Our surroundings can interfere with the nightly break that the stress response needs to take in order to keep our reactions appropriate. When that happens we spend more time in a stressed state - angry, unable to cope and over-reacting to ever smaller issues. While most approaches try reduce the size of the stress it is possible to increase our coping capacity by adjusting our surroundings so that they no longer interfere with, or cripple, the stress response. With a normalized response issues quickly take a more reasonable position on the totem pole.
What can I do?
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Spend the hour before bed in low light, low noise, low demand surroundings
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Take a walk after concentration-demanding activities
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Unplug wireless and electrical equipment before bed
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Open the windows for ten minutes before bed
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Recommended Reading - Books
The Sleep-Powered Wellness Workbook: Better Bedrooms for Better Sleep, by Angela Hobbs
Hobbs guides the reader through the 24 hour hormone rhythm revealing the many ways that a person's surroundings can be used to support it. A workbook packed with simple, inexpensive suggestions for exploiting our surroundings to support our most environmentally sensitive hormones.
Sleep-Powered Wellness: Better Bedrooms for Turbocharged Zzzz's, by Angela Hobbs
Hobbs discusses the impact that noise, wireless, light, electricity, chemicals and air pollutants can have on the hormones responsible for sleep and alertness, and ultimately on many common symptoms of ill health.
The Relaxation and Stress Reduction Workbook by Martha Davis, Elizabeth Robbins Eshelman and Matthew McKay
A really thick, comprehensive 'cookbook' style discussion of relaxation therapies, time management, lifestyle, exercise and stress reduction techniques
Active Relaxation: How to Increase Productivity and Achieve Balance by Decreasing Stress and Anxiety by Jennifer Abel
Abel combines a range of eastern and western techniques to create a drug-free approach to coping in stressful situations