Using your body's internal clock to your advantage

What do you do all day?

Many of us don’t really know what we do on any given day. We know what time the alarm goes off and roughly how many hours we spend at work, but we don’t usually have fixed times for activities such as eating, exercising and resting. Work or family commitments tend to dictate our day-to-day schedules, and we just fit food, fitness and sleep around those. 

But when we do that, we stop giving the body the predictable signals it needs to function. If we eat lunch at 12.00 on one day and 14.00 on another, our bodies are already confused. If we stay up late some nights to work – or to work out – but get to bed early on other nights, our bodies don’t know how or when to prepare for sleep. To understand how your schedule is already affecting your health you need to ask yourself two questions:

1.      Am I getting seven hours of uninterrupted sleep when it is dark outside?

2.      Am I doing almost all of my eating when it is light outside?

Most people can’t answer yes to these questions and this is a serious problem that needs to be addressed.

To understand the impact our schedule has on our overall wellbeing, let’s explore the daily routine of Caroline, a fictious yet typical example of a modern businesswoman. A successful advertising executive working in London, Caroline has a husband who also works full time and two young children. She appears to do all the “right” things; working out most days, eating a good diet with lots of protein, low-calorie meals and her five-a-day, and still managing to find time for family alongside her work. However, despite these apparently healthy lifestyle choices, Caroline has developed irritable bowel syndrome which is becoming debilitating and causing major disruption to her sleep, in turn affecting her mental health.

Upon close investigation of Caroline’s schedule the pieces of the puzzle begin to fall into place. On a typical day Caroline wakes at 06:30 and leaves the house by 07.00 to drop the children at the childminder before heading to work. With no time for breakfast she often skips this meal, preferring to grab a coffee on the way. If she can get to the gym at lunchtime she’ll have a protein shake after her workout, otherwise lunch is a salad eaten at her desk. Getting home at around 18.30, Caroline sits down to a home-cooked meal at 20.00, if she’s lucky. Once the kids are in bed, she has a glass of wine or a coffee and watches TV with the laptop open to answer emails which are still arriving from different time zones across the globe. If she didn’t work out over lunch she may skip dinner and head to an evening exercise class, drinking a protein shake and checking messages when she gets home, before heading to bed.  

Like most people Caroline has no idea her erratic schedule is the cause of her health problems. She sees food merely as fuel that can be eaten at any time of the day. She thinks skipping meals is just saving calories for later, that a protein shake is healthy no matter when she drinks it, and that if exercise is good for her it must be good whenever she works out. Sleep is just the thing she does when she hasn’t anything else scheduled. This means Caroline is skipping meals when her body needs food, eating large meals when her body struggles to digest them, exercising when her body can’t benefit from strenuous activity and robbing herself of restful sleep by working or exercising late at night. Combined with the lack of a regular daily routine these factors are all contributing to Caroline’s health issues. 

A healthy lifestyle is not about the total calories we consume over a single day, the minutes we log in a HIIT class, or the hours of sleep we typically get. Instead it is the coordination of these things with the body’s scheduled needs. The failure to synchronise food, exercise and rest with the body’s Circadian Rhythms results in a variety of health issues. 

The Ayurveda Day

In Ayurveda the day is separated into six segments that outline the body’s needs. Let’s take a look at the segments in layman’s terms and explore what this means for the body.

06.00-10.00 is a time associated with the qualities of water. The body may be a little dull and heavy, prone to retaining water or generating congestion. As the mind and body are still waking up with the emergence of daylight, they need a jolt of exercise, food and perhaps meditation to synchronize with the new day. When we exercise and take in good food during this time our bodies stop being dull and instead become a steady, calming influence on our morning’s work.

10.00-14.00 is a time associated with the qualities of fire. During this period the mind and body are firing on all cylinders. It’s a good time to eat our largest meal of the day and do our most intense work. Our bodies don’t need exercise at this time of day as they are already wide awake. This fire energy can make people a little more passionate but also short tempered.

14.00-18.00 is a time associated with the qualities of air. It’s a period of rapid reflexes and quick thinking but is also a time when people get easily distracted and dehydrated. Without enough food, this light, quick energy can make people shaky or anxious, which is why we love snacks and coffee at this time of day. Ideally we will have grounded ourselves earlier in the day otherwise we can become lost in thoughts or daydreams. The key at this time is to remain hydrated and minimise distractions.

18.00-22.00 is a time when energy flips back to the qualities of water. The body gets a little dull and heavy again, preparing for sleep as the sun goes down. Our digestion is slowing down from 18.00 onwards so this is the wrong time to load up on our biggest meal of the day. Our minds are moving on from being quick and easily distracted and are becoming steadier, which is why people often stay at their desks to get things done. But it is easy to overwork the mind, disrupting sleep later on. It is best to eat a very light meal early in this period and then rest as much as possible.

22.00-02.00 is a time when energy is again associated with fire. The brain wants to generate deep sleep cycles to rest and cleanse the body by setting the liver and adrenal glands to work. If we get to sleep early in this period, our body is naturally able to detoxify much better. But many people stay awake far into this period, even feeling like they get a second wind. As a result they experience fewer deep sleep cycles. Many people think they have insomnia but if they rest for sleep before 22.30 they will naturally sleep better and more easily.

02.00-06.00 is a time when the body is airy again. At this time we sleep lightly, our dreams can be more vivid, and we often wake mid-way through a dream. Here the body is preparing for the active day cycle. Strange as it may sound, it is easier to wake up in the morning before 06.00 than after 06.00, when the body moves into the next water segment. 

Getting started with a healthy schedule

From the Ayurveda Day it’s clear to see how the body’s needs change profoundly throughout the day and night, and how most of us need to realign our schedules with what our bodies require to function correctly.

It’s not just eating and sleeping that can be done at optimal times, we can also schedule our workload to take advantage of the body’s natural rhythm. Most people build their daily schedule around work, thinking they’ll be more productive, but they can work more effectively by planning work around the body’s needs.

At Havio, for instance, we’ve moved many of our meetings from the morning to the afternoon. Why? Because between 10.00 and 14.00 people operate with the most fire in their belly, and this can result in meetings that are more critical and cranky. By moving meetings to the afternoon segment, after we’ve eaten lunch, people are calmer and more creative.

We think of health habits in isolation. If we want to lose weight we change our diet. If we want to get fit we buy a gym membership. But all these health habits work together so we can put them into one schedule and make that the centre of our day. Our sleep affects our weight and fitness levels, our diet affects our sleep and mental health. Our daily exercise improves our sleep, energy levels and food choices. The two main results of arranging our schedule around the Circadian Rhythm is losing excess weight and increasing energy levels.

If you do nothing else to realign your schedule with your Circadian Rhythm, try these five initial steps:

1.      Go to sleep at a set time every night, ideally by 22.30. You will immediately feel the effects of greater focus during the day, you will be able to deal better with stress and you may start to lose excess weight.

2.      Exercise first thing in the morning. Most people don’t have to do as much exercise as they think. Spending an hour on the treadmill at the end of the day won’t do much for you, 20 to 30 minutes at the start of the day is much better. Early morning exercise improves your sleep cycle, your weight and your blood pressure, and also discharges stress.

3.      Drink hot water and lemon throughout the morning. A few cups will help your liver and kidneys flush out the purged toxins processed throughout the night.

4.      Eat your largest meal of the day as close as possible to noon. From experience this is the hardest step as western culture has ingrained in us that we eat our biggest meal in the evening. That’s why Pret is so successful at pushing lunchtime sandwiches to time stretched individuals. By eating your largest meal at lunch you will have a much easier time maintaining weight and managing digestive issues. A large meal at night wreaks havoc with the digestive tract so your evening meal should be about half of what you are used to. Don’t worry about being hungry, you will still be digesting lunch.

5.      Incorporate meditation into your life. This is quite simply the most transformative activity I have taken on board. Two 20 minute meditations each and every day has catapulted my progression and health more than I could ever have imagined.

Do just these five things for a week and your health will begin to transform.

I would love to hear your comments, is there anything you can see yourself adopting? Too idealistic? Anything you disagree with? Let me know.

Next week is all about the wonders of Sleep zzzzzzzzzzz