Dr. Matt Walker: Improve Sleep to Boost Mood & Emotional Regulation | Huberman Lab Guest Series

(energetic music) Welcome to the Huberman Lab Guest Series, where I and an expert guest discuss science and science-based tools for everyday life. I'm Andrew Huberman, and I'm a professor of neurobiology and ophthalmology at Stanford School of Medicine. Today marks the fifth episode in our six-episode series all about sleep, with expert guest Dr. Matthew Walker. Today's episode focuses on the inextricable link between sleep and our mental health. For instance, a specific stage of sleep called rapid eye movement or REM sleep is critical for removing the emotional content of our previous day's memories, and in doing so, provides a sort of therapy within sleep that allows us to feel emotionally restored when we wake the next morning. We discuss what happens when you are deprived of REM sleep to a small or greater degree, and we discuss how to improve the quality and quantity of your REM sleep in order to ensure mental health. We also discuss science-based protocols for reducing rumination and negative thoughts before sleep. The information shared by Dr. Walker in today's episode is sure to be critical for anyone that is either struggling with mental health issues or who simply wants to bolster their overall mental health. Before we begin, I'd like to emphasize that this podcast is separate from my teaching and research roles at Stanford. It is, however, part of my desire and effort to bring zero-cost-to-consumer information about science and science-related tools to the general public. In keeping with that theme, I'd like to thank the sponsors of today's podcast. Our first sponsor is Eight Sleep. Eight Sleep makes smart mattress covers with cooling, heating, and sleep-tracking capacity. Many times on this podcast, we discuss how in order to fall and stay deeply asleep, your body temperature actually needs to drop by about one to three degrees, and in order to wake up feeling maximally refreshed and energized, your body temperature needs to heat up by about one to three degrees. Eight Sleep makes it very easy to control the temperature of your sleeping environment so that it's easy to fall and stay asleep and wake up feeling refreshed. I started sleeping on an Eight Sleep mattress cover several years ago, and it has completely and positively transformed my sleep, so much so that when I travel to hotels or Airbnbs, I really miss my Eight Sleep. I've even shipped my Eight Sleep out to hotels that I've been staying in because it improves my sleep that much. If you'd like to try Eight Sleep, you can go to eightsleep.com/huberman to save $150 off their Pod 3 cover. Eight Sleep currently ships to the USA, Canada, UK, select countries in the EU, and Australia. Again, that's eightsleep.com/huberman. Today's episode is also brought to us by LMNT. LMNT is an electrolyte drink that has everything you need and nothing you don't. That means plenty of the electrolytes magnesium, potassium, and sodium and no sugar. As I mentioned before on this podcast, I'm a big fan of salt. Now, I want to be clear. People who already consume a lot of salt or who have high blood pressure or who happen to consume a lot of processed foods that typically contain salt need to control their salt intake. However, if you're somebody who eats pretty clean and you're somebody who exercises and you're drinking a lot of water, there's a decent chance that you could benefit from ingesting more electrolytes with your liquids. The reason for that is that all the cells in our body, including the nerve cells, the neurons, require the electrolytes in order to function properly. So we don't just want to be hydrated. We want to be hydrated with proper electrolyte levels. With LMNT, that's very easy to do. What I do is when I wake up in the morning, I consume about 16 to 32 ounces of water, and I'll dissolve a packet of LMNT in that water. I'll also do the same when I exercise, especially if it's on a hot day and I'm sweating a lot, and sometimes I'll even have a third LMNT packet dissolved in water if I'm exercising really hard or sweating a lot or if I just notice that I'm not consuming enough salt with my food. If you'd like to try LMNT, you can go to DrinkLMNT, spelled L-M-N-T, .com/huberman to claim a free LMNT sample pack with your purchase. Again, that's DrinkLMNT, L-M-N-T, .com/huberman. Today's episode is also brought to us by BetterHelp. BetterHelp offers professional therapy with a licensed therapist carried out entirely online. I've been doing therapy for over 30 years. Initially, it was a requirement for being let back in school, but I decided to keep up with that therapy because provided the therapy has three essential components, which are excellent rapport with the therapist, support from the therapist, and valuable insights from the therapist that we wouldn't otherwise be able to arrive at, well, then it's a terrific way to improve our mental landscape, both our emotional state and our behaviors. BetterHelp allows you to find a therapist with whom you have those three key components, and it also makes it very easy to schedule. Again, the sessions are carried out entirely online, and even if you're extremely busy or traveling a lot or have a lot of family and business obligations, BetterHelp allows you to access those therapy sessions regularly so that you can constantly improve. There's just, oh, so much data supporting that quality therapy can improve our mental health and the overall landscape of our lives. In fact, I view quality therapy as important as physical exercise, and I know many others do as well. They certainly aren't a replacement for one another, but if you're doing physical exercise, meaning resistance training and cardiovascular training, and you're doing regular quality therapy of the sort that BetterHelp can provide, well, then you're essentially doing as much as anyone possibly can to improve your mental health and physical health. If you'd like to try BetterHelp, go to betterhelp.com/huberman to get 10% off your first month. Again, that's betterhelp.com/huberman. And now for my conversation with Dr. Matthew Walker. Dr. Matthew Walker, welcome back.