product, so you know that they are always using the best health and meditation technology. This sleep app helps you create a customized plan and makes recommendations based on your personal settings. It’s free (or you can buy a premium subscription for expanded access) so why not try it out tonight?

For suggestions on other sleep gadgets that can help you fall asleep, read about Men’s Health Top 13 best gadgets. (https://www.menshealth.com/technology-gear/g23397130/best-sleep-tech/)

Get deeper, high-quality sleep

As I’ve mentioned, the quality of your sleep matters even more than the quantity. Too many of us may “sleep’ for 8 hours, but the majority of that is “light” sleep. If you’re not getting deep REM sleep, your body isn’t fully rejuvenating and resting. The main reasons you’re not getting deep sleep is because of your bedroom environment or not getting enough oxygen (which causes snoring).

Snoring

Are you a snorer? Snoring doesn’t just drive your partner crazy—it actually worsens your sleep quality as well! Snoring occurs when you’re not getting enough oxygen while sleeping, so your body overcompensates. Your body requires more oxygen during sleep to assist in the recovery and restoration process. Without good breathing, you aren’t inhaling the necessary oxygen, so you won’t get a good quality of sleep.

There are a lot of snoring devices out there that you can try. But most men don’t want to put a loud, cumbersome device on their faces to try and get rid of snoring.

SmartNora is a no-contact anti-snoring device that’s showing a lot of awesome results. You place an Expander device insert in your pillow and a Nora sensor on your nightstand. When the sensor hears you snoring, it activates the Expander. This gently moves your pillow to stimulate the throat muscles, which minimizes or stops snoring altogether.

Some men say the Nora is a little obtrusive the first few days when you feel the motion, but most men quickly get used to it. It’s a much better solution than nose strips, mouth guards, and muzzles.

Improve your bedroom environment

There are four key environmental factors that impact your sleep: light, noise, temperature, and air quality. What can you do about these?

Light

There are two aspects of light that impact your sleep: blue light and light pollution.

Blue Light vs. Red Light

Blue light is the light emitted from electronics, like phones, laptops, and even some light bulbs. Research has proven that blue light suppresses melatonin production and circadian rhythm about twice as long as other wavelengths, which can drastically impact both sleep quality and quantity. Those who have to spend lengthy periods of time in front of screens, perhaps for work, may wish to source prescription glasses which block blue light.

Red light on the other hand, is known to boost melatonin production and soothe you into sleep (amongst other benefits like activating the lymphatic system and reducing inflammation). But you don’t necessarily need your bedroom to have a Moulin Rouge glow. You can buy red spectrum bulbs, which minimize blue light wavelengths and maximize red ones without leaving your room rosy-colored. Try Lighting Science’s Good Night Biological LED Lamp (lsgc.com). Originally developed for NASA astronauts on the International Space Station, it looks like a regular white light but with all the sleep inducing benefits of red.

In addition, you’ll want to reduce and remove blue light in the evening. This can be done with just a few simple shifts:

  • Turn on “night shift” on your electronic devices. This reduces blue light by utilizing orange light instead.
  • Better yet, don’t use your electronics 2-3 hours before bed. This ensures you’re not subjecting your eyes and brain to any unnecessary light.
  • Invest in blue-light blocking glasses. You can choose yellow tinted ones like TrueDarks or newer generation “clear” lenses that reduce 90% of blue light.
  • Use Philips Hue ambiance color lights in your bedroom. If you find you respond best to color changes, you can use a setting that mimics a sunset. You can also program it to turn orange/red at night and blue in the morning to naturally promote your circadian rhythm.

Light pollution

Your brain is biologically programmed to be “on” when it sees light and “off” when the sun goes down. So even the smallest stream of light pouring into your bedroom could keep your brain in active mode, even while you’re sleeping. This can make it hard to fall asleep, or it might keep you in a lighter sleep cycle throughout the night.

The best way to do this is with blackout curtains, which block any and all light coming from your backyard or neighbors’ houses. You can also purchase blackout liners for your existing curtains.

Sleep masks are another option, if you don’t mind something on your face. These can make it challenging to wake up in the morning, though, since your brain isn’t exposed to light first thing.

Noise

Any background noise can be distracting and disturbing for your brain, even if you’re not conscious of it. A lot of people prefer to sleep with white noise makers or fans to drown out any external noise and drift into a deeper sleep.

There are a lot of different options to block or adjust the noise you hear at night, based on your preferences. Some popular choices include: CozyPhones, Nightingale Sleep System, and Dreampad.

CozyPhones

These sleep headphones are made for comfort. CozyPhones wear like a head band with breathable material so you can put on your music, books, or meditation without disturbing your partner. This works especially well if you don’t want to keep earplugs in all night.

You can also check out other headphones like Bose SleepBuds or QuietOn.

Nightingale Sleep System

The Nightgale sleep system works if you and your partner both want white noise. This system creates a blanket of sound throughout your room using a stereo effect, which masks environmental noises and lulls you into a gentle sleep. You can even connect it to a smart device to get weather, traffic, and other alerts built in to help wake you up in the morning.

Dreampad

The Dreampad relaxation pillow plays soothing music and sounds to help you sleep right through your pillow, traveling through your entire body. This helps you fall asleep faster and stay asleep longer. It uses gentle vibrations so it won’t wake up your partner, and it’s been backed by a number of studies as one of the best ways to minimize pre-sleep stress.

Note: If you want to listen to music but don’t want the music to stimulate your brain, consider listening to binaural beats. Theta waves initiate drowsy, light sleep while delta waves keep you in a deep sleep. You can find these sorts of binaural beats on meditation apps like Insight Timer or even on YouTube videos! (Check out this video of 8 hours of theta waves.)

sleep tracking Dr Tracy Gapin men's health optimization

Temperature

Studies show that sleeping in a cold room is actually better for your health than sleeping in a warm one. Our body temperature naturally drops while we sleep, so a cooler bedroom can reinforce the body’s instinct to sleep. Temperatures between 60 and 68 degrees have been shown to stimulate the production of melatonin, which is the “sleep hormone.”

You can sleep with a fan, like a Dyson cool air purifier, to cool down your room. However, moving air may actually make it harder to sleep for some people. If you’re not too fond of the idea of a fan it may be worth looking at an air filter from somewhere like air purifier first may be a better option, as there will be less of a direct flow of air compared to a dyson fan.

Instead, I recommend a Nest thermostat. You can program your smart thermostat to make your A.C. cooler at night to help you fall asleep, but then it can get warmer in the morning to help you wake up easier. (No one likes to leave their comfy bed if it’s too cold in the morning.) Plus, you can save money on your energy bill by programming your thermostat to cool and heat your house in accordance with your routines and lifestyle.

You can also try out cooling sheets. These promote air flow and minimize perspiration, so you can stay covered while staying cool. Sheex is a popular option thanks to their Sleep-Fit Technology with advanced thermoregulation. Plus, their sheets are super soft and quick drying.

Natural solution: sleep naked! Doesn’t hurt, right?

Air quality

Poor air quality in your bedroom may actually play the biggest role in your ability to sleep soundly through the night. Our bodies require high levels of oxygen at night. If your bedroom doesn’t have clean, pure oxygen available, your body can’t fall into that restful state it needs for restoring balance.

See what your air quality looks like with a monitor like Awair. This analyzes and tracks toxins, chemicals, dust, humidity, and carbon dioxide to determine what your bedroom environment is like. It will even learn your routines, habits, and lifestyle to determine how your living impacts your air quality. Awair even interacts with other smart home devices to offer personalized recommendations that can improve your air quality.

To purify your air, I recommend the Pure Cool Link Air Purifier by Dyson. This two-in-one fan purifies 99.97% of allergens and pollutants, even those as small as 0.3 microns. It also keeps you cool while purifying, so you can have a chillier bedroom at night as well (and save on you’re HVAC bill).

You also want to keep the air humid, which helps keep your sinuses lubricated and your skin soft. Plus, humidity helps you sleep better. You can purchase a humidifier, or you can even use an essential oil diffuser. This will add a bit of moisture to the air while also making your room smell incredible. Add lavender, bergamot, and eucalyptus essential oils to induce superior sleep.

Natural air quality solution: succulents! Succulents continue to intake carbon dioxide and release oxygen at night (other plants stop releasing oxygen at night). So putting a few succulent plants in your bedroom can purify the air and add in more oxygen.

Wake up energized

Waking up is part of the sleep process as well. If you wake up in the middle of a dream, you’re waking up from deep REM sleep—the sleep that is used to restore your body back to healthy homeostasis. Interrupting this pattern stops your body in the middle of its work, which will leave you feeling groggy, tired, and unrested the whole day.

You want to wake up naturally, so you feel energetic and vital to take on the day. That’s why I recommend using a sunrise alarm clock. These gadgets will wake you up gently in accordance with your tracked sleep rhythm, using light that mimics the rise of the sun. Your brain will slowly start to acknowledge the rising light, so it will wake up naturally without the shock of an alarm clock.

Popular sun alarm clocks are the Nox Sleep Light and Philips Wake-Up Light.

Nox Sleep Light

This Nox sleep light will monitor your sleep quality, help you fall asleep, and wake you up naturally. I love that it adjusts according to your personal body clock. So, it will send off a red wavelength when you’re falling asleep to raise your production of melatonin. Then, it will wake you up at the lightest part of your sleep so you’ll feel awake and energized. It can also track your bedroom environment like temperature, humidity, light, and noise to optimize your sleep moving forward.

Philips Wake-up Light

Philips lights offers several versions of their sunrise lamp. These offer natural wake up sounds and sunrise simulation, but they also include simulated sunsets and sleep music. This is a great starter option if you already have a sleep tracker.

Can sleep gadgets really help me sleep?

The good news is that in this age of technology, many sleep problems can be resolved through access to these cool gadgets. Instead of being prescribed a pharmaceutical medication, learning to reduce blue light and listening to a meditation at bedtime may be the alternative you need. You’ll have to experiment to find the best sleep aid for your personal challenges. However, these sleeping tips aren’t meant to replace professional sleep therapy.

If you’re having a hard time falling or staying asleep, just buying up all of these bedroom gadgets isn’t necessarily going to help (and if your problems are chronic, you should really seek assistance from a medical professional, not an app or tech product). If you’re doing everything you can for your sleep and still aren’t seeing results, it may be in your genes. Yup, our sleep schedule is actually part of our genetic expression!

But you can hack your genetic expression, so you can sleep better and healthier. It starts with a consultation to see where your health is now… and where it can be in just a few short months or weeks.

Let’s get you sleeping right, waking well, and living awesome.

It’s time for you to get in the driver’s seat of your health. With elite men’s optimization program, we’ll put you at the peak of your human potential.

Click here to learn more about the lifelong benefits of a personalized genetics consultation and epigenetic coaching program.

I look forward to hearing from you to revolutionize and revitalize your life and vitality. Let’s taking your health to the next level.