Journey to Well
We are not created to do this healing journey or life alone. In fact, it was Bessle Van Der Kolk who expertly shared “healing happens in the presence of an empathic witness”. That is the heart of this podcast & my business : to witness. You can expect a plethora of conversations on nervous system regulation, breathwork, human design & astrology, cycle alignment, energy & spirituality work and so much more. We are all on a journey back home to ourselves, rediscovering our innate power within & I am thrilled to take this journey to well with you. be well xx
Journey to Well
Unlocking Restorative Sleep: Creating Your Optimal Health | Evalee Gertz | Sia Silk Sleep Mask
Ever wondered why you still wake up exhausted after a full night's sleep? The answer might lie not in how long you're sleeping, but in the quality of that sleep—and darkness plays a crucial role.
Sleep isn't just about logging hours in bed; it's about reaching those deep, restorative stages where your body can truly heal. Founder of Sia Silk, Evalee, a former professional dancer who learned firsthand how sleep dramatically affected her performance abilities, shares game-changing insights about optimizing sleep quality through simple environmental adjustments.
One surprising revelation is the significant difference between men's and women's sleep needs. Research shows men typically get more deep sleep than women in the same amount of time, and women generally need closer to nine hours of quality rest for proper hormonal regulation. This disparity explains why many women feel chronically exhausted despite seemingly adequate sleep—our bodies simply require more restorative rest than we're giving them.
The conversation explores practical, accessible ways to transform your sleep experience, from creating a brief but effective wind-down routine to understanding how light exposure affects your melatonin production. Even small changes—like using red light in the evening (which mimics ancestral firelight) or wearing a quality sleep mask—can dramatically improve your sleep quality, affecting everything from weight management to mental health.
For those with specific energy types like manifesting generators, physical activity throughout the day proves essential for quality rest. As Evalee explains, "If I don't actually do even just a few minutes of physical activity, I really can't sleep." These personalized insights demonstrate how understanding your unique body can transform your relationship with rest.
Ready to revolutionize your sleep? Start with one small adjustment tonight. Your mind, body, and future self will thank you for prioritizing this fundamental pillar of health that affects literally everything else in your life.
Try Sia Silk! Follow this link or use code journeytowell15 for a special discount. :)
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be well, my friend
xx Hannah
Welcome back to the podcast Journey to Well. So today is a good one because I talk about sleep often on my Instagram channel with my friends. I am joined today with Eva Lee. She's a 3-5 emotional manifesting generator, so kind of get into human design throughout, kind of just linked throughout the podcast. But today we're going to be talking about the importance of sleep, also how to create the best environment for sleep, because there's actually some things that we can do that really benefit the quality of our sleep, not just the amount of time that we're laying in bed, right. So I'm super excited to have you on the podcast Evilly. If you could give a little intro it doesn't have to be anything specific, honestly, just who is Evilly?
Speaker 2:Let's start just kind of making some connections and then we'll get into the nice conversation of sleep connections and then we'll get into the nice conversation of sleep, sure, so, um, I guess I'll give you a little background on me. I, uh, I used to live in LA, I was a yoga teacher and eventually became a professional dancer. So I always was really connected to my body and really aware of how, you know, health and wellness affected my performance and how I felt in my body in a day to day. So I got really interested in all the health and wellness things like nutrition and, you know, exercise and obviously as a yoga instructor. But I realized pretty quickly that sleep was kind of the cornerstone of all of it, of how you look, how you feel and definitely how you perform. Like, if I didn't get a good night's sleep and I had an audition or performance the next day, I really felt it Like I probably wasn't going to book that job, so, um. So I got really interested in how to optimize my sleep, because I've never been a great sleeper and as I dug in on research, I realized that sleeping in total darkness is one of the most key components to getting really restorative sleep. There are so many benefits to it that range from everything like metabolic health and hormone regulation and longevity and even lowering your risk of depression and obesity. So you know the list goes on. It's really important to sleep in total darkness and you know, as a starving artist, I didn't have the money to like outfit my house with blackout curtains and things like that, and you know I'd be on tour and traveling or working late nights. So I realized very quickly that a sleep mask is one of the best tools to maximize your sleep quality and you know it's such a great return investment because sleep masks are really cheap and affordable and convenient and you can travel with them and so and you really it really does affect your sleep quality in a big, big way.
Speaker 2:But I tried a million different masks. I tried all the masks on the market, all the kinds of masks, and they were either, you know, like cheap synthetic that fell apart when you wash them and made me break out when I wore them, or they had nice silk masks that just didn't stay on and didn't work and didn't fit and weren't very comfortable. So I eventually decided to create my own sleep mask. So I created a design, a unique design. It's a little bit larger than your average sleep mask, you have a little bit better coverage and it has extra thick padding, so it's thicker and more cushiony and has larger than standard eye cups.
Speaker 2:Because I have really long lashes and I found that my eyelashes were always getting like smashed and real wonky, and so I created a mask that had more room for your eyes and that also helps it conform to your face and just like get that real blackout seal. And it's adjustable too, because I have a tiny head and I could never find masks that fit. I'm like all over sewing. You know you spend a bunch of money in a silk mask, so I'm over to sew it to fit my head. So it was important to me to make sure that people could get like a custom fit, and then the whole mask is made out of really high quality silk, so it's really, really good for your skin. It has anti-aging qualities, it's also better for the environment and all the things. So that's been my journey and that's you know kind of where. What got me to here and now I just like to spend my time helping people understand why getting better sleep is so important and helping them do that.
Speaker 1:So I love that. I love the classic manifesting generator, like, oh, this doesn't exist in the world yet, let me just create it. No big deal Like that's definitely in human design. Manifesting generators are kind of that bridge between bringing things that don't exist yet into reality, and I'm also a manifesting generator. So if I like see something that is it doesn't exist, or if there's something that's in my world that I want that I don't know how to get it, I oftentimes just create it as well. So that's the classic Manny Jen energy. Right there. I'm curious. In the beginning you said I have always been a bad sleeper. What can you? Can you expound upon that, expand upon that a little bit of what do you mean by bad sleeper? And and like, what had, um, what, what happens or what had been happening?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I, I always tease my husband and say I'm like the princess and the pea. I have to be in my own bed. I have to. You know, I don't know, I just I never was good at falling asleep. I was never great at staying asleep. I think I struggled with insomnia and, you know, learning to meditate and yoga like really helps with that, but yeah, I just never was good. Like you know, some people, like my husband, can fall asleep anywhere in minutes, and that is not me. I can't sleep on an airplane or in a car, you know, like I'm I'm not a great sleeper, but having a sleep mask, you know, it helps me kind of create my little cocoon and my little like perfect sleep environment anywhere. So that's also really really helped me get better sleep.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, and it's something that you can carry with you too. Which I know you and I talked about before is we don't know like I travel a lot too, so we don't know if there's going to be nice shades at the Airbnb that you're staying at. Hotels tend to have pretty good curtains, but still if they have that like crack that you can't cover with the curtain, then you're just getting blinded with sunlight, and I used to spend a lot of time in New York and I would sleep in kind of like this um top floor room that they didn't have any curtains on the windows, and so it would just be, you know, city lights at night and then sunlight in the morning, and having a sleep mask would really help me get that like consistent sleep as well. I think it does. It really does help with the consistency of the quality of your sleep.
Speaker 2:I totally agree. And traveling really is a good point, because even if your hotel does have blackout curtains, there's often a smoke detector or an air conditioner and like little green or blue lights on them and you know we don't think about the light pollution. You know like our our room might feel dark, but even if there's like a little bit of a glow from the street lamp outside or there's a nightlight in your hall or something and just that little crack of light.
Speaker 2:Our eyelids really aren't made to filter the light, so we really do see it and it really does affect the quality of our sleep, and without getting to those really specific levels you know there's four levels of sleep and without getting to the REM or that deep sleep, then your hormones can't really restart and regulate, your cells don't regenerate like.
Speaker 2:You just can't get into that same restorative space. And so, even if you're one of those people that can sleep anywhere and doesn't have a problem like, you're still going to wake up, not that refreshed, you're still going to feel it and you're just feeling sluggish or brain fog or you know whatever it's also have a possibility of, you know, gaining more weight because your whole metabolism isn't working as well and your heart rate is higher. So, yeah, it really. You know, unless you want to, I knew somebody that used to travel stickers and they would go put stickers on all the little lights and hotel room but like, what a pain in the butt. You know like. Or you can just grab a sleep mask and take it with you. Ours comes with like a little travel pouch and you know it doesn't weigh anything, you just throw it in your bag and it's just makes all the difference in the world.
Speaker 1:Super easy and I definitely do want to kind of dive into the sleep mask. But I'm curious if just kind of having that conversation of sleep for people that are resonating with oh, I feel like I've always been a terrible sleeper. I don't necessarily think that I've been a terrible sleeper. I am probably a little bit more like your husband Like I can sleep on planes and I can fall asleep relatively quickly. But there's a lot of things that I have done in my life, especially in my daily evening routine, that support better quality sleep. So I'm curious what other things you have learned and that you've developed along your sleep journey that might be beneficial to try.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's lots of things and and this and a nighttime routine is definitely something that we don't think about that much, but yeah, I do. You know I learned to meditate when I was 19 and that that like changed my life, especially in terms of my sleep and my ability to like turn my brain off and go to sleep. So, you know, having a good nighttime routine is really important and it could be anything like from having your nighttime tea or taking a bath before bed, or, you know, some people read.
Speaker 2:I often read before bed, but you know, I always will turn the lights off and take you know, five minutes to just take some deep breaths, get centered, quiet my mind.
Speaker 2:Um, we also sell some other kind of nighttime routine products that we have this really nice aromatherapy roll on it's lavender oil and it's infused with amethyst crystals which are good for, you know, spiritual wellbeing and just calming, and the lavender obviously is really great stress relief. So that can help you just kind of start to unwind. That you take some nice deep breaths, put your mask on. That can just help you drift off to sleep a little faster. We also have a sleep kit and it's like everything you need to get your best night's sleep. So it comes with like bath salts and nighttime tea and lip balm and earplugs and the aromatherapy and the mask all together in like one little gift box. So it's like a really great self-care gift and it helps you kind of cultivate that nighttime routine of just letting, helping signal your brain and your body that it's time to wind down and get ready to sleep, which can be hard.
Speaker 2:You know we live in such a hustle culture.
Speaker 2:The other thing that's really important is light and it not just to be in darkness when you're sleeping, but like to actually start to limit the quality of light in your environment for the few hours leading up to bed.
Speaker 2:So like we're surrounded by screens you know we have blue light and and led lights and our TVs, our computers and our phones all are putting off a certain frequency of light that actually suppresses our melatonin production and kind of stresses out the brain. Like that's fine in the morning when you want the cortisol to start pumping and to wake you up and get you going for the day, but you don't want that cortisol going when you're trying to go to sleep. That's a stress hormone and you want that melatonin to start pumping so it regulates all your other horm hormonal processes so you can really go to sleep and get that restorative rest. So limiting your screen time before bed or, you know, turning off your LEDs and using like incandescent bulbs or candles before bed can really help you calm down and prepare to get much better sleep you calm down and prepare to get much better sleep.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't know where I read this or really what it said, but when you're talking about amethyst, I actually have an amethyst crystal by my bed and I must've read somewhere that it was good to have amethyst by your bed because that's why it's there. But lavender is a really great one. I definitely use lavender. You can also diffuse it. I've diffused lavender for years now.
Speaker 1:But the red light, or the reducing light, is so important. I talk all the time about red light. I actually just had a podcast episode about red light therapy, which is different than just red light. But I've done in the past. I've done, um, the smart bulbs you can get in. Like, if you have a bedroom lamp, exchange it with a smart bulb, if you have an Alexa or a smart home, and I would always just do red light at night and just have that light change. Um, you know, once the sun goes down. There's also glasses. I mean you look a little silly wearing like red, red glasses, but yes, those, I have them by my bed. So if I'm reading at night too, or or if I'm watching TV, honestly it makes such a difference. You don't know until you know. But you can get those red glasses on Amazon for relatively cheap. I think mine are like money bags or whatever.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and they do. They make a really big difference. I didn't know about the smart bulbs, but that's really cool. We have incandescent bulbs which not recently had been banned in America and they've just been re put back on the market. But they were banned for the last like four years and now they're legal again, which is great, because LEDs the theory about LEDs that they're use less energy, but they do put off blue light and they flicker, which causes stress to your eyes and your brain, so they're actually really harmful and they're bad for the environment too. They're bad for animals and stuff. So it's really great that incandescent bulbs are making a comeback, because they actually put off the same frequency as light as like fire does, which is calming and good.
Speaker 1:That's the whole. I did a deep dive a couple of years ago when I started doing red light at night and I heard this on a podcast, but they kind of went into the history behind. The red light actually is kind of mimicking, like a candlelight or a fire. So when we were like back in tribal times, when we didn't have electricity, we didn't have light at night. The only thing that we had was candles or fires and that's how we would light our homes or light, you know, the tent or whatever, and that's why our brains they assimilate that with okay, it's time to sleep. And that's where, like, the melatonin production comes in. And there's so many simple things that we can do that we don't even realize like this, or even just limiting the light, like you're saying, or the type of light. I didn't actually know that about incandescent versus LED. I don't even know what my lights are at home or my lamp lights, but there's so many things that we can do to help, like you're saying, like our hormone production and the stress hormones.
Speaker 1:I think a lot of people obviously, like we live in such a fast paced society that it's really hard for us to slow down and a lot of us are just kind of coming to the end of the day exhausted and we fall into bed and then we just pass out, but then we're still having that, like I think I saw.
Speaker 1:Do you have an aura ring? I do, yeah. So like it's so interesting to track your sleep and track how much movement and REM you're getting and deep sleep and like the latency of your sleep, how fast you fall asleep, and that was really interesting to me, because aura will tell you you can fall asleep too fast and that means that you're too tired, too exhausted, that you need to create a little bit more Well, you need to invitation to create a little bit more balance. And that's really where that nighttime routine could come in, which could be five minutes, like I like that you said just five minutes doing breathing at night. I think sometimes we think of nighttime routines like they have to be an hour. They don't really. It can be five minutes of breathing or five minutes like rolling on some lavender, something like that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, exactly Anything that just helps you kind of get centered and calm down and, you know, quiet your mind.
Speaker 2:That was one of the things like my racing thoughts, so like that. That's's where, when I learned to meditate, it made a big, big difference for me of just, you know, connecting to my breath and kind of turning my brain off. But that's such a good point what you said. Like I do think that people are burnt out and so you just kind of fall into bed and you're sleeping from this exhaustion place and, again, that may not be the most restorative place to be sleeping Like, have you ever been so tired? And you just like crash out and you sleep like 10 hours and you wake up exhausted, like, and it's just like well, that means that you're too tired and you're not really getting the quality of sleep that you should be getting. And I think it's such a good point.
Speaker 2:We live in such a crazy society, like it it really is. There's such a focus to kind of being hectic, the hectic lifestyle and the go, go, go, go, go and do a million things and, um, you know, especially for women, I think we're a bit kind of taught to be people pleasers, so we're kind of always putting everyone above ourselves and and it can be really hard to prioritize our rest and our self care because we feel bad about feel guilty and, unfortunately, like you can't give from an empty well, like you have to take time and give yourself permission to prioritize your rest, and sometimes that means you know you have to take a nap or something. Your rest and sometimes that means you know you have to take a nap or something Time out of your day. You have to just, you know, slow down because it is there's a lot of pressure to just keep going.
Speaker 2:And the other interesting thing is that men can function on a lot less sleep than women can. Yes, yeah, there's some interesting stays. One is that in the same amount of time, men tend to get more time in the REM and deep sleep, so that really restorative levels sleep than women do. Women tend to like go in and out of it and not stay there as long. And so, just if we were to like go to bed at the same time and get up at the same time, we have significantly less quality of sleep than men.
Speaker 2:So that's interesting. But the other interesting thing is that men can function a lot less sleep, so they can function on six to eight hours of sleep and be fine and not necessarily feel that sleep deprivation, but because of our much more complex hormonal systems, we just can't do that. So most women need closer to like nine hours of sleep a night in order to get the same restoration and because our hormones get so depleted if we try to function on less sleep than we need, like we really just can't, like we just don't function as well, you know. That's, I think, where some of those negative taboos about women, about. You know.
Speaker 2:That's I think where some of those negative taboos about women, about, you know, hysteria or whatever comes in is that it's like we're sleep deprived, you know, and we take on the role we take on. We're taking care of the babies and cleaning the house and trying to be career people and doing 8 million things for 8 million people and you know we just we can't do it, especially if we're not taking the time to like really get good sleep and not at least the way men can. So it's it's really interesting to dig into that stuff yeah.
Speaker 1:I had not heard that you, that men can in the same amount of sleep. They spend more time in REM. I had heard well, REM and deep sleep. I had heard that women when I first heard yeah, it was like women need like eight to 10 hours, I'm like, oh my gosh, that is so much. But honestly, if I've also spent the past maybe year or two on well longer than that, I don't like alarm clocks and I know that that's obviously not an option for some people. If you have to be at work by 9am, you I mean actually that's a whole conversation because one could argue, if you're taking more time for your nighttime routine and you're getting better quality sleep, that you would possibly be able to wake up at, you know, 6am every day if you're getting the same amount of sleep and you're not waking up in exhaustion.
Speaker 2:I think you hit the nail on the head about the consistency. If you go to the same time, you actually will train your body to be on a schedule. I don't use an alarm clock and I do get up at 730 every day. Yeah, it's just, my body is just as trained to wake up at that time. But consistency is important with the quality of your sleep as well. So I'm about that a lot like going to bed at the same time and staying on the same schedule is really good for you. I didn't mean to cut you off, though. No, that's okay.
Speaker 1:No good, good point, but yeah, so I was just saying I, I, I've been practicing, but for more than a couple of years. I mean, this has been basically since I left corporate America, where I had to wake up at like 6am every day. Uh, I, I don't wake up to an alarm, and it's very helpful to allow, like, but you're right, I do wake up. I wake up between like six, 30 and seven every day, Naturally, um, there was something that I was going to say about that, though, but it's, it's just. Oh, that's what I was going to say.
Speaker 1:Obviously, a big part of my business is cycle alignment and, like, cycle syncing. So another very interesting thing is we actually need a little bit more sleep in our luteal phase, because our body, if you think about it, our bodies, are preparing to shed, which is like going through the death process, or I mean, you could get like very like spiritually into this, but like, physically, we're we're shedding, we're like shedding the egg from our liner, um, and so your body is preparing for that, so it needs a little bit more sleep. So it's also interesting for me, and you can track this just by yourself, or, if you have an aura ring, start noticing. When you're in the luteal phase, I always sleep like I'll always sleep closer to seven, versus when I'm in my follicular or ovulation phase. I like wake up like 615, 630, and I'm ready to go. It's not dramatic, but it is interesting to notice the differences.
Speaker 2:That is really interesting. I did not know that. Thank you for sharing that. That makes a lot of sense, though, because I know I mean I'm pregnant now, but before, when I would be in my ludo phase, I would just feel more tired, like I just needed more rest. I didn't have the same energy levels whenever, so that makes feel more tired, like I just needed more rest. I didn't have the same energy levels, whatever.
Speaker 1:That makes a lot of sense. That's so interesting, Super interesting. Yeah, yeah, I love not. I feel like we're just talking. I'm talking a lot about Oura Ring, but but when we talk about sleep, I feel like I am a very data-driven person. I have a one line in human design which is the investigator, and they tend to be like very, very data driven. They want to know their, your resources and where you got that information. So using something that has the biometric data is very helpful for me. To see what my score is, to see how much movement I have.
Speaker 1:Alcohol, I mean, oh my gosh, we all know that we sleep worse with alcohol. There's there's no way that you can convince me that you think that you sleep better. You don't, Um. But to see the reflection on your aura ring. I mean I go from like a 92 sleep score to like a 70 or a 60 sleep score and you're outside. I mean you don't really feel like you feel more tired and you feel hung over right, it's kind of the wording that we use, but if you're looking at the data behind it, your heart rate is elevated, your temperature often is elevated. You have more movement. You have way more disturbed sleep. Same with eating before bed, Like have you ever explored that eating, stopping eating?
Speaker 2:like three hours before bed. I have that eating. Stopping eating, like three hours before bed I have, um, I'm one of those freak people, though, that I think I have like blood sugar crashes. So I'll like wake up in the middle of the night starving, and then I want to go back to sleep and that's really annoying to have to get up and eat. I mean, I do now that I'm pregnant. I can't make it through the night. I have to get up and eat, but before I would eat something before bed so that I could through the night. But it is true, like I wouldn't eat anything heavy, I would usually do like a, you know, like a hot chocolate with protein in it or something that would be like calming and relaxing but would have protein that would keep me satiated through the night. But yeah, it's true, like they say, you should not eat anything at least two hours before bed because it does disturb it. And you know, also, we were like coffee addicts.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's another point More than like your one or two cups of coffee and drinking coffee later in the day, because coffee actually has a half-life of like 12 hours. Yeah, if you drink coffee at noon it's not really going to wear out Like the effects of that caffeine aren't really going to wear off until like midnight. So if you're trying to go to bed at like nine or 10 o'clock at night, that's going to prevent you from getting good sleep and falling asleep early. So, yeah, those are all things to consider when you're trying to get better sleep. But you're so right about the alcohol I don't drink. But partly why I don't drink is that when I was younger and would drink, I just I couldn't sleep at all. I just, you know, I'd pass out for like an hour or two and then I would just toss and turn the rest of the night and then I'd wake up feeling like absolute garbage and I was like there's, this isn't worth it, don't drink. But yeah, it really does affect the quality of your sleep in a big way.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I've significantly reduced, uh, how much I drink and how often I drink, but I'll still have like a glass of wine, even just one one glass of wine still affects negatively affects my sleep score, which is just affects negatively affects my sleep score, which is just, I mean, it's.
Speaker 1:it's so interesting just to begin to pay attention. I think one of the reasons I really wanted to have this conversation is that there's not really anything profoundly new that we're saying right Like. This is all science, this has been researched for years. There's a lot of talk about let's get better sleep, but I think why I wanted to have this conversation is because I wanted to send the invitation to open the door, to begin to think about your sleep, to begin to think about the quality of your sleep, how you're approaching your evening, your evening routine again, whether that's five minutes or an hour, or even if it's just trying a sleep mask and seeing how that improves your sleep.
Speaker 1:You don't have to do every single thing that we're suggesting or giving ideas about, but oftentimes we do overlook sleep. We do overlook like oh well, I got, I gave myself seven hours to sleep tonight, but I still feel exhausted or I still slept like shit. Okay, what did you do before bed? What did you do during bed?
Speaker 1:There's there's a lot of things that we can add to our routine and our daily practices that are not time consuming, they're not really that expensive and they're not that difficult to incorporate, but it's going to make such a big difference. I mean everything that you said, like in our hormone levels and the way that we look in holding onto weight, if our body is always in that stress state. That's why our bodies hold onto weight. It's not that you're eating too much fast food. Maybe it is that you're eating too much fast food, but if you're eating healthy, if you're doing all the other things, you have to look at your stress levels, and sleep plays a huge role in that.
Speaker 1:So there's so many different ways that we can approach this, but that's why I really wanted to have this conversation with sleep. So I want to briefly touch upon this face mask, this sleep mask, and then we'll kind of close how we normally close. So you obviously introed this in the beginning, but can you go over what the differences are in your sleep mask, um, and then we'll kind of go from there. I love that it has deeper holes, because I too have long eyelashes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, so, um, yeah again. So it's, it's a unique design. It looks kind of like your average you know contoured silk mask, but when you actually hold it in your hands or hold them next to each other, you can really see the difference. It's it's a little bit larger, so you really get full coverage, and it has, like I said, extra thick padding. So the eye cups are, on average, like a centimeter to a centimeter and a half deeper than your average eye cup. Um, we use really soft low resistance foam so it does compress the eye cup a bit, but it that just makes it extra cushiony. It's like sleeping on a cloud. It just conforms your face. It's so comfortable and the eye cups are larger round as well because of the bigger coverage.
Speaker 2:So there's more for eyes and the eye cup is deeper. And I did that because I do have long lashes and even though I tried you know the kind of average cookie cutter design that's out there it just I still felt like it wasn't very comfortable, it didn't really stay in place and then my lashes still were getting smashed, even with the eye cups. So I was like, how do we make this as deep as possible? I would have made them even deeper, but you know, has to fit, because it's silk. It has to fit through the sewing machine. So it was like we can do it.
Speaker 2:But that's also. We don't use any chemical adhesives, we don't use any synthetic fabrics, so it's really good for your skin. And and silk is, um, it looks amazing, it's. So we use really really high quality silk. It's unbelievably soft and smooth, so there's less friction, so that creates less pull on your skin. But it also absorbs less moisture than like cotton or synthetic matte uh fabrics do, so like, if you put.
Speaker 2:You know, I'm in my 40s, I use expensive face creams and I don't want it to like suck off into my sleep mask. I want to like absorb into my skin and so like absorb it as much. So that's really good. So it helps your skin and your hair maintain its moisture. And they have even done studies that show if you have, like, a wound and you bind it in silk instead of cotton, it will heal faster. So what that shows that actually speeds up the cell turnover of your skin. So it's literally anti-aging.
Speaker 2:Wow, yeah, so it's really good for your skin and, like, like I said, it's adjustable. So it's the only mask. Like I said, I tried a lot of masks and it's the only mask I've ever had that stayed in place, was really comfortable, blocked all light and didn't smash my lashes. It didn't cause me to break out. So it's naturally antimicrobial. So it's all the good things. Obviously, it's a little bit more expensive because because we use a lot of really high quality silk, which is expensive. But you know, again, if you're looking at like oh, I could outfit my house with blackout curtains, whatever, like no, invest in a really good sleep mask. And yeah, it's. I think it's the single most helpful tool to increase your sleep quality. And then, of course, we've talked about some of the other tools are very inexpensive and some of the other things that don't cost anything. Just take a little discipline that can really increase your sleep quality. But if you're going to invest in one thing, I would say invest in sleep masks, because the return on investment is so high.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I would agree it took me a while to find a mask, but I enjoy. I do have light that comes in, like under my eyes. So it's not exactly like yours, obviously, but it took me a while to find one that I liked and it has improved my sleep for sure, and it continues to improve my sleep. We were at dinner the other night and who knows why, we were talking about sleep masks. I don't know, but the couple that we were having dinner with, he didn't. He was.
Speaker 1:We were talking about sleep mouse and I think he has one or something or I don't know what he was saying, but he didn't even know that they had sleep masks that have the holes for your eyes because he was commenting on but he didn't even know that they had sleep masks that have the holes for your eyes because he was commenting on how his like, he's like I can't blink and like the sleep masks that are flat are like, so out, don't try those, because they also are flat and they don't like help your nose. I have a larger nose or maybe a large, the higher bridge. Yeah, I don't know. But yeah, I've tried the flat ones and they don't do anything because you have that like all of the light coming in under. But I was like no, they make ones that have eye holes, you know. So maybe people don't even know that. I don't know.
Speaker 2:I don't know. I mean we do have a lot of men that buy our masks. We have some really nice, more masculine colors and we have, you know, more girly colors too, but um, and we do, ours has like a slightly higher nose cut out for that reason. I mean, everybody's face is different, everyone's nose is different and so, you know, some people aren't going to get total blackout. It's, you know, some people it's going to be more comfortable for than others, you know. But I think overall, it's, it's better than what is out there at least in my experience so.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Yeah Well, and the adjustable strap, I think is very helpful too, because then then you're able to tighten it a little bit, which would also maybe help with with kind of solidifying it to your face. But anyway, super fun conversation, thank you. Thank you for coming on. I have two more, two more pieces. I would like to chat a little bit of your human design. We've already kind of talked about this, but in in regards to sleep, I'll kind of align this to sleep, and we've already talked a little bit about manifesting generators.
Speaker 1:But one other point that I wanted to bring up about human design and yours specifically, your what's called a manifesting generator, energy type, which we have five different energy types. We could be a manifesting generator, a manifester, a generator, a reflector or a projector, and manifesting generators and generators are what makes them that specific energy type is. You have what's called a defined sacral center, and our sacral center is our life force, energy. It's like our powerhouse center, it's where we get a lot of our physical energy from. If you think also in terms of like the chakra system, you can think in terms of like the sacral chakra and because of that fact, mgs and generators, one of the things that we kind of invite in these energy types is make sure that you're physically expanding, expelling, expelling your energy throughout the day, where you're actually physically exerting yourself to help bring like kind of drain that battery. If you think of of energy types in terms of batteries, generators, manifesting generators have like one large battery and that their job is to drain that battery throughout the day. So when you come to the end of the day with an empty battery, that does not mean that your battery is like completely depleted and over emptied, like we talked about, kind of falling into bed like just fucking exhausted. Um, but to drain the battery to like 20%, 10%, right, projectors, manifestors and reflectors, they have little batteries that their job is to kind of drain throughout the day and then once they drain that battery, they need to take a break, they need to get out of people's energy to recharge that battery and then eventually come back to whatever they're doing. So projectors, reflectors, manifestors, they tend to do a little bit better. They tend to thrive more, optimize their energy when they're taking those breaks throughout the day.
Speaker 1:So for you being a manifesting generator, and any MGs or generators out there that are listening, one of the tips that I would add to this conversation is making sure that you're physically using your body throughout the day, whether that's going for a walk, whether that's working out for you, maybe dancing, right, make sure that you're using your energy throughout the day, even if it's 10, 15 minutes. I follow an MG on on Instagram and she talks a lot about that. She's like, even if I just work out for 15, 20 minutes, she has some you know workout video that she enjoys doing. She always says she sleeps so much better and I know that that makes a really big difference.
Speaker 1:For me is to make sure that I'm using my body. So then you're coming to the end of the day and again that battery is is drained, you know, 10, 20% like physically, emotionally, spiritually, um, you're just making sure that that that battery is is drained. So then overnight, when you're laying down which is how we kind of recharge our sacral center, that battery is going to be um, built back up. But that might also affect your sleep too. If you're someone that's very sedentary I mean, this is general, right, you don't have to be a manifesting generator or generator but it would affect those energy types more.
Speaker 2:That's so interesting. Thank you for sharing that, because you know I run a business so I do often feel like super exhausted at the end of the day, like mentally, emotionally. But if I don't actually do even just a few minutes of some physical activity, I really can't sleep, and if I do that like for three days in a row, like it will really affect my sleep. So I have to like work out really regularly. Even if it is, like you said, just going for a walk or just doing 15 minutes of high intensity exercise or something, it will make such a big difference in my sleep quality and I didn't know that, but that I'm like that's connecting the dots for me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I think I don't know. I don't know about you, but I tend to be like a zero to 100 person or an all or nothing person. So with working out I'd be like, well, if I can't go to the gym for an hour, then I'm not doing anything. And that's not the case. We can. We can introduce this new perspective of oh what if I just saw how I felt if I moved my body for 15 minutes, even if it's just like dancing around your kitchen when you're cooking, my body for 50 minutes, even if it's just like dancing around your kitchen when you're cooking. We don't have to do this structured drive all the way to the gym, lift weights for an hour and then go home. It can be creative and see what brings you more energy. I mean, being outside for me always brings me more energy. So if I can exercise outside, I will.
Speaker 2:But yeah, like squats while you're watching TV or something. So yeah, absolutely, I've heard that do squats every commercial break. Yeah, they're especially good if you're pregnant.
Speaker 1:Oh loud, I bet, I bet.
Speaker 2:Do squats. Just you can't do enough squats.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh my gosh. Well, there you go, do some squats while you're watching TV or waiting for your dinner to cook, or something like that, absolutely.
Speaker 2:I love that. Well, thank you so much for sharing.
Speaker 1:Oh, you're welcome. Yeah, super fun. So I like to end with this question, and it can be sleep related or not, it doesn't have to be. But if you were standing on a stage and you had one message to share 30 seconds a minute with the world, what would you share?
Speaker 2:I'm like I immediately just got anxious. I hate being on stage unless I'm dancing.
Speaker 1:You're just, you're not standing on stage, but um.
Speaker 2:No, I think it's just to have more grace and to have more permission. Like you know, we talked about, you can't give from an empty well, and we're just so conditioned not to give to ourselves. So it's really just to be kinder to yourself, to take time for yourself, to have grace. You know everybody has good days and has bad days, and you know sometimes it's just not your day and so instead of being hard on yourself, just being like, okay, well, today's not my day, I'm gonna come back tomorrow and just try to show up as my best self. So I just, yeah, I think there's just so much pressure on all of us in today's world and I just want people to be kinder to themselves and also because permission for yourself is permission for others, and so the kinder you are for to yourself, then that reflects in your interactions out in the world, and then you're just spending kindness and you're influencing that, that kindness to spread. So I just it makes the world a better place.
Speaker 1:I love that. Thank you, I love that message. So, where can people find you? I forgot to do that. Where can people find you? Where do you hang out? And also, if they're curious to explore the sleep mask, where can they find that?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't really do social media personally, but we do have social media for the brand. So it's Sia Silk which is S-I-A Silk, and that's pretty much TikTok Instagram meta all the things interests. Yeah, all the things. So you can find us there and if you want to shop our products, we also have lots of great blogs and resources on our website, so just go to see a silkcom.
Speaker 1:Yay, and I'll put all those links down below so there'll be clickable and way easier to to find. But for people that just listen and they don't like to read the description, it's nice to say yeah, this was such a fun conversation evilly. Thank you for coming on oh my gosh.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for having me. This was really fun and a pleasure, so thank you.