The Key to a Better Night's Sleep | The Sleep Doctor, Dr. Michael Breus

Michael Breus (0:00)

Everybody doesn't need more sleep. What everybody needs to figure out is how much sleep do they need, right? It's different. Eight hours is a myth, okay?

Very few people actually need eight hours of sleep.

I go to bed at midnight, I wake up at 617 almost every single day without an alarm.

I'm the sleep doctor for God sakes, and I get six hours and 15 or so minutes of sleep. How do you do something like that, Michael? How do you function? Are you okay? Do you have energy? All of these different things. If my wife got six hours and 15 minutes of sleep, she'd be a disaster. Understanding what your sleep need is becomes critically important, along with things like your chronotype. Once you know how much sleep you need and when you should be sleeping, chronotype is early bird or night owl, then everything starts to fall into place, actually, quite easily.

Michael Gervais (0:53)

All right, welcome back or welcome to the Finding Mastery podcast. I'm Michael Gervais and by trade and training, a sport and performance psychologist. The whole idea behind these conversations, behind this podcast is to sit across from people who have dedicated their life efforts towards mastery.

We want to understand what it is that they are searching for, what they're craving, what are they dedicating the life toward? Is it mastery of self? Is it mastery of craft? Is it both? We want to understand how do they organize their inner life? How do they explain things in their life?

How do they use their mental skills to build and refine their craft?

I want to take a minute here to announce a really exciting event that we have coming up. As you continue to navigate the challenges and opportunities of 2024, I want to pose a question. What are you doing right now to be great with stress? How are you working with stress on your pursuit towards your most important ambitions and goals? And I just want to get right to the heart of the key elements, one in particular, for what it takes to excel in today's high heat, high stakes world. Because stress is not the problem that we think it is. Stress is a synonym for change.

And our ability to be agile with change, that is the real opportunity at hand. So if you're wanting to unlock extraordinary results and sustainable performance in your life, it's not about avoiding or reducing stress. And as simple as that sounds, it's very tricky to do. But it is about fundamentally changing your relationship with it.

And that's why I'm so thrilled to invite you to a special event. It's a free virtual event that we're offering. And it's called The Power of Embracing Stress. It's on Wednesday, March 6th at 2 p.m. Pacific. So to sign up, just head over to findingmastery.com/training. Whether it's advancing in your career or improving your health or cultivating stronger relationships, I think a new approach to stress can be one of the most powerful unlocks for you in your life. So join us for this free virtual training, The Power of Embracing Stress, on Wednesday, March 6th at 2 p.m. Pacific. Go to findingmastery.com/training to sign up. Once again, that's findingmastery.com/training. And I'm really excited to see you there.

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Now, this week's conversation is with Dr. Michael Breus. He's a clinical psychologist, but better known as The Sleep Doctor. Michael is both a diplomat of the American Board of Sleep Medicine and a fellow of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine. And he was one of the youngest people to pass the board at age 31 with a specialty in sleep disorders. Sleep is critical just about everything that we're doing. So this is why I want to have conversations with leading experts about sleep. And it's so foundation to the lives that we live and the way that we feel on a day-to-day basis.