Sleep serves to re-energize the body’s cells, clear waste from the brain, and improve learning and memory.  Most of the sleeping we do is characterized by large, slow brain waves, relaxed muscles and slow, deep breathing, which help the brain and body to recuperate after a long day.

Inadequate sleep causes a reduction in concentration and perception due to the brain not adequately benefiting from the restorative nature of sleep.  An increasing number of us are chronically sleep deprived because of our modern lifestyles. If your sleep account is in deficit, it will affect your daytime energy, emotional balance, and your weight. Sleep plays a vital role in physical health, memory, emotional well-being and longevity. 8 hours of sleep is recommended for optimum health.

Lack of sleep influences your digestive system, immune system, vitality and your weight.  It affects your “famine response” hormones, it increases ghrelin and decreases Leptin, affecting your appetite, you are tired and start to crave higher calorie foods.  A further affect on your body caused by lack of sleep is an increase in cortisol – the stress hormone which activates the reward centers in your brain that make you want food – and not the healthy foods we should be eating.  Lack of sleep leaves you hungrier, less satisfied after meals and with no energy to exercise.

The cure for sleep difficulties can often be found in your daily routine.   Unhealthy choices during the day can result in restlessness at night. Try the following actions to help you achieve 8 hours sleep a night – including weekends.

Work towards a  natural sleep and wake cycle.

• Get enough sunlight during the day to stimulate the production of melatonin . Melatonin is a naturally occurring hormone controlled by light exposure that helps regulate your sleep-wake cycle. Your brain secretes more melatonin when it’s dark—making you sleepy—and less when it’s light—making you more alert.
• Try to go to sleep and get up at the same time everyday. Choose a bedtime when you naturally feel tired.
• Avoid sleeping in on weekends if you need extra sleep at the weekend take a daytime nap but keep to the same wake up time. Limit naps to 15 to 20 mins in the early afternoon.
• Avoid sleeping after supper, if you feel drowsy get up off the couch and do some exercise or light household chores, do not sleep on the couch!

Preparing yourself for bedtime.

Make your bedroom a place for sleeping,

• Remove clutter, re-locate desks and work items, put clothing away, remove the TV, make the space condusive to sleep.
• Make your bedroom as dark as possible or use a sleep mask.
• Make sure its not too hot or too cold, adjust your bedding to ensure you are sleeping at a temperature that encourages sleep.

Change your habits:

• Cut out the late night coffee , avoid alcohol before bed, that nightcap that you think is helping you relax is affecting your sleep cycle- stimulants disrupt sleep patterns.
• Avoid bright screens an hour before bedtime – ipads, cell phones, TV. Listen to music or a podcast instead.
• Avoid eating large meals late at night

Some nights it is inevitable that we are not going to get enough sleep, the key is to make up for it on the following day and catch up on the lost sleep.  If you are in a situation where you only get a few hours sleep a night consistently, start to make the changes that will give you the chance to get more hours of restorative sleep.

Homework:

Decide on a bedtime and wake-up time that works best for you.

Spend some time each day outdoors in the sunshine.

Replace caffeinated drinks after 5 pm with alternate non-caffeinated beverages.

The Team of Friends Culture.

Members of a team or group following common goals and sharing achievements, live longer happier lives than those living alone. We know a key to extending our lives is to improve our lifestyle especially if we are also overweight. We must eat healthier and add more exercise and activity. Life experience has proven that a group culture is supportive of this and will encourage us to adopt and then keep to our new improved ways of living.

(Over time we usually become what our 4 or 5 closest family and friends are.)

We believe the importance of having a “team of friends” in our MTP groups cannot be overstated. It is critical to the success of each and every team and the success of the program. MTP is as much a way of life and social and networking enterprise as it is an exercise class.

Most fitness programs don’t give much attention to this “team culture”. They are usually based on one on one, trainer to client, personal trainer model or are group classes with many solo people interacting with the trainer. MTP is about interacting with each other and working as a team guided by the trainer. Everyone helps each other to boost attendance, to energize the classes, empower the talks , be successful at the weekly homeworks , keep at it , and to support success of all.

We need to experience the value of sharing the life rewards, and the achievement felt within a team as one by one we hit our life change goals. For those overweight it is visible and unmistakable. Smiles are hard to hide.

The influence that each of us as individuals have on our team, healthy or even at times toxic, is important in overall “team’s success” but at the same time the team’s success has significant effect on the success of its individual members. We all probably have been members of downer groups, ones that permeate negativity, unhealthy competition, and conflict. It sure doesn’t feel good and it can interfere with reaching our personal intentions.

Everyone including the coach, will have a big impact on how your group gets along, functions, and performs. It effects if your team’s membership grows and the group lasts or if the membership declines and the group falls apart. We must all try and create new norms of what we all need to do to support building our team. Each one of us must try a relationship to our MTP community more representative of a religious group than a sports team when it comes to adding members to keep a local group healthy and prosperous.

The MTP team culture must energize a positive atmosphere that permeates every aspect of our MTP experience. We can make it whatever we want it to be. In the end an MTP groups culture will be an expression of our values, attitudes, and beliefs about life.

MTP management try to ensure the focus is on fun, improvement, and change to promote and support each other to accomplish success. Our culture is grounded in an identified sense of mission and shared goals. We are all seeking and needing life change and are willing to work with everyone else in the MTP team for the common good. This must be our culture.

MTP must be also be relaxed and never intense, light-hearted, with only friendly competition, all-inclusive and supportive.

These support happiness. All support improved longevity.

Everyone on a team will with time understand and feel that its in their own and the whole teams interest to feel some implicit pressure (in the good sense) to support the MTP culture.

Summing it Up

Each MTPs team will adopt the Team of Friend’s culture to some extent as an expression of its individual members. This “organic” approach will hopefully lead to all team members feeling a sense of ownership. Members will create their own team’s version of it. There is always a risk that this Team of Friends Culture will not be adopted by some teams. These teams I am afraid will not last.We know from years of experience a team needs a minimum of 10 and 20 is a better number.

Through good coach mentorship and leadership and open discussion within your team, of the values, attitudes, and beliefs that you all want to introduce as your groups foundation, your flavor of the “team of friends” culture will emerge.

All team members are encouraged to discuss openly what you feel is important to the  atmosphere you want to create, what your expectations are, and the ways in which your team will best communicate socially.

This collaborative approach will produce a sense of ownership of your MTP teams culture. As a result, you are more likely to live by it, stay with it , change your life, and succeed by it.

Homework (Coaches included)

• What values do you want to act as the foundation for your team’s culture?
• What attitudes and beliefs do you want to hold?
• What are the goals that the team wants to pursue?
• How do your team want to treat each other?
• What kind of atmosphere do you want in your team ?

Use the blog comments area or Facebook to discuss this week.

Posting the positive benefits of MTP on your personal facebook pages will help build your MTP Team.

Low Glycemic Index Foods

We talk a lot about changing to a healthier diet, making better choices  and eating more vegetables.  Change we know is hard, especially when we have developed the habit of eating certain foods that are not healthy choices.  I know that I should eat more vegetables and higher grain content bread, but I am not really sure why ? What is the benefit?  The benefit is that these foods have lower “Glycemic Index” values meaning they break down more slowly in your digestive system. This reduces the size of glucose spikes and allows time for your body to burn the fuel and not store as much as fat. It also keeps your stomach full longer before emptying and reduces hunger before you next meal.Read more