Recently, after what should have been a relaxing staycation with my wife, I confessed to her that I was feeling discouraged. We talked through a few possibilities without success, but then she asked me, “Are you discouraged or just tired?”

The fact is that it is incredibly easy to confuse these two feelings because the symptoms are similar.

Click to Listen

When I don't get enough sleep, it impacts me in five ways:

I’m less focused.

I’m less creative.

I’m less resilient.

I’m less generous.

I’m less productive.

Nothing is more important than sleep. Exercise, diet, and mental focus are all important, but they can’t make up for a lack of rest.

Here are eight tips for getting a better night's rest.

Avoid caffeinated drinks (especially after 4 p.m.).

Eliminate negative input.

Go to bed on time.

Make sure the room is dark.

Keep the temperature cool.

Run a fan (or white noise generator).

Use essential oils.

Pray.

Listener Questions

Jeff Sanders asked, “When it comes to sleep, what’s more important: quantity or quality?”

Tabitha Ford asked, “Should I allow other sites to re-post my content?”

John Burke asked, “How do I start to monetize my speaking events?”

Egil Elling Elingsen asked, “Why do you use digital tools in your morning ritual?”

Matthew Kenyon asked, “When is my platform big enough to monetize?”

Special Announcements

We still have a few tickets left for the Platform Conference, which will be held in Dallas, Texas on November 3-5, 2013—just about a month away. We have a terrific lineup of speakers this year:

Lysa TerKeurst

Amy Porterfield

Derek Halpern

Cliff Ravenscraft

Stu McLaren

Ray Edwards

Jeff Goins

Ken Davis

Also, until October 18 you can get a special $200 discount by using the code: OCTOBER.

If you are considering launching your own platform—or just getting serious about it—you need to start with a self-hosted WordPress blog.

This is not as complicated as it sounds. In fact, I have put together a step-by-step screencast on exactly how to do it.

You don’t need any technical knowledge.By the way, I just updated this screencast a few weeks ago, so it has the latest and greatest information available. I walk you through the entire process in exactly 20 minutes.

In my next podcast I will interview my wife, Gail, on the subject of "Entrepreneurship and Marriage: How to Accomplish Your Dreams Without Blowing Up Your Marriage." If you have a question on this or ANY subject, please leave me a voicemail by clicking below:

This is a terrific way to cross-promote your blog or website, because I will link to it, just like I did with the callers in this episode.

Episode Resources

In this episode I mentioned several resources, including:

Book: Platform: Get Noticed in a Noisy World by Michael Hyatt

Conference: