How Exercise Helps Brain Health, Sleep & Performance | Dr. Andrew Huberman
00:00:00.000 | [silence]
00:00:02.880 | Okay, so multiple times throughout today's discussion,
00:00:05.140 | we've been talking about how exercise increases arousal,
00:00:08.060 | arousal improves brain function, that's true.
00:00:11.260 | You know what's also true?
00:00:12.260 | What's also true is that exercise improves brain health
00:00:15.700 | in the long-term, yes, through the deployment of things
00:00:18.340 | like BDNF, yes, through the deployment of things
00:00:20.540 | like osteocalcin and on and on,
00:00:23.180 | but it also does so by improving your sleep.
00:00:27.380 | One question I get a lot is let's say I don't sleep
00:00:30.800 | that well, should I exercise?
00:00:33.560 | Well, the short answer is yes,
00:00:35.920 | provided that it was just one night of poor sleep.
00:00:39.120 | In fact, there are studies showing
00:00:40.400 | that if you're slightly sleep deprived,
00:00:42.040 | meaning one night's poor sleep,
00:00:44.340 | so most people need somewhere between six and nine hours
00:00:46.700 | of sleep, varies by person, varies by age,
00:00:48.720 | varies by time of year and so on,
00:00:50.120 | all discussed in that series with Matt Walker.
00:00:54.840 | Most people need six to nine hours,
00:00:56.340 | but let's say you normally get eight
00:00:58.820 | or you normally get seven,
00:01:00.380 | but you're down two hours on sleep for whatever reason,
00:01:03.160 | should you exercise the next morning?
00:01:05.020 | The short answer is yes,
00:01:06.940 | provided it was just one night of poor sleep.
00:01:09.220 | It turns out that exercising after a poor night's sleep
00:01:12.420 | can help offset some of the negative effects
00:01:14.680 | of sleep deprivation on what?
00:01:17.100 | On brain performance and health.
00:01:19.220 | Now, you don't want to get into a habit of this.
00:01:20.860 | You don't want to get into a habit of using exercise
00:01:23.580 | as a way to compensate for sleep loss.
00:01:25.820 | So if you don't sleep well for one night,
00:01:28.160 | exercise is a great way to offset
00:01:30.440 | that sleep loss effect on the brain
00:01:32.480 | or that would otherwise affect the brain.
00:01:34.400 | You can compensate for it by doing some exercise.
00:01:36.520 | Keep in mind, you want to exercise in a way
00:01:38.560 | that's not too intense
00:01:39.620 | because you can drive your immune system down
00:01:41.200 | and be more vulnerable to infections.
00:01:43.080 | That's certainly the case after a poor night's sleep.
00:01:45.920 | You also want to be really careful
00:01:47.240 | with what you do for that exercise
00:01:48.880 | in terms of your coordinated movement.
00:01:50.800 | It's much easier to get injured when you're sleep deprived.
00:01:53.680 | In fact, there's a really nice set of studies.
00:01:56.280 | Lane Norton's talked about this elsewhere,
00:01:58.320 | that the relationship between sleep,
00:02:00.200 | or I should say sleep deprivation and injury
00:02:02.300 | is a strong one.
00:02:03.320 | And the relationship between sleep loss and pain
00:02:06.360 | and failure to recover from injury is also a strong one.
00:02:09.880 | The direct point being, if you're slightly sleep deprived,
00:02:12.880 | sure, go ahead and exercise.
00:02:14.080 | That will actually help you offset
00:02:15.280 | some of the negative effects of that sleep deprivation,
00:02:17.780 | but you want to be careful how you exercise
00:02:19.340 | so you don't get sick and you don't get injured.
00:02:21.280 | And there are actually studies of how quickly
00:02:23.360 | your brain starts to suffer if you don't exercise.
00:02:26.480 | And the major thing that I was able to extract
00:02:28.240 | from that literature is that after about 10 days
00:02:31.700 | of not doing any training,
00:02:33.460 | that is no cardiovascular training, no resistance training,
00:02:36.360 | you start to see significant decrements
00:02:38.660 | in brain oxygenation levels,
00:02:40.780 | as well as some other markers
00:02:42.060 | that are indicative of brain health,
00:02:43.280 | or that would be indicative of brain health
00:02:45.580 | if they were to continue.
00:02:47.240 | So if you haven't been training at all
00:02:48.880 | for a long period of time, your brain is suffering.
00:02:51.220 | The good news is you can start benefiting your brain
00:02:53.720 | very quickly by exercising.
00:02:56.260 | So you can keep in mind
00:02:57.140 | that if you're having trouble sleeping,
00:02:58.360 | or even if you're a great sleeper already,
00:03:00.440 | getting exercise will further improve
00:03:02.400 | the architecture of your sleep.
00:03:03.820 | In fact, there's some evidence
00:03:05.240 | that doing high intensity interval training
00:03:06.980 | can improve the amount of deep slow wave sleep that you get.
00:03:10.040 | And there's some additional data showing
00:03:12.280 | that if you do high intensity training early in the day,
00:03:16.060 | and that's combined with a bunch of other things
00:03:17.760 | that stimulate autonomic arousal,
00:03:19.420 | so here we are again at autonomic arousal,
00:03:21.380 | things like caffeine, if that's in your program,
00:03:23.440 | you don't have to drink caffeine.
00:03:25.060 | Things like getting bright light in your eyes
00:03:26.620 | early in the day, definitely do that.
00:03:28.220 | Don't stare at the sun or any light so bright
00:03:29.820 | that it's dangerous or painful to look at,
00:03:31.500 | but certainly get bright light in your eyes.
00:03:32.860 | All those things that increase autonomic arousal
00:03:35.060 | early in the day can also help improve the amount
00:03:38.340 | and the quality of sleep that you get at night,
00:03:40.280 | in particular, rapid eye movement sleep,
00:03:42.560 | which is so critical for learning and memory.
00:03:44.820 | In fact, there's something called the first night effect,
00:03:46.580 | which is the amount and quality of rapid eye movement sleep
00:03:49.880 | that you get on the first night
00:03:51.100 | after trying to learn something,
00:03:52.580 | powerfully dictates whether or not you actually learn
00:03:54.660 | and remember that thing.
00:03:55.620 | Because as you recall, learning and memory,
00:03:58.100 | neuroplasticity is a two-step process.
00:04:00.500 | You need to be focused and alert during the encoding phase,
00:04:03.340 | during the learning, but it's in states of deep rest,
00:04:06.100 | sleep in particular, but also non-sleep deep rest,
00:04:08.700 | but rapid eye movement sleep is the kind of king
00:04:12.020 | of reshaping your brain connections for the better.
00:04:15.140 | Unloading the emotional load of experiences
00:04:17.180 | that were troubling,
00:04:18.180 | that happens during rapid eye movement sleep.
00:04:20.340 | Just a little bit of REM deprivation,
00:04:21.900 | rapid eye movement sleep deprivation
00:04:23.780 | will make you more emotional
00:04:25.280 | and will make the painful experiences
00:04:26.980 | of recent and distant past also more painful.
00:04:29.700 | Get more rapid eye movement sleep if you can.
00:04:31.940 | It also consolidates learning of things
00:04:33.460 | that you want to remember.
00:04:35.080 | Again, exercise early in the day,
00:04:37.340 | in particular, high intensity exercise
00:04:39.300 | combined with some of the other things we just discussed,
00:04:41.180 | terrific way to improve the amount and quality of sleep
00:04:44.860 | that you get at night.
00:04:46.140 | And of course, all of that geysers up to what?
00:04:48.980 | Better brain health and performance in the short-term
00:04:51.740 | and in the long-term.
00:04:52.700 | There are now many, many studies showing
00:04:55.300 | that sleep is the thing that mediates many, not all,
00:04:58.460 | but many of the positive effects of exercise
00:05:01.000 | on brain performance and long-term brain health.
00:05:04.500 | So what this means is that you have to make sure
00:05:06.620 | that you're getting adequate amounts of sleep.
00:05:08.340 | It's not sufficient just to exercise.
00:05:10.700 | You need to get proper sleep.
00:05:11.860 | And I've done multiple episodes
00:05:13.780 | on how to optimize your sleep, how to improve your sleep,
00:05:16.420 | how to deal with insomnia, shift work.
00:05:18.880 | If you want to learn about any and all of that,
00:05:20.740 | either from podcasts or from our newsletter,
00:05:22.940 | go to hubermanlab.com,
00:05:24.780 | put sleep into the search function,
00:05:26.860 | and it will take you to the episodes
00:05:28.820 | and the newsletters that discuss that.
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