Breaking Ordinary with Andy Petranek

Can you lose weight simply by sleeping more? Is 8 hours the "magic" number when it comes to sleep each night? Does the time you go to bed make a difference?Is there any truth to the idea that you sleep in 90 minute cycles? If so, should you plan your wake-up time accordingly? Are the Apps for your smartphone that measure sleep quality good and/or worth it?

These are just a few of the many topics we discussed with the Sleep Doctor, Dr. Michael Breus. Dr. Breus is a recognized sleep expert who has been writing, speaking and educating the public about sleep for years. His most recent He's written two books on the subject:
Good Night: The Sleep Doctor's 4-Week Program to Better Sleep and Better Health, and
The Sleep Doctor's Diet Plan: Simple Rules for Losing Weight While You Sleep.

To download a copy of his ebook, 10 Things Great Sleepers Do, visit his website at www.secretstosleepsuccess.com.

When it comes to getting enough sleep, most of us can use all the help we can get. Since the invention of electricity and light bulbs over 100 years ago, we've been functioning on ever-shortening hours of sleep each night... something which we're not  designed to do.

Three ideas to help get you more sleep this week: set a bedtime, prep for sleep, and track your sleep... but for more details you'll have to listen to our 10-minute conversation.

Have a great week 4 in the Challenge!

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Let's face it... we've all procrastinated at one time or another. And taking action in spite of not necessarily feeling like it, is the only way to truly eliminate it. But knowing this doesn't seem to help. Most of us know it, and yet  continue to do it, putting off what we know will turn around and bite us in the butt down the road. Why?

I came across the iProcrastinate podcast about a year ago and have been a big fan of Dr. Tim Pychyl's work ever since... thanks to the benefits I experienced directly by listening to his thoughts, ideas and strategies about dealing with this human condition that we all deal with.

And Tim - well lets just say he's quite the expert. He's on staff at Carlton University and has been studying, researching and publishing about procrastination for over 20 years!

In this podcast we talk to Tim about the nature of procrastination, why we do it, some of the way's we (Michael and I) procrastinate, and strategies we can all adopt for dealing with it.

To find out more about Dr. Pychyl's work, check out his site at www.procrastination.ca, and at the iProcrastinate Podcast.

We've just come off of a great week... taking the extra time each day to read reflections, comment on what others are doing, and support them simply by engaging.

I don't know about you, but for me, it truly does make a difference. It makes it clear that we're doing this in the context of others...  the idea that you are there, right along side of us, moving in the same direction, makes straying from the rules when the going gets tough something I have to really have to think twice about.

This week we're on to the practice of working on a hobby or skill. This is so much fun & it can be literally anything... reading a book, practicing an instrument, working on your cooking or knife skills in the kitchen. Your only limit is your imagination.

Looking forward to hearing about all the great things you're up to in reflections and in the Whole Life Challenge Facebook Group.

Gretchen Rubin is a NY Times bestselling author of The Happiness Project and Happier at Home, whose latest work Better Than Before is a book about personal habits. And it couldn't be any better reading for players in the Whole Life Challenge.

We invited her to join us in the WLC Podcast today because of the value that both Michael and I got from reading Better than Before. We thought that talking with her about her research and methods would give us additional insight into her very specific and practical advice about making positive and lasting change in your life.

Let's just say that she didn't disappoint!

Join us as we discuss taking action as it relates personally to both Andy & Michael along with some of the things we discovered about ourselves that apply to how we approach the Whole Life Challenge.

For more about Gretchen, and to find out which of the 4 action-taking types you are, check out www.gretchenrubin.com.

What does it mean to be on someone else's team during the Whole Life Challenge. You may be on a team that you see every day, and you may be on one where the members are spread all over the world.

Whatever the case, teams are an incredibly powerful part of the Challenge... and supporting one another, whether it's commenting on reflections, or simply moving in the same direction together, simultaneously; your teammates can have a profound impact on your success.

Join us as we talk about our experiences on teams and how they've effected our journey.

Join us on the podcast today as we talk to Lela Buttery, chef, educator, activist, coffee enthusiast, and author of We Can Do Butter, a modern treatise on reclaiming our relationship with and control over the food that we eat.

Lela shares how the most important step to making a change in your lifestyle around food is making a conscious commitment—deciding that it's important enough to take on the work of making it.

We cover an array of topics from the difference between food and "phood" products, to learning to plan, source, and prep, to Mary Poppins, to, of course, butter.

You can learn more about Lela at www.lelabuttery.com and her book at www.wecandobutter.com. And if you find yourself in Venice, CA, check out her fantastic neighborhood coffee shop, Another Kind of Sunrise, where you can try her Buttery Brew.

Week 1 of the Whole Life Challenge is a chance to get yourself organized around preparation and systems. Stocking your fridge and pantry, making a list of all compliant restaurants in your area, and planning your schedule around getting it all in. It's also a great opportunity to look at all the areas of your life that might be a little disheveled, that could use some attention and some action.

Join Michael Stanwyck and Andy Petranek, co-founders of the Challenge, as they talk with each other in this short (10-minute) podcast on how they're approaching week 1 and what you can expect.

Personal trainers around the world don't typically call the group of people that they train a community. In fact, their clients almost never actually know one another, unless they happen to pass by while walking through the gym.

Our guests this week, Shari-Beth Susskind and two of her clients, Robyn & Gail, talk about how the Whole Life Challenge changed all this for her group of clients.

Shari-Beth is a personal trainer, and for this Challenge, she signed up herself, and got all of her clients to join her. For the first time ever, it turned a bunch of individuals into a small community. It brought them together, introducing them to each other for the first time, giving them a long-term goal, and giving them a common shared daily struggle. 

The impact has been tremendous - truly life changing for many of the people on their team.

The other effect... It humanized Shari-Beth... for the first time ever, her clients could see that just because she looked great and was strong in the gym, she too struggled with various parts of being healthy. 

Join us as Shari-Beth, Gayle and Robin share their team's story. 

Finishing the Challenge is one thing, but completing... that's another story. Whether you've logged your score every day and been fully engaged, or you've given up, not kept up with logging in and effectively quit, you have the opportunity this week to COMPLETE.

What's that mean? Completing is like putting the period at the end of a sentence... and it doesn't matter how long your sentence or what words you used, to complete the sentence, it needs a period. 

So the first thing completing means is actually following through this week. Remember, you've still got 5 days to go.

Next, it means taking the time to look back over the past 8 weeks, getting into integrity with yourself, and clarifying where you came from, what you changed, what new habits you've taken on, what you learned, and what results have occured as a result.

In the mean time, go ahead - enjoy this week and the feeling of accomplishment you get after 8 weeks of accountability. Congratulations, you did it!