Hello and welcome to session 5 of speaking about sleeping. This session is giving time to the external environment and these are things that we can control and that we can do to promote better sleeping. We'll talk more about the internal landscape, the internal environment, and the mind, and the thinking in our last session.

So this session, it can be called sleep hygiene, which kind of fits, but I'm not so fond of that as a title myself, but environment of sleep, the landscape of sleep, and we're thinking about things that we can do. These are all things that we can play with and make our own, and we're all quite individual, so we can certainly know ourselves and try things out but be ready to disregard the things that don't work for us.

There are a couple of things, having said that, that are generally assumed to be ingredients that promote better sleep. And so the two things that we're talking about are pretty concrete. So if you've got problems sleeping, it's not the same for people who don't have problems sleeping, it's to have a darker room. And that could mean investing in some blackout. You can get a seamstress or maybe you yourself could sew in some blackout. You can buy a blackout material, you don't have to buy anything. I'm sure you could find an old blanket. And get something and sew it in. Sew it into the back of your curtain and make it darker.

So a darker room and a cooler room. So the air in your room wants to be cooler. Maybe with a window open. And your bedclothes are cosy. Your bedclothes are warm. So you're not being cooler, but your external environment is cooler. It's also darker. Now, if you're in an era of life where you might be menopausal, this can be a really good opportunity to have a couple of different covers that suit. Having things nearby where you can pull a warmer duvet on or pull a thinner ider down over you will really help you and if you have them nearby it means you don't have to get up and when you get up you're starting to not, you'll be more wakeful and we'll do some work on getting back to sleep but it'd be better not to be waking yourself up by having to get up and move around.

The other thing for some people that really disturbs sleep is noise. And it's not a perfect solution, but the idea here is that if noise is a stimulus to you and it wakes you, then try out various strategies for blocking sound. And there are all sorts of ways that you can do that with waxy earplugs, foam earplugs.

Some people use headphones. So playing about with what makes your room quieter. Some people find that playing music or a book can be useful, that it promote’s sleep, sound of there are those sounds where people hear cutting hair or water moving, and for some people that promote’s sleep and for others it doesn't.

So here again, it's wanting to be creative and playful and work out what works for you. Give yourself a routine. The mind, although busy and easily distracted and dislocated, it is quite a simple creature. And if you can create a fairly regular routine, that might include a bath or a shower and a bit of wind down in front of the television, then that will give your mind an idea that it is getting ready to go to bed.

And you've got your time at which you go to bed. You might have more time to do your work, finish projects, than you thought you had because you were labouring under a belief that you needed to be in bed at a certain time. You already might have more time. And, ideally, you want to make it so that your bedroom is not your office.

Be out of the bedroom and make your bedroom a place that you look forward to going to, however that is for you. Spend some time in your bedroom, make it good, maybe invest in some nice bedding, blackout, and move, if you can, your office out of the bedroom. If you keep using your bedroom as an office, your mind doesn't know if it's going up to that room to sleep or to work. So try and have your working space in another room. If you can't do that, it's not the end of the world. You do your work there and cover it over with a cloth and come out of the room. And certainly in your routine, it might be that it's better to be not working in the last hours before you go to bed.

So that could be useful. Make your room cosy. Make it so that you're not there too much in the day. Your bedroom is for sleeping and for sex. Having sex everywhere else is great too. But make it so that the mind knows that going to bed is going to happen. So a routine and create an environment that promotes sleep.

Darker. Cooler. Quieter.

Okay, play around, have fun, sleep well, see you next time.