In this next section we’re going to cover one of my favorite topics: Exercise. Exercise is one of the best things that you can do for your overall health and well-being. It reduces stress, it boosts your immune system, it reduces the risk of illnesses like heart disease and osteoporosis, makes you feel good, and on top of all that, it actually helps you sleep better.
Studies show that even a moderate amount of exercise can improve the length and depth of your sleep. So, if you’ve been struggling to fall asleep, you might want to consider lacing up those shoes and going out for a run.
One important caveat about exercise is that if you do it too close to bedtime it can actually impair your ability to sleep. And this is for a couple reasons. One is that exercise will heat up the body and as we learned about earlier, your body prefers to be cool and cold at night.
The other reason is that exercise can increase stress and cortisol in the body. So, if you’re going to exercise, you want to not exercise too late in the evening, and you want to give your body time to recover before you go to sleep.