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Clothes Matter

I recently changed my belief system around clothes.

For all of my life, I believed that caring about clothes meant valuing material possessions.

However, the more I learn about everything it takes to release our favorite selves into the world, I realize that clothes do matter. A lot.

The reason they hold so much power is because they impact how we feel about ourselves. They impact how we look at ourselves in the mirror. They impact what message we are sending into the world.

I’m not here to tell everyone to head down to Nordstrom’s and get a new suit or the most on-trend outfit.

The power of our clothes is actually a reflection of the power of our feelings.

Our thoughts determine our feelings. Our feelings determine our behaviors. Our behaviors determine our results. Therefore, manage your thoughts and your results will follow.

Imagine the difference in how you feel when in:

A. Pajamas someone gave you at Christmas 7 years ago. They’re in a color you don’t like, faded, but oversized and so very comfortable. You put them on whenever you feel frumpy or lazy. It’s your message to yourself that today is a frumpy day.

Or

B. You picked out the comfiest, softest pajamas ever in your favorite color from your favorite store. You feel so warm and cozy when you wear them.

In both scenarios, you are comfortable. But in one you feel frumpy about yourself, and in the other you feel cute. How you feel about yourself will go on to impact your mood that day and how you communicate with those around you. You’re sending different messages to yourself and therefore will show up differently to others.

This translates to every room we ever enter. If you feel confident in your clothes, you will speak with confidence. If you feel insecure in your clothes, you will be distracted by the thing that’s bothering you and be less present in the moment.

I’ve taken slack for my entire adulthood that I wear too much black. I have tried to compensate with colors and patterns. Every time I wear something that doesn’t feel authentic to me, I feel like I’m wearing someone else’s clothes from their closet. I’m not the most radiant version of myself because part of me feels out of place.

Several months ago, I purged my closet of all the patterns. It’s now entirely blacks, whites and solids. I purged every pair of workout pants that weren’t solid black. Now, every time I get dressed, I look in the mirror and think, “Ahhhh…..that’s me!”

I found that I needed a filter to sort my closet. My clothes all needed to make me feel:

Confident

Comfortable

Polished

Keep in mind, we each may have our own definitions of these words. I will still wear stilettos, just not the ones that squeeze my toes.

I have friends and clients that have used the same process, but picked different words for their filters. Some I’ve heard are:

Strong

Chic

Bad-ass

Approachable

Radiant

Vibrant

Powerful

Only you can determine your words for how you want to feel about yourself.

My challenge to you is to start noticing how you feel about yourself when you wear certain pieces. If they don’t bring out your favorite version of yourself, however you may define that, release them from your closet. Whether you donate them, sell them, give them to a friend or throw them away, I don’t care. Just get them out of your life if you don’t like how you feel about yourself when you wear them.

How YOU FEEL is the ONLY opinion that matters.

If you want to regularly walk through life feeling like your favorite self in every aspect, schedule a call with me.

I can teach you how to discover that strong, inner confidence and create a life you love.


Sophia Hyde is a certified life coach. Her coaching program Release Your Favorite Self combines a digital course with 20 minute private coaching calls to help people create the life changes they desire.

Connect with Sophia on Facebook or Instagram.

The #1 Regret of the Dying

I recently read something that I cannot get out of my mind. Bronnie Ware worked as a nurse, caring for patients at the end of their lives. In her book, she spells out the top 5 regrets people had on their deathbed. The one that hit me like a sucker punch to the gut was the #1 regret:

#1: I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

This is the trap I see crippling so many people. 

The expectations come from all around us. They come from society and cultural norms, our families, our friends, our school systems, our coworkers, our partners and most especially ourselves. 

Sometimes, we alter our lives to meet expectations no one has clearly communicated; we have just assumed. When we sit down and talk with our partners, family, friends or work colleagues, we find out all they genuinely care about is us being happy. The same freedom we crave is what they crave for us. 

Other times, the fear is real. We have been handed roles we are blatantly expected to conform to, and they are suffocating. The consequences of choosing a different path are significant. I have more than one client right now navigating divorce. As painful as it is to walk through, the pain of staying was worse.

Breaking social norms is uncomfortable because of commentary we may have to face from people in our lives, strangers, or the awkwardness of feeling different from everyone else in a room. Being a mother who climbs the corporate ladder to CEO, or a father who decides to walk away from a high paying job to be a full time parent, are such examples.

My own transformation really began the night my husband and I had one of our biggest fights of our marriage. When I was honest with him and told him how much I was holding back what was inside because of how a handful of other people would react, I had no idea I was going to light a fire under my calm, mellow husband. He aptly pointed out I was being a hypocrite. He told me I needed to pick a new career if I wanted to teach people to follow their dreams, but wouldn’t play mine out in full force because I feared a few people’s responses. 

You don’t have to die with this regret. 

Living the life you crave is absolutely within your reach. 

I know this for a fact because not only have I totally transformed my own life, but I have helped so many others do this work. 

My program Release Your Favorite Self is centered on this very idea. Only YOU can define what your favorite life looks like. And only YOU can do the work to release it into the world. 

It took me ten years, but it doesn’t need to take you that long. I can help you shave YEARS off the process with the tools in my toolbox. 

If there is a gap between the life you are living today and the life you are craving, let’s chat. 

I See You

I see you, the real you.

When I look at you, I see your greatness. I see your potential. You are already worthy and have value in my eyes without needing to justify anything to me.

If you need someone to believe in you, I do.

If you feel like there is all this potential sitting underneath the surface that’s screaming to come out, I see it.

If you know that something about the life you are living today is not the life you are meant to be living and you crave more, I know that pain.

You don’t need to explain yourself to me. I don’t care about the mistakes you have made. I don’t care about your flaws or your weaknesses.

Here is what I do know, with certainty: you are human and that is enough. Simply by being born, you entered this planet with both superpowers and vices. You are a combination of your good and your bad. I don’t expect you to be perfect.

When I look at you, I choose to see and speak to the gifts you have to offer this world. I choose to speak to the strengths and pull them out of you so you can see how strong you are.

To my clients, I am so proud of you for investing in yourself.

I see you learning to set boundaries and hold them. Watching you value yourself and your time more and expecting other people to adjust to the newfound respect you have for yourself is beautiful.

I see you creating a new normal for your routine, one where you prioritize the time to plan or rest instead of always feeling like you need to produce for others.

I see you training your mind to think differently. I know how hard it is to separate from believing all the thoughts that cross your mind to recognizing you are not the thoughts, you are the being observing the thoughts and have the option to let them go or rewrite them.

I see you moving from shaming your body to loving it. I see you taking pride and joy in the skin you are in and asking her how she needs to be loved today. I see you prioritizing movement and rest.

You are already enough. I will not judge you or criticize you because I recognize we are hard enough on ourselves as it is. I will always be a non-judgmental safe space for you to process what’s happening in your mind and in your heart.


And slowly, but surely, things will begin to shift.


You will begin to see yourself for your potential and not your current reality.

You will begin to give yourself grace and patience instead of criticism.

You will begin to look at yourself as someone who is not only meant for greatness, but creating it and admiring the fruit of your labor.

You will see your strengths, talents and gifts and lean into them with intensity. You will surround yourself with people whose strengths are your weaknesses so you have an incredible team to support and compliment you.

It is my joy to help you release your favorite self. It is an honor. It is a privilege. Thank you for trusting me to help you through this process.

P.S. If you aren’t enrolled in the course but want someone to hold this space for you so that you can also take that lampshade off and shine brightly, let’s chat.

You do not need to figure out life on your own. Do you know any athlete, even playing at the professional level, who attempts playing their sport without a coach? The best athletes have a team of coaches. The top performing CEO’s all have a coach. This is why life coaches are so helpful. If you want to make the most out of your one wild and precious life, consider adding a coach to your bench. I have an entire toolbox filled with resources to help you fill the gap between where you are to where you want to be.

Schedule a call if you want to discuss your particular situation with someone. There is no cost to start the conversation.

Follow Your Thoughts

Hey friends,

I have a very simple thought I want to leave with you for this week:

Pay attention to your thoughts.

Start paying attention to where your mind is drifting regularly.

Many of you have goals, plans or intentions for your life. You have some area you want to improve, whether it’s your family, your career, your health, your hobby or something else.

If you are not moving the needle in the area where you want to see the most progress, let me ask you this question:

When you are driving down the road, what do you think about?

When you are washing the dishes, where does your mind drift?

When you are sitting in a meeting or an event and struggling to be present, to where is your mind going?

How about in the shower?

When you’re trying to relax?

If you were to break up all your thoughts in one day into a pie chart, what’s getting the most attention?

Recently, I started tracking this. I started intentionally observing where my thoughts drifted. And guess what…it was in three areas I’m not even actively pursuing a goal.

Rather than my mental energy being spent on how to serve my clients, serve my family, or grow my business, most of my thoughts kept going to these three places:

  • Politics- issues I care deeply about but don’t actually have any control on being able to impact
  • My house- all the chores going left undone or feeling like sandpaper on my mind at the moment
  • Volunteerism- things I volunteered my time to do and needed to follow through with the tasks

Meanwhile, if you look at my weekly brain dump of tasks, my vision board, or read my goals, none of these things move the needle on even one thing.

So guess what I have started doing?

Since I understand the power of our thoughts and the heaviness that mental load plays, I have to give myself a break. I had to eliminate things to free up more headspace.

For the last few weeks I have been working diligently to make more room for my mind to wander where I want it to be drifting. I have only found one things that helps…pruning.

Slowly, but surely, one small thing at a time I am eliminating opportunity for things to even become thoughts.

Regarding politics, I asked myself the really, really, really important question which is, “what can I actually control or influence?” I wrote down the very small, short list of answers to that question and decided I wouldn’t allow more in my mind than I could manage. I was spending waaaay too much thought energy on solving the worlds problems instead of solving my own. Too much of my personal energy was going to having “well informed opinions.” I released the need to have opinions about whatever may be dominating the news. I am not sticking my head in the sand by any means, and I do value being an informed voter, but in the pie chart of my thoughts, it needs to be a much thinner area.

With volunteerism, I have a really beautiful problem I created for myself. I have accumulated a seat at too many tables. I need to let some go.

I asked some really hard questions regarding where my butt in that seat actually made significant impact. If nothing would change whether I was in the room or not, then it’s time to let someone else fill my chair. I’ve cried actual tears over this process, but it’s necessary. I had to evaluate how many hours of my week were spent at events and meetings for organizations, and then how much of my thought energy was drifting to conversations from those rooms, solving problems I had become aware of, and completing tasks I agreed to. Because I am currently president of one of these organizations and they mentally need a lot from me right now, I realized there really isn’t much bandwidth for others. I have to prune. It hurts, but it will create room for beautiful growth.

And lastly, the house. This tool is still working wonders in my household, but it doesn’t change the fact that just walking around my home I feel bombarded by all the undone tasks and projects that have to be compartmentalized for later.

For this area, I can’t change anything about it immediately. Trying to let it go and remind myself when on the schedule we are getting to it is the best I can do. However, I’m fully aware there is a ton that could be delegated if we hired help.

Now, every time I see a nagging “thing”, I changed the thought. I’ve decided that once my business is at the capacity where I can hire some part time help, my first hire will not be the virtual assistant or the social media help I had envisioned. My very first hire will be a house cleaner who is also willing to run errands and help with odds and ends. I am losing so much mental energy to the space that area takes up in my brain. I’m certain an investment there would actually return the largest ROI in my business and quickly fund the other hires I am craving.

If I am not trying to solve the problem of how to get a stain out of a sweater, , asking when I’ll get around to mopping or cleaning baseboards or dusting photo frames, then I can mentally solve more impactful problems.

Instead, I could solve problems like “how can I open more doors for speaking events?” or “which friends have I forgotten to check in on in a while?” or maybe, “what series could I plan and pre-schedule on Instagram that would really add a lot of value to others?” And soooooooo many more things I wish I had more mental capacity to solve more often.

Start today.

All this week, pay attention to where your mind goes and what problems your brain is trying to solve. How can you free up some space in your mind?


P.S. Teaching people how to manage their thoughts, rewrite them, and improve the mental spoke on their Wheel of Life is a major component of the coaching work I do. If you want to have a conversation about what’s going on in your life, where you want to make progress and what may be holding you back, that’s what I am here for. Schedule a call here.

P.P.S. Did you know that my coaching process is actually super simple and flexible? Most of my clients are on a plan for 20 minute coaching calls. No matter how busy you may be, you can find a 20 minute window to have regular check ins on improving your life. If athletes have coaches to help them improve their game, of course it makes sense to invest in coaching to improve your life. There are so many tools that can help. No reason to feel you have to do it alone. I’m here if you want someone to walk alongside you.

Do I owe them an explanation?

The same topic has come up on three of my coaching calls recently. It’s something I know I have personally struggled with so much in my life as well. 

My clients have shared with me the fallout they fear will follow them making a change. They know what change they want to make. They know the right next step. And yet, they freeze. Why?

Because they know that once they take the next step, it will create some situation where they will end up in conversations explaining to others why they did what they did. 

Here is my response each time:

Why do you owe them an explanation?

What if you just make the change you know you want to make, and you don’t need to justify or explain it to anyone? 

Each time I asked this question, there was silence and a pause on the other side. 

I know the feeling. I’ve done it. Sooooooo many times. I feel this need to justify myself, explain my decisions, tell them all the thoughts that I am thinking. Give all the details as to why I did what I did. 

Sometimes, with the right people, it makes for beautiful conversation. 

Most of the time, it’s utterly exhausting. I quickly find myself in a defensive posture. By over explaining, I just create more confusion and uncertainty. 

The conversations I’m referring to have involved the decision to end a relationship, the decision to make a business change, the decision to leave work on time, and the decision to stay home instead of going where others are going. 

Each time, in the conversations, the fear all centered around “but what will I say? How will I explain it? I don’t think it will make sense to them.” 

What if the answer is that you don’t. 

Regarding the relationship ending, she was able to discover that the only person she owed an explanation to was the other person in the relationship. When everyone else wanted to know the details, and why, and felt entitled to more information, she chose to not answer. We came up with a simple, one-liner response that painted them both in a good light, and she decided to set her boundary there. That was her line in the sand. After her simple line, there was nothing else to say.

The dialogue was very similar in all the other conversations. We clarified who actually deserved to know more details because it was the appropriate thing to do, and who was just being nosey or would create a stressful situation if the can was opened. 

As I write this post today, I cannot help but laugh. I have been the QUEEN of TMI. I have spent a lifetime over-explaining myself. It’s probably the people pleaser in many of us that wants to explain all the details and thoughts so they understand why we did what we did and are less likely to judge us, right? Because at the end of the day, the fear of rejection or not being liked motivates many of us. 

We don’t need to live this way.

We have the option to live with bold confidence. We can own our decisions because we know precisely why we made them and completely release how others respond. 

I would be lying if I said I have this figured out or have mastered it, but personally, I’m working on becoming hyper aware when I feel tempted to explain when unnecessary. When I find myself wanting to elaborate, I am trying to pause and ask “do I owe them an explanation?” 

Most often, the answer is no. 


Sophia Hyde is a certified life coach.

If there is something about your life that you know needs to change, working with a coach may be a great next step for you.

The first step is a one hour Zoom call where she will listen to your situation, go through an assessment with you, and share those results. Then, together you will determine if coaching can benefit you.

To explore if Sophia is the right coach for you, just set up a time to chat.

Do you know the one thing?

Do you know the #1 difference between goals that are met and those that are unmet?

I spent so many years of my life being taught about “SMART” goals, and all the right ways to hit goals. Yet, year after year I was missing the same ones over and over again.

Like many things in life, it’s so very simple, but not always easy.

Attach it to a daily habit.

“The fastest way to success is to replace a bad habit with a good habit.” – Tom Ziglar

The goals that are the most likely to be achieved in your life are the ones you have attached to a habit you are committed to each day.

It sounds so easy, and yet, we all have a story of when we have struggled to stick with a habit we wanted to form.

Here are a couple tips to help ensure your habits will stick. BJ Fogg wrote about these tips and the studies behind them in his book Tiny Habits. I have found each of these principles to be true in my own life.

Tackle one at a time.

Go all in on one habit change for as long as it takes to stick before picking up the next one. Sometimes this can be done in a couple days. Sometimes this may take months.

It is easier to commit to one habit change each month, and successfully complete 12 by the end of the year, than try to tackle 12 new things in January.

Make it as small as possible

Instead of tackling something large like “exercise every day at 6am,” try breaking it down into smaller steps. For example, “I will sleep in workout clothes and replace my slippers next to my bed with tennis shoes so that as soon as I wake up, I’m dressed.”

(By the way, I definitely love sleeping in pajamas and wearing my comfiest pajamas to bed. My tiny habit is that when I change clothes to drop the kids off at school, I dress in workout clothes and tennis shoes so it’s that much easier to stop at the park next to their school each morning.)

Keep it positive

You are highly unlikely to stick with a habit that you don’t enjoy. This is why 30 day programs and anything you commit to for a short stint is unlikely to become a life change. If you feel like you are “suffering through it,” your eyes will regularly be on the finish line, focused on when you can quit.

Instead, find ways to enjoy your habit so your brain associates happy feelings with the task.

I love my morning walk because it genuinely brings me joy and peace. I also remind myself I am doing it because it helps my brain work more efficiently and think clearer. I show up to the track so that I can be more effective the rest of the day.

I also love the way yoga makes my body feel, so I’m much more likely to show up to my mat when I say I will because it feels like a reward to myself.

However, fast paced workouts and H.I.I.T stress me out. Even if I know they help me get in shape and get stronger, I don’t find pleasure when I’m doing them. Therefore, I’m more likely to avoid the habit.

Don’t should on yourself.

If you are setting this habit goal because it’s something you “should” be doing, but not something you genuinely want to do, it will not stick. Commit to habits you want and know why you want them.

I’m so excited for you guys to create the lives you want to be living in 2022. I look forward to helping and being a part of your journey.

Keep it simple folks. Success is found in the mundane of the daily routine.


With Gratitude,

Sophia Hyde


If you are ready to make yourself a priority in your own life and start putting yourself on your own to-do list, let’s chat. Here are the two ways to get started on creating the life you crave to be living:

1. Book a strategy call with Sophia to discuss your particular situation and see if coaching can benefit you. Sessions are extremely flexible and only 20 minutes twice a month to get results.

2. Become a member of Release Your Favorite Self for $29 a month to get access to the online course.

Why I Threw Away My Scale

Earlier this year, I threw my scale away. If you are someone who struggles with your weight, I cannot recommend this decision highly enough. Here’s my story about why.

As I was writing down my goals for this year, once again, at the top of the list was to weigh 150 pounds. This was the same number I had associated with a “healthy Sophia” since high school, and yet, I only hit the number three times, at 17, 22 and 26, each time using very unsustainable trendy diet plans and therefore not maintaining it for more than a month. 

For almost 20 years, each time I stepped on a scale and discovered I was trending away, not toward, that number, feelings of disappointment and shame came over me.

I realized that my mood, my self-confidence, and how I moved about in the world were directly attached to a number on a scale. 

Last year, something in my heart broke when I wrote my annual goals down, and at the top of the list was that 150 number…again. I asked myself, “really, your #1 goal in life is connected to a number on a scale?” Something felt unsettling. 

I decided to delete the goal and begin a journey of looking for a new way to define whether I was moving closer to health, or away from it. 

I decided to double down on learning to love myself. I knew that pursuing health needed to come from a place of love, not shame or guilt. I started following and learning from registered dietitians, and took a course from an amazing life coach that specializes specifically in weight loss (good coaches have a coach themselves 😉 

Before I committed to any plan or habit changes, I first committed to loving myself exactly as I was. I needed to first know that I was already worthy and already enough, even if I stayed exactly the same. That step alone took a few months, but it was the most important. 

Then, I committed to these habits:

  1. Drink enough water each day (My goal is 100oz per day)
  2. Get a full night’s rest every night 
  3. Stop eating as soon as you sense you’re full (Learning how to listen to my stomach, not my brain)
  4. When you feel the desire to emotionally eat, journal about it instead (I designed this sheet, which you can download here)
  5. Eat the foods that make you feel good (This applies to joy, energy, brain fog, food sensitivities, etc.) 
  6. Get my heart rate up for 20 minutes a day

I also made a personal commitment that I would meet with my doctor, get labs done, and then work with her to improve whatever my numbers said. 

Because I am very goal-oriented, I needed something to pursue and refused to define whether I was succeeding or failing in my health journey based on a number on the scale. After about 4 months of focusing on care and love for my body, I decided these would be my two goal metrics:

  1. Improving my blood work
  2. Creating sustainable daily habits that will support me being a yoga teacher in my 80’s 

So, how did my health goals go this year? Absolutely wonderful. 

First, I learned so much about my body by working with my doctor. My blood work showed a few things were off, and by taking her recommended steps to get them all back to the green, I felt immediate improvements.

Second, I double-downed on learning about my mental health. The more we understand ourselves, our needs, our motivations, our triggers and so many other facets about what’s happening in our brains, the better we can meet our own needs. Also, we become better about communicating our needs and improving how we interact with our friends and loved ones as well. 

So, all that to say, why did I throw away the scale? Well, even months into this journey and the decision to not allow it to define me, I found myself continuing to “check in.” And when I did, I would feel emotions based on that number. If it had fallen, I was motivated to keep going, but also felt like I earned “a treat.” And second, if it went up, I felt discouraged and would trigger my emotional eating, but I would eat the food in shame. Therefore, I realized the entire process was stupid and pointless. A number doesn’t define me. It doesn’t define my health. It doesn’t define my worth. 

Am I saying everyone should throw theirs away? No. I make an intentional effort to not should on people. If you do not have baggage around your weight and whatever number the scale shows then good for you. But for me, and many others, it’s not serving us. 


Sophia Hyde is a certified life coach. Don’t forget to register for the first live event for 2022, the Drive Workshop. It will be a three hour workshop dedicated to starting 2022 off on the right foot. Click here for what to expect and all the details.

Let’s Get Together

Hello Friends,

I have been thinking about you guys for MONTHS asking myself the same question, “How can I make their lives easier while also helping them achieve their goals and create the life they want to be living?”

The answer is….let’s get together. I have created a 3-hour workshop that will bring together all the best ways to start the new year. We will reflect on the right questions to ask ourselves, simplify the goal setting process, and create a plan of action. And here is the most important promise (that always matters to me when I go to events):

I promise to not send you home with homework.

You will write your 2022 plan, and you will walk out the door with it in hand, confident on the first step you want to take.

Click here to reserve your seat and join us.

For those of you who are not local, shoot me an email. Let me know if you would be interested in me putting together an online version of this. Do you want to set aside three hours on Zoom? If there is enough demand, I will create a virtual version.

Can we lower the bar? Actually….yes.

If any part of the holiday season is beginning to overwhelm you, I want to offer you a word of encouragement.

You don’t have to do it all.

Just in case you need me to say it again with other words, it’s okay to let go of some things. In fact, it’s probably healthy.

Maybe you need to let go of some events on the calendar.

Maybe you need to let go of some expectations you have.

Maybe you need to let go of comparing yourself to what other families are doing.

Right now on my Instastories I am posting our family’s daily advent calendar. It’s an adorable kindness calendar I got from Mail Your Mark. You are welcome to join us and do 24 kind acts…but you know what else? You’re welcome to say that one more thing on your plate is exactly what will push you over the edge and you cannot join us. Both are fine.

While I may have agreed to this 24 day challenge, I have also accepted that our Christmas pajamas are going to clash because the kids disagreed with my choices, and I’m letting that one go. I’ve also accepted that because we are going out of town for Christmas during a year they are getting physically large items…the whole Santa thing is going to be whacky and may not go over well on Christmas Day. Oh well.

Ya know how I am managing all these small details?

I have released all the expectations that anything will go well.

I am committed to picking my priorities, doing the best I can and being unattached to how others respond.

Yesterday we took our kids to an evening Christmas event that went past bedtime. It was adorable and fun, until it ended up in meltdowns and us physically carrying our children to the cars for two blocks.

I didn’t even stress. Wanna know why? I never told myself it was going to go well. I just said it mattered to me to go.

So here is your reminder, in case you need it this holiday season…..you can lower your expectations.

Do you have family members that don’t get along and are all going to be together at Christmas? Maybe just don’t expect them to get along.

Do your kids go crazy after sugar…maybe don’t expect them to go to bed on time.

Last year we tried to introduce Home Alone to our daughter and she said it was too scary and we had to turn it off. Although it was a bit disappointing I must say, it was also whatever.

This is supposed to be the happiest time of year, but we often allow it to be the most frustrating time of year by stretching ourselves too thin, setting expectations too high and comparing ourselves to other families.

Today, the message on my heart was to remind you of this message….let it go. Whatever your “it” is. You don’t have to be or do it all.

With gratitude,

Sophia Hyde

Let’s Talk About Sleep

All these years later, the most common sense thing we have all heard still manages to blow my mind. 

Last night I fell asleep putting the kids down and my body woke up 9.5 hours later. 

I had a whole list of things to do last night. I woke up with none of them done. The dishwasher was left wide open. The counters were cluttered. The clothes weren’t ironed.

 However, it amazed me how much energy I had this morning.

Most mornings it’s a battle and chore to get everyone out on time. Today, we left 10 minutes ahead of schedule, and I had accomplished a half hour worth of tasks that I normally do after they are gone. 

The science is there. Even common sense is there. We KNOW without a doubt that our brains work better when we have more sleep. 

We KNOW that more sleep means better efficiency.

And yet…

We sabotage our sleep all the time. Just a couple days ago I stayed up past my bedtime so I could fold six batches of laundry and make sure my kitchen was spotless. But guess what? The next day I was dragging and accomplished less than I usually do in my workday. 

If you are struggling with getting a full night’s rest, I compiled a list of things to help increase your chances:

  • Actually calendar your sleep. Block the time and respect the boundaries
  • Communicate with your family the time frame you need to sleep and ask them to help keep you accountable to keeping your word. 
  • Cut out caffeine. Both my husband and I have had to completely remove it from our diet to get better rest at night (I have found if I squeeze in one serving before 11am, I am still okay) 
  • Try different supplements. There are things like melatonin and magnesium that regularly make a world of difference for many people. However, sometimes other things are off in your body and getting the right balance can change everything. Talk to your doctor about running some labs to see where you may have deficiencies. You can also have your hormones checked because your hormones being out of balance can greatly affect your ability to get a good night’s rest
  • Exercise. Getting proper exercise during the day has been proven over and over again to improve sleep in many people. However, exercising too close to bedtime can negatively affect sleep, so be sure your body has ample time to calm back down for rest
  • Screentime. Cut out screen time before bed. I’ve heard many different timeframes recommended, so see what works best for you. Some people recommend 30 minutes, one hour and two hours of no screen time before bedtime to help best prepare your brain for rest
  • Manage your food. Being overstuffed or eating foods that cause indigestion can also disturb your sleep 
  • Alcohol consumption can also affect your quality of sleep
  • Improve your sleeping conditions. Things like a darkroom, cooler temperatures, earplugs, fans, or anything else that may improve your environment
  • Calm down rituals. There are things you can do to prepare your body before rest so you can fall asleep quicker and stay asleep longer. For many people hot baths, teas, or reading (but not on a screen) are helpful.
  • Guided meditations can be powerfully helpful, especially if your thoughts often keep you awake. Apps like Headspace and Calm offer meditations you can listen to before bed to help release any stresses, worries, or tasks before you fall asleep.
  • Journaling. If you find that bedtime is when your brain starts buzzing with tasks and ideas, keep a journal next to your bed to write down the thoughts as they pop in.