Sleep-Enhancing Wellness Tricks You Need To Try

Including wellness practices into your night routine can help optimize your sleep. We know that sleep is extremely important to our wellbeing. Not just sleep, but quality rest that actually lets us reset our bodies at night and be ready for the next day.

Prioritizing our sleep is SO important. When people want to get into wellness, one of the first things I tell them to change is their sleep habits. Once you actually start getting sleep that helps your body fully reset, you will notice crazy differences.

In this blog post I'm going to share tips and tricks I've added into my night routine that I feel actually make a difference in 1. making me feel sleepy, and 2. improving the quality of my sleep.

Red Lights at Bedtime

This winter, I started using red lights before bed. About an hour before I want to fall asleep, I turn my lamp to red.

Red light helps stimulate the production of melatonin in our bodies. Melatonin is the number one hormone in our body that is responsible for making us "sleepy". Red light also helps us wind down and feel a sense of calmness.

I purchased a lightbulb that I can change the color of, which has been such a good addition to my night routine. I truly feel that the red light helps my brain wind down and get the signal that it's time to start getting sleepy.

"Sleepy Girl Mocktail"

Okay, either you're on "wellness-tok" like I am and you've seen the sleepy girl mocktail over and over again, or you're asking "WHAT is that?". Well, the sleepy girl mocktail has gone absolutely viral. Why? Because it works.

The ingredients of the sleepy girl mocktail are 100% tart cherry juice, magnesium powder, and another (no caffeine) drink of your choice. For the drink of your choice, most people are using Poppi soda, but I just add sparkling water to mine! If you need to see a visual, this TikTok shows how to make it.

So what does this drink do? It knocks you out. It puts you to sleep like you wouldn't believe. Try it and you'll get the best sleep of your life.

A couple of months ago I started drinking tart cherry juice to help me sleep after I learned about it in my college nutrition class. Tart cherries are rich in melatonin. Magnesium has been shown to be a miracle in relaxing muscles, keeping you calm, and most importantly, helping you sleep. The combination of the two work like a charm to induce sleep, and keep you sleeping all night long.

Get your Circadian Rhythm in Check

Circadian rhythm is the most important thing to know about if you're trying to set yourself up for sleep success. Circadian rhythm is basically like our body's internal clock. It helps us wake up naturally, and get tired naturally.

There are many things that you might be doing to disrupt your circadian rhythm, so you want to make sure you avoid those things if you want to prioritize your sleep.

I'll link an article with lots of tips to support circadian rhythm here. One big tip that I'm sure to follow is to get sunlight first thing in the morning. Yes, setting yourself up for sleep success starts right when you wake up. The second I wake up, I open my blinds so that my body's "clock" can restart and get going so that I'm tired when I need to be.

Another thing I do to help my circadian rhythm is to never have caffeine after 3pm. I also make sure to turn off my phone at least an hour before bed. That one took some adjusting, but now I just read or journal before bed and it makes such a big difference in my sleep quality.

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All of these tips I've shared have significantly changed my sleep, and in turn elevated the way I feel throughout the day. My night routine is now my favorite part of the day!

There's a lot of things you can do to optimize your sleep. Wellness can be overwhelming at times, so start with these tips and please let me know if you see a difference in your sleep by using the comment section below!