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gwunspoken
We know that now more than ever, there is a growing disconnection between parents and their teens, corporates and their employees, and human interactions in general.
This can cause stress, frustration and many arguments within families and the work environment.
gwunspoken looks at the challenges people of all ages have in their relationships with one another and provides experience and advice, allowing all parties to have a voice.... and feel heard.
Join us to hear corporates, parents, educators, teens and the latest advice of how we can in fact live the life we love, in making authentic interactions, because we know... authentic connection is everything.
gwunspoken
Your Late-Night Habits Are Slowly Killing You, And You Know It
Are you secretly sabotaging your own sleep? In this season finale on sleep, we tackle the confronting truth about sleep accountability and the excuses we make that undermine our rest.
Most of us aren't "just bad sleepers" – we're making conscious choices that hurt our sleep quality. From that friend who drinks coffee after dinner while complaining about insomnia to those of us who sacrifice sleep for "just one more episode," we examine the self-sabotaging behaviours we've normalised. Research reveals people who use screens before bed take 30-50% longer to fall asleep, while caffeine lingers in our system for up to eight hours. Even more alarming, consistently getting less than six hours of sleep increases your risk of heart disease by nearly 50%.
The hard truth? Sleep isn't just about feeling rested – it's literally about staying alive. Yet we prioritise everything else – work, socialising, endless scrolling – while acting shocked when exhaustion hits. FOMO drives us to check our phones 180-200 times daily, and we justify late-night screen time as "relaxation" when science proves it's anything but.
Taking ownership of your sleep decisions is the first step toward change. We challenge you to audit your nighttime routine honestly, set non-negotiable sleep boundaries, and recognise that "I don't have time" is rarely the truth. If you have time for Netflix, you have time for sleep – it's not about finding hours, it's about priorities.
Ready to break the cycle of sleep sabotage? Try our journaling prompts to identify your sleep-sabotaging habits, examine what you're actually doing instead of sleeping, and set one boundary tonight that reconnects you with the rest your body desperately needs. Your future self will thank you.
www.in8code.com
Welcome to another edition of GW Unspoken, where we discuss stuff we don't typically talk about but probably should. And we're here at season eight, the last episode, episode eight on sleep, and we're going to get a bit controversial. Today we're going to talk about your accountability, like are you sabotaging your own rest? I mean, we all say we want better sleep, we complain about being tired, we nod along when someone tells us how important rest is. But here's the real question are you actually making choices that support good sleep or are you secretly sabotaging yourself? This episode is going to get a little uncomfortable, is? But here's the real question Are you actually making choices that support good sleep or are you secretly sabotaging yourself? This episode is going to get a little uncomfortable because today we're talking about accountability. I'm calling out all excuses, the I'm just a bad sleeper narratives and the habits. We know are hurting us, but we do them anyway. So if you've ever said I don't have time for more sleep or I can function just fine with five or four hours, well, this episode is for you, so let's dive in.
Speaker 1:A few months ago, I had a friend tell me she was exhausted all the time and I don't know what's wrong with me. She was saying, and she'd say it while she was yawning, and she kept saying I think I've got a sleep disorder. So I asked her. I said what time is your typical bed routine? What I said you know what time is your typical bed routine? What time do you go to bed? She said, well, I usually go to bed around 11 pm. But then I check my phone for a bit and say I couldn't help myself. So I said well, you know well how long is a bit. You say look at your phone, how long is a bit. She said oh, maybe an hour. I said, okay, well, what about caffeine? And she goes what do you mean? I said well, do you have coffee or tea or something after dinner? She goes yeah, often I'll drink just a coffee after dinner, but caffeine doesn't really affect me. So obviously it turns out her mystery sleep problem wasn't actually a disorder. It was a series of choices she was making.
Speaker 1:And you know, that's what we need to talk about tonight, because for most of us the problem isn't our bodies betraying us, it's our behaviors that betray our bodies. We make excuses for bad sleep habits. We convince ourselves that we need our phone before bed, that checking emails at midnight is just part of life. It's part of my work. I need to get on top of things. It'll stress me out if I don't do it, and drinking coffee late at night doesn't affect us, but we know that research says otherwise. Again, I was doing some more research on this stuff because I don't want to just come across and give opinions, but there was a university of Pittsburgh found that people who regularly use screens before bed take 30 to 50% longer to fall asleep.
Speaker 1:Caffeine we've talked about this before in one of our earlier episodes, but it stays in our system for about six to eight hours. So even if you think it doesn't affect you, your nervous system, which you probably don't have any kind of influence over, would definitely disagree. So ask yourself are you really a bad sleeper? Are you just not getting enough? Or setting yourself up, I suppose, for success? You know, the other thing with the problems we face is that we prioritize everything else over sleep. We work, we socialize, we get on Netflix, we scroll, we game. You know it all eats into our sleep, and yet we act shocked when we feel terrible the next day. Here's the truth If you don't prioritize sleep, you'll pay for it somewhere else, with low energy, poor focus, mood swings, even long-term health consequences. You know, there's a study found that people who consistently get less than six hours of sleep per night have a 48% so it's almost 50% higher risk of developing heart disease. So that's right. Sleep isn't just about feeling rested. It's literally about staying alive.
Speaker 1:The ones I also heard is that we blame external factors instead of owning our choices. So, yes, life is busy, yes, stress is real, but if you're staying up until 1am watching YouTube, that's not your job's fault. That's your choice. And let's be real, most of us aren't losing sleep because we're solving world crises. We're losing sleep because we're stuck in a cycle of self-sabotage disguised as relaxation.
Speaker 1:I'm asking you now, in our last episode, for sleep. Do you do this? What are some of the behaviors you do before bed and think it'll be right or I've just had a bad day, so I just need to relax by doing this? I need to do this because it'll help me switch off. I've heard people say this before where they go. Yeah, gary, I just get my phone because it's it's actually my downtime. But be real, let's be real about this. It's. It might make your you feel like your brain is relaxed or you don't have to think about stressful things from your job or your study. We know that it provides dopamine to your brain. We know that the blue light will actually make that melatonin decrease. It's actually going to make you stay awake and make you stay alert.
Speaker 1:Teens, I'm mainly talking to you here as well. It affects you right now. We don't want you to get actually addicted to other things because now you're addicted to screens before bed. So stop't want you to get actually addicted to other things because now you're addicted to screens before bed. So stop saying that you're stressed and this is going to help you out. We know, you know deep down that's not true. So look, we've talked about some negatives. We've said some hard-hitting truths. So what's the solutions? What are some solutions here? How's this? How about you start owning your sleep decisions? Stop saying I'm just a bad sleeper and start saying I make choices that impact my sleep and so when you take ownership, you can then change it, because you have that feeling of autonomy then. So own your sleep decisions, just do it.
Speaker 1:Number two audit your nightmare routine or your nighttime routine. What do you actually do before bed? Do you drink caffeine? Are you on your phone? Are you relaxing by binge watching TV? Write it down, look at the patterns. Be really honest.
Speaker 1:Here's another idea for a solution. How about you set hard sleep boundaries, treat your bedtime like a non-negotiable appointment? If you wouldn't cancel a meeting for Netflix, don't cancel sleep for it either. How about you give yourself a reality check on late night strolling? Ask yourself do I really need to see this right now? 99% of the time, the answer is no. Put the phone down. We live in a society of FOMO. We have a fear of missing out and we keep grabbing our phones, touching our phones, looking at our phones. I think the average person now does the pickup of their phone between 180 and 200 times in a day. That's crazy. That's absolutely crazy. 99% of the time, the answer is no. Put the phone down and stop drinking caffeine late. Even if you think that it doesn't affect you, caffeine's half-life means it lingers.
Speaker 1:If you've been struggling with sleep, move your last cup of coffee before 2 pm and see what happens. See if you can get to sleep better. Challenge the I don't have time for sleep. Lie If you have time to scroll. If you've got time for social media. You've got time for games. You've got time for socialising. You've got time to watch Netflix or another series. Now you have time to sleep. If you can watch three episodes of a show, you can go to bed earlier. It's not about time, it's about priorities.
Speaker 1:All right, to sum up, to sum up our sleep season eight, episode eight. Here's some calls to action for your journal. Okay, number one be brutally honest. What sleep-sabotaging habits are you making excuses for? Write them down and ask yourself if you're willing to change them. Again, we are emotional creatures. We do things on emotion, not logic, most of the time. So if you know it's actually sabotaging your sleep habits, are you willing to change them? Because if you can emotionally change them and get in that bind to your brain and go, I'm going to actually feel better if I can stop doing these things and get more sleep. You're a winner to try to change that behavior. Number two write this down how often do you say I don't have time for sleep and what are you actually doing instead? What can you cut back on? Number three, the last one what's one boundary you can set tonight to take back control of your sleep? So, whether it's limiting screens, seeing your bedtime or cutting caffeine earlier. Is there something you can do now that actually you can have a boundary and say that's it from tonight forward? I'm not going to do it and see how that changes.
Speaker 1:Look, I hope you got something out of the season eight of these episodes on sleep. I really hope that they can help you because I know sleep is a big one. There's been a lot of popular responses around this episode or this season about sleep and how we sabotage sleep and how to get more sleep. We know the importance of it. It's like being fit. We know how to become fit. We know that to be fit or to look great, we need to sleep well, we need to exercise, we need to have good nutrition. We know all these things but, again, because we are not governed logically, we often are governed by our emotion. What are some things that you can do to make yourself feel better and have little wins, like celebrate the wins of when you can change your sleep habits and make yourself feel better during the day. I challenge you, see if you can actually do that. Go back through the season, see if you can improve your sleep, love to hear from your comments and look forward to our next episode. We come for something different in gw Unspoken.