Hack your sleep by Karl Mentol - HTML preview

Chapter 1: Biohacking Briefly Explained

Do you eat a lot of fatty fish to improve your brain health? Do you use essential oils to relieve stress and boost your mood? Perhaps you follow a diet high in antioxidants or work out regularly to improve your cardiovascular health. If that's the case, then you are already a biohacker! In fact, most of us are biohackers in some form or another without even knowing it.

What is Biohacking?

Biohacking is the process of making changes to your lifestyle habits in order to “hack” the body’s biological functions and achieve positive health changes.

• Biohacking is simply "do-it-yourself" biology. Simple changes (such as in diet, exercise and sleep habits) are made to improve health, safeguard from disease and overcome issues like sleep deprivation.
• It is a fairly new practice and although it has its basis in biology, is not considered a science per se. However, its potentials could be huge. Studies on the field are ongoing and the findings are very promising. Biohacking has been already shown to have a major impact on many areas of physical and mental health.
• Biohacking is an experimental process because not all body cycles and rhythms are the same. Some people may respond to certain "hacks" while others will not. Therefore, it's a process of trying out different hacks to find out which one works best for you. This absolutely does not mean experimenting with your body in any way that can cause harm. The tools are perfectly safe to play around with and see which ones - if not all of them - improve your sleep.
• The main experts in the field of biohacking are Dave Asprey and Ben Greenfield. They experiment on themselves, develop new products and hacks in the field of nutrition and fitness and share them with the world.

There are three categories of biohacking:

1. Nutrigenomics is related to nutrition, stress management and hacking your surrounding environment, such as sound and light.
2. DIYBIO or do-it-yourself biology. This is where non-professional scientists conduct experiments in biohacking and share the results with likeminded people. The goal is to prove that the average laymen can become a successful biohacker.
3. Grinder biohacking focuses on technology such as implants and chemical supplements for hacking the body's biology. This is absolutely NOT recommended as the risks may be far greater than the benefits. This is better left to the total fanatics.

What should you focus on?

Sleep scientists tell us that it's not the number of hours that matter. It is the quality of your sleep that is essential for physical and mental health.

Many people sleep for 7 – 8 hours a night but still wake up feeling drained and unrested. This is because the quality of their sleep is poor. They are unable to enter into the state of deep sleep that relaxes and rejuvenates the body. Quality sleep means waking up energized and filled with vitality, regardless of how many hours you have slept. This needs to be your main focus; not just falling asleep, but sleeping well.

We can use a number of safe and natural biohacking techniques to improve our overall sleep quality. The following chapters will discuss some of the most popular and successful sleep hacks. These will help you:

• Overcome insomnia
• Fall asleep faster
• Improve the duration of sleep
• Improve the quality of sleep
• Promote deep, restful sleep

Some so-called experts claim that biohacking requires various gadgets and complex measurements to monitor brain waves and other responses. Honestly, this is completely unnecessary.

Always remember that nobody knows your body better than you. You will know what works best for you by how you feel. You will be able to measure the results by how much your sleep improves.

You may find that you enjoy biohacking so much that you want to delve deeper. As your knowledge and skill increases, you may want to try gadgets and measuring tools. But for now, let’s keep things simple.