Better Sleep for a Better Mood: Tips on Restorative Rest for Greater Well-Being

Transformational Choices
Oct 21
4 min read

Updated: Oct 30

By Megan Porath, MSW Candidate

When faced with mental health challenges, we can be tempted to focus on everything but the basics – but few habits compare with the power of deep, restorative rest to help us regulate our emotions, cope with stress, and experience greater well-being.

It’s 2:30 AM. I know my alarm is set for 6:00 AM, but I haven’t slept yet. My mind is a spaghetti of fragments from conversations I had that evening, thoughts about tasks I didn’t have time for earlier in the day, and hooks from pop songs I haven’t heard in 25 years. I’m hardly thrilled. What’s worse – I know that a lot of my daily habits are fueling this experience, and that chronic sleep deprivation is becoming my normal state of existence. It’s a vicious cycle, and the brain fog of sleeplessness and emergency afternoon cups of coffee is making it ever more challenging to find my way out of it.

Fortunately, my primary care doctor is a practical woman. She speaks to me with a hopeful attitude that once I get a handle on my sleep, my stress will start to feel more manageable and my mood will start to lift. We talk through a couple small changes I can make starting today to move my sleep cycle in the right direction.

Getting quality sleep is one of the most important factors in our overall well-being and ability to be present in our lives. It can be tempting when we’re going through a difficult period of life to neglect it, and yet it impacts every area of our functioning, our emotional health, and our ability to navigate stress with grace.

It can be a real challenge to reverse the cycle of poor quality or inadequate sleep, but even small interventions can quickly make a huge difference in how you feel throughout the day.

Here are a few key tips to avoid common pitfalls with “sleep hygiene”:

Adults need bedtimes, too.

Our bodies thrive on predictable rhythms. While we can’t always control our own sleep schedule (especially if you work a swing shift, or care for little humans who wake at all hours), any effort to go to bed and wake up at around the same time every day can make a huge impact. Over time, your body will start to learn that at 11 PM, we sleep, or at 7 AM, we wake – rather than you having to force the issue, it will begin to happen more effortlessly.

Watch your intake.

If you’re regularly struggling with sleep, that midnight snack or late afternoon energy drink may not be your friends. It has been shown that consuming food within 1-2 hours or caffeinated beverages within 7-8 hours of bedtime both negatively impact sleep quality and make it more difficult to drift off. Heavy alcohol consumption also significantly disrupts your ability to sleep soundly by interfering REM sleep and causing a rebound effect of nervous system arousal that impacts sleep especially in the second half of the night.

Shift your mind to a lower gear.

Have you ever tried to sleep immediately after watching an exciting movie or show? Unless you're downright exhausted, it can be very difficult to slow the mind down enough to fall asleep immediately following a highly stimulating experience. A lot of digital media is fast-paced, emotionally charged, and visually stimulating to a degree our brains can't easily disconnect from after we turn them off. Save the TikToks, video games, and exciting Netflix series for earlier in the day and instead consider a screenless activity 1 to 2 hours before bed. The blue light from phone, computer and TV screens can trick your brain into thinking it's daytime and interfere with your body's ability to produce the hormones it needs to sleep well.

Improve your nighttime routine.

There are many ways to signal to your body through repetitive rituals that it's time to get some rest. Switching off your screens, making a cup of soothing herbal tea, getting into comfy clothes, skin and dental care routines, setting out what you'll need in the morning -- these and many others are all self-care practices that send the message to your brain that the day is coming to a close. Helping your mind and body to relax before getting under the covers will help immensely, too. You could try gentle stretching, relaxing breathing techniques, prayer, or journaling to help leave today's worries where they belong: today. Creating a sufficiently calm, relaxing, dark, and cool environment to sleep in will also work wonders.

Move your body during the day.

Even a modest amount of physical activity during the day can start improving your sleep quality, as long as it isn't too late at night. If you can do this outdoors and receive the benefits of natural sunlight and fresh air, even better!

When we’re struggling with stress or our emotional health, it can be easy to look at the external factors that might be contributing to our struggles – but sometimes, with even just a few small shifts to our routines, improvements in our ability to benefit from restorative rest in turn improve our ability to respond in new and more helpful ways to the stressors in our lives.