5 Pillars of Health: Part II
by Serkan Yimsel, CHEK Exercise Coach, NCEP Exercise Therapist

IV. HEALTHY SLEEPING

According to T.S. Wiley and Bent Formby, Ph.D., authors of an amazing book entitled Lights Out, one of the biggest changes human beings have undergone in the last ten thousand years happened less than seventy years ago. Electricity and the widespread use of the light bulb qualify as a point of no return in human history.¹ As our daily lifestyles evolved around the instant convenience of electricity and light, so did our sleeping habits.

In 1910, the average adult was sleeping nine to ten hours a night. Now the average adult is lucky to get a full seven hours a night. Most of us don't. These numbers add up to an extra five hundred hours of waking hours per year. In nature, we would sleep 4,370 hours out of a possible 8,760, or half of our lives. Eighty years ago, we were down to 3,395 hours. Now we are lucky to get a measly 2,555.¹

As the book states, neither sleeping through our alarm clocks, nor the indirect cost of more than $100 billion in lost work time and accidents are the major disaster facing the sleepless…it's death. When the authors asked Dr. Thomas Wehr, the head of the department studying seasonal and circadian rhythmicity at the National Institute of Health in Washington, his answers were devastating: On less than 9.5 hours of sleep at night, especially in the dark, we (a) will never be able to stop eating sugar, smoking or drinking alcohol and (b) will most certainly develop one of the following conditions: diabetes, heart disease, cancer, infertility, mental illness, and/or premature aging. He continued: "Well yes, they do have a right to know; but it won't change anything. Nobody will ever turn off the lights."¹

We think that the human brain is capable of doing almost anything. As long as it is allowed to see the truth!

Circadian Rhythm is one of the essential terms that most holistic practitioners use to be able to explain how important it is for us to sleep not only enough, but also to sleep on time. It is a natural physiological cycle that determines our hormonal activities within an approximate 24-hour period. This rhythm is so finely tuned that it continues to exist even in the absence of external influences. Due to millions of years of evolution, our hormonal cycle is finely tuned with the cycle of the sun.² Fight-or-flight hormones (such as cortisol) are released as the sun rises, and growth/repair hormones increase as the sun goes down. In a normal hormonal cycle, the nighttime cortisol drops significantly during the afternoon after about 3pm. Approximately three hours after dark, cortisol hormone reaches its minimum levels so that growth/repair hormones can take over.

During sleep, physical repair takes place from approximately 10pm-2am; psychic regeneration occurs from approximately 2am-6am.^{2, 3} If we disrupt this natural cycle with TV, computers, fluorescent light, etc. and stay up late; cortisol levels stay elevated above normal. This will prevent the production of parasympathetic hormones such as melatonin and growth hormone. If we go to bed after midnight, we already missed at least two hours of physical repair.

Losing physical recovery and repair time may create a number of problems:

• Since the immune system functions optimally during the physical repair period (10PM-2AM), our immune cell's ability to fight against bacteria and viruses decreases.
• Holistic physician Dr. Joseph Mercola talks about the importance of sleep and detoxification in his book Total Health Cookbook & Program.⁴ According to Dr. Mercola, the gallbladder dumps toxins during the physical repair period, between 10pm-2am. If we are awake, the toxins back up into the liver, which then sends toxins into our blood stream.
• If cortisol is elevated at night, we cannot fully recover from our exercises.
• Due to reduction of growth hormone release, which promotes the use of fatty acids for energy, we will have trouble losing body fat.
• Prolonged disruption of the sleep/wake cycle can result in adrenal fatigue. This can create a number of problems such as lack of energy, parasitic infections, headaches and addiction to stimulants such as caffeine and sugar.

Since hormones and neurotransmitters are the major regulatory substances of our metabolism, and sleeping in sync with our natural circadian rhythm is crucial to controlling these substances; most of you will notice a significant improvement in your lives by getting to bed between 10-11pm every night and sleeping at least 8 to 9 hours in complete darkness. We say "in complete darkness" because even if a tiny part of your body is exposed to any light leaks in your bedroom, your skin cells will read this light and translate this information to your pineal gland as "daytime". This would reduce and eventually stop the melatonin hormone secretion.¹

Of course, you might miss some sleep here or there occasionally. To make up for that missing sleep; make sure you keep a sleep diary and get at least between 55-60 hours of total sleep every week. It is also beneficial if you can complete your exercise routine before 7pm and finish your dinner by 8pm. This will prevent you from staying up late at night and eating a very late night dinner. Eating familiar foods helps the digestive system to work more smoothly and promotes better sleep. Bright fluorescent light should be minimized at least 2 hours prior to the bed time; this includes TV and computer screens as well.

V. HEALTHY MOVEMENT

It is no coincidence that we left the movement/exercise section of this article series until the end. Many holistic practitioners agree that if we fail to develop optimum lifestyle habits regarding the other 4 pillars we mentioned earlier, it could be very difficult for most of you to follow a regular exercise routine for a lifetime and enjoy your results permanently. The reason for this is because all the actions you take regarding each health pillar determine your body's overall stress load. Since exercise itself is also a stressor, it can either be beneficial, or counterproductive depending on each person's total stress.

When we skip meals (nutrition), stay up late at night (sleep) or constantly breathe through our chest due to poor posture (breathing); this results in excessive stimulation of our Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS). This particular branch of our nervous system is known as the fight-or-flight nervous system. When we are predominantly stuck in this fight-or-flight state, we might eventually decrease the repair/recovery function of the Parasympathetic Nervous System (PNS).⁵

So how does this relate to exercise? One of the most interesting things about our body chemistry is that whether you are trying to outrun a predator or you are running on the treadmill at the gym, your physiological response to both of these events are actually the same: more cortisol and more SNS stimulation. This is why for people who are SNS dominant, intense exercise could actually worsen the imbalance between the SNS and PNS. This would eventually lead to chronic fatigue, decreased immunity, pain and injuries.⁵

Therefore, the number one goal of an exercise routine should be to restore one's overall vitality. Exercise intensity should then be gradually increased if the individual can successfully apply the lifestyle changes.

There are 4 important components of a scientifically based exercise program:

Step 1: Improve Structural Alignment

It is very common in our society today to prolong certain positions that can create undesired muscle adaptations. (For example: sitting in front of a computer for several hours a day.) When we maintain a certain position long enough, we may risk the length/tension relationships of the muscles that surround our joints. Since the quality of each and every movement is very much dependent upon the optimum mobility of these joints, exercising with poor structural alignment may increase the risk of a possible injury.

In order for us to be able to exercise without major wear and tear on our bodies, we must identify altered muscles and correct any possible imbalances. Everybody is different, so we can't apply a cookie cutter approach for our bodies and start stretching muscles randomly because we might cause the tight muscles to stay tight and loose muscles to get even looser! Remember, the worse your physical alignment, the more energy you must expend to complete each movement.

In Paul Chek's book The Golf Biomechanic's Manual, there is a user friendly self-assessment guide that you can use to test the range of motion of most of your joints.⁶ Based on these results, you can do the recommended stretches/exercises to realign your body. If you are working with a trainer, make sure he or she takes time to assess your structural alignment before designing your exercise program. C.H.E.K certified trainers usually require at least one hour for the musculo-skeletal assessments.

Step2: Improve Energy Levels

In his book How to Eat, Move and Be Healthy, Paul Chek explains how eating high quality food, proper hydration, and breathing correctly are all necessary to enhance our vitality.² He also states that some low-force rhythmical movements that target particular zones in our bodies can improve energy levels and reduce everyday life stresses.

Exercising the muscles for each zone helps energy to flow to the related hormonal and organ systems. This "Energy Zone Training" is actually the foundation for yoga, Tai Chi and Qigong.² Due to its healing capability, especially for people who have higher stress load or who score low on the other four health pillars, it is very important to include these exercises in program designs.

Step 3: Improve Spinal Stabilization

Due to prolonged hours of office work and decreased levels of physical activity, muscles that support spinal structures usually become increasingly weaker.^{2, 5, 6} Therefore, before attempting any form of exercise that demands high levels of coordination and power (especially ones that involve bending and rotating movements of the spine) a program should focus on segmental stability exercises to reduce the risk of injury. Most seated or machine exercises don't necessarily require high levels of neuromuscular stabilization because they have a huge base of support and they usually guide our movements. However, static positional exercises with our body weight, or working on stability balls would help improve spinal stabilization.

Step 4: Improve Anabolic Stimulus

After correcting muscle imbalances, balancing energy levels and enhancing spinal stability, the general goal of every resistance training program should be to increase the anabolic response from training. There are two possible ways to increase anabolic response without overloading the system: decreasing the duration and increasing the intensity. For any given workout day, the duration of the program should not exceed 50 minutes. Short bouts of several workout programs are better than one long one. Also due to its different hormonal response, it is better to perform exercises that stress the cardiovascular system on different days. The intensity of the exercises should be high enough to stress anabolic hormones (such as growth hormone), however it should not force the exerciser to the point of failure.