Founder Tools: Sleep (1/n)
All-nighters are NOT a badge of honor.
Ever notice that fast supercars all have big brakes? That’s because systems that accelerate quickly also need proportionally robust ways to decelerate.
Sleep works in similar ways. We need to slow down. To take the evolutionary biology view, what benefits exist to going unconscious for eight hours nightly for humans who lack claws, fangs, and wings? It turns out, a lot - so much so that investment into sleep tech has been booming.
Sleep not only helps us relax and recharge, but it also has many non-obvious benefits:
Clearer thinking and decision-making
Stress reduction
Weight management
Do any of these benefits sound like they could help founders? Absolutely.
I believe that properly managed, good sleep is an asset; bad sleep is a liability. I consider every sleep-related expense to be an investment into myself. I’d love to invest someday in a startup that can compress a full night of sleep into fewer hours or force-multiply the benefits of a full night of sleep.
My interest in sleep is not casual. I studied Neurobiology in college. Sleep was a critical part of my reaching 5% body fat as a national champion powerlifter.
For my addiction startup InCommon, we built an AI-powered patient-reported outcomes product for healthcare providers where the main behavioral trigger was sleep. From my own empirical observation, sleep quality tracked pretty closely with addiction recovery progress.
During the pandemic, I had terrible insomnia and tracked sleep like my life depended on it. Thus, I developed a “Sleep Toggle List” of 200+ experimental inputs like diet, supplements, and protocols to improve sleep. This Sleep Toggle List has been shared with medical doctors, entrepreneurs, world-class athletes, and more.
Now, I’m sharing parts of this list in a series about sleep - primarily for founders, who make so many daily decisions that encroach on sleep and are influenced by sleep. However, this list is for lay audiences as well - new parents, tired students, and retirees alike can benefit.
We are truly nothing without our health.
What follows is a partial list of the winning inputs from my multi-year journey in sleep tracking. For clarity, I’ll skip the details and PubMed articles. This is for informational purposes only, and your mileage may vary, especially if you have a health condition that requires medical advice.
Diet
Before bed: No alcohol, no spicy food, no heavy meals, no candy or excess added sugar
Water intake restriction starting at dinner
Supplements
Magnesium L-Threonate
L-Theanine (useful in daytime too)
ZMA or ZMA-5
Pharma GABA
Tryptophan
CBD/THC (state laws vary)
Medication
DO NOT take Xanax for sleep. I’d rather not have to mention this, but it has been a common thread in my conversations about burnout and crisis with founder friends.
Don’t use sleep medication for an extended time either.
Claritin and/or Flonase (?) nasal spray to clear airways, as needed.
Technology
Yellow Light on all devices. On Apple devices, this is found under Night Shift and can be accessed from the pull-down Shortcuts menu by Force Touch.
Blue light-blocking glasses, if available
Turn off overhead lights and “modern” lights like LED, fluorescent, halogen, etc in favor of low-intensity lights, particularly incandescent.
Refrain from calls and apps that can induce “social jet lag” like Clubhouse, Twitter, or Facebook.
Refrain from activities that may cause agitation like video games, Netflix, or checking crypto, stocks, and email.
Put phone in drawer or someplace out of sight, out of mind.
Apps: I like Headspace, Oura, and Crescent Health (currently beta-testing it with the founders, check them out). Figure out if you prefer guided audio, sounds only, no sounds, or something else. Note: Most sleep-tracking apps are better at longitudinal tracking over longer periods of time, rather than single-point calculations.
Items
ChiliPad water-cooling mattress pad
Theragun massage gun - most used on calves and soles of feet. Game-changer.
Rumble Roller foam roller or lacrosse ball for tight muscles
Superior sheets and bedding. Figure out if you like down, poly-fill, or otherwise.
Blackout curtains on every light source
Air purifier (I love my Molekule and IQAir). The air is cleaner and the fan doubles as a white-noise machine.
Quality eye mask and ear plugs
Some people like gravity blankets, but I found that mine frequently caused nighttime awakenings to use the bathroom, so I stopped.
Physical alarm clock to replace the phone
Protocols
Warm shower
For heavier days, epsom salt baths
Non-Sleep Deep Rest (NSDR, also called Yoga Nidra) guided video
Thought-stopping by dumping tasks into to-do notes (paper is best) or using dictation apps to record thoughts (I like Otter.ai but there are plenty of good free options)
Breathwork: I like the Weill 4/7/8 method and box method of 4/4/4/4.
I’ve noticed that my best sleep typically follows days where I’ve hit over 10K steps.
Compound exercises like bench press, deadlift, or squat to tax the body and mind.
Watch the sun set (No, you don’t have to look directly at it).
Temperature control. I like a cool bed and warm-ish ambient air.
Mentally book-end the day. Physically put away work. Journal in writing or dictation. Give myself permission to end the day.
If hot and tossing/turning, wash face and hands with cool water.
If late-night work tasks pile up, establishing and honoring work boundaries. Team phone calls can be summarized in text, investors are not hungry lions, and fraught decisions can often look more approachable with fresh eyes.
A separate category for “Break open in case of insomnia”
A big mass of protocols I’d lump together as “therapy stuff”
Best practices
Sleep at a consistent time as best you can. If you’re trying to shift your sleep window, try to tackle bedtime or wake time separately instead of simultaneously.
Mindset. Don’t conceptualize sleep as time lost from work. Think of it as an investment and self-care, so that work gets done better and faster. Don’t buy into the toxic hustle culture claims about skipping sleep (looking at you, Gary Vaynerchuk).
If you sleep with a partner, talk with them about your needs and tendencies so you can sleep together peacefully.
Think about sleep in sleep cycles of 90 minutes each.
2 am is just 5 minutes away from 10:55 pm.
Thanks for reading! I’d love to hear from you.
Which of these tips have been successful for you, and which are a surprise to see here? What sleep tips do you swear by? If you’re a health professional, what insights do you wish more people knew? How has sleep affected you as a founder?
Let me know in the comments below!
“Fatigue is the best pillow.”
-Benjamin Franklin
