Exercises — Chapter 30: Sleep, Energy, and Peak Performance

Several exercises here require observation over days or weeks. The data you collect on your own patterns is more useful than any general principle.

Part 1: Sleep Assessment

Exercise 30.1 — The Sleep Audit

Before reading about what you "should" be doing, establish what you actually do.

For two weeks, keep a daily sleep log. Each morning, record:

(a) After two weeks: what is your average total sleep time? Is it below the general adult recommendation of 7–9 hours?

(b) What is your sleep consistency — how much does your bedtime and wake time vary between weekdays and weekends? The chapter describes this variation as "social jetlag."

(c) Is there a pattern between your sleep quality ratings and your subsequent mood/performance ratings?

(d) Do you typically feel rested when you wake? If not, is this a quantity problem (total hours), a quality problem (frequently waking), or a timing problem (sleeping at the wrong point in your circadian cycle)?

Exercise 30.2 — The Chronotype Assessment

(a) On days when you have no external constraints (no alarm, no commitments), what time do you naturally fall asleep and wake? This is your biological sleep timing.

(b) What time do your work and social obligations require you to be active? Calculate the discrepancy between your biological timing and your required timing. This is your social jetlag.

(c) On a scale: are you a morning type (energized and alert earliest), an evening type (energized and alert latest), or intermediate?

(d) Given your chronotype: - When is your cognitive peak window likely? (Morning types: late morning; evening types: mid-afternoon to evening) - When is your trough? (When do you typically experience the most difficulty concentrating?) - Are you scheduling your most demanding work during your peak or your trough?

(e) Design one scheduling change to better align your most demanding work with your chronotype peak.

Part 2: Sleep Quality Improvement

Exercise 30.3 — The Sleep Hygiene Audit

Rate your current consistency with each of the following evidence-based sleep practices (1 = never/rarely, 5 = consistently):

(a) Identify your two lowest-scoring practices. These are your highest-leverage intervention points.

(b) Choose one practice to implement first. Design the specific implementation: when, how, and what will make it stick?

(c) The chapter notes that alcohol is widely misunderstood as a sleep aid. If you use alcohol for sleep: track your sleep quality (using your log from Exercise 30.1) on alcohol-free nights versus nights with alcohol. What do you find?

Exercise 30.4 — The Wind-Down Experiment

Design a 20-minute pre-sleep wind-down routine:

(a) What currently happens in the 60 minutes before you try to sleep? Is it conducive to sleep initiation (calm, low-light, low-stimulation) or sleep-disrupting (screens, stimulating content, work)?

(b) Design a 20-minute alternative. Include: - A transition signal that begins the wind-down (e.g., setting the alarm, turning off overhead lights) - One or two low-stimulation activities (reading physical books, light stretching, journaling, listening to calm music) - Consistent ending time and immediate transition to bed

(c) Run this routine for two weeks. Track whether time-to-fall-asleep and sleep quality change.

(d) The chapter notes that a warm bath or shower before bed can improve sleep by accelerating post-bath core temperature reduction. If you haven't tried this, experiment for one week.

Exercise 30.5 — The Caffeine Timing Experiment

Many people believe caffeine doesn't affect their sleep because they don't notice difficulty falling asleep. This exercise tests whether it affects sleep quality even when onset is unaffected.

(a) For one week, have your last caffeine before noon.

(b) Compare sleep quality ratings during this week to your baseline (from Exercise 30.1).

(c) If your sleep quality improved: calculate how many years you've been drinking caffeine in the afternoon and getting subtly worse sleep than you could have had.

(d) If no change: your caffeine metabolism may be faster than average, or your sleep quality is limited by other factors. Proceed to other interventions.

Part 3: Energy and Performance Rhythms

Exercise 30.6 — Mapping Your Ultradian Rhythm

The approximately 90-minute rest-activity cycle produces predictable alertness peaks and troughs during the waking day. This exercise maps yours.

For five consecutive workdays, rate your subjective alertness, focus, and mental energy every 30 minutes from waking to sleeping (1 = very low, 5 = very high).

(a) Plot the resulting curve across each day. Are there recognizable peaks and troughs at roughly 90-minute intervals?

(b) When is your first peak? When is your trough? When is your second peak?

(c) Compare what you are currently scheduled to do during your peaks and troughs versus what the research suggests is optimal (analytical work during peaks, creative/generative work or low-demand tasks during troughs).

(d) Identify one scheduling change that would better align your work with your energy rhythm.

Exercise 30.7 — The Recovery Interval Experiment

Most people work continuously across multi-hour blocks without genuine recovery intervals. This experiment tests whether scheduled brief recovery improves output.

(a) Choose a demanding workday. Work continuously for a full morning without intentional breaks (your current pattern).

(b) The following workday, work in 90-minute blocks with 10–15 minutes of genuine recovery between blocks (walking, non-screen relaxation, or brief physical activity). Not email-checking — actual recovery.

(c) Compare: total focused work output, subjective quality of concentration, and end-of-day energy level.

(d) If recovery intervals improved your output: design a regular schedule that includes them. What would need to change about your meeting schedule, open-door expectations, or physical environment to make this possible?

Exercise 30.8 — The Four Dimensions of Energy

Loehr and Schwartz identify four dimensions of energy: physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual (purpose/meaning). This exercise assesses your current state in each.

(a) Rate your current energy in each dimension (1 = severely depleted, 5 = fully resourced):

| Dimension | Current State (1–5) | Primary Drains | Primary Sources | |-----------|--------------------|-----------------|--------------|----| | Physical (sleep, nutrition, movement) | | | | | Emotional (quality of emotional experience, regulation) | | | | | Mental (concentration, focus, cognitive capacity) | | | | | Spiritual (purpose, meaning, values alignment) | | | |

(b) Which dimension is your most depleted? Which is your primary source of restoration?

(c) The chapter notes that these dimensions interact — depleted physical energy (poor sleep) degrades all others. If physical energy is your lowest score, address it first before attempting to improve other dimensions.

(d) For each dimension, identify one specific recovery practice you currently underuse.

Part 4: Recovery Practices

Exercise 30.9 — Psychological Detachment Assessment

Psychological detachment — mentally disengaging from work during non-work time — is the recovery dimension most consistently associated with reduced fatigue and improved wellbeing.

(a) On a typical weekday evening: what percentage of your non-work hours are genuinely work-free (not checking email, not thinking about work, not problem-solving work situations)?

(b) Identify the main sources of work intrusion during non-work time. For each, assess: is it necessary or habitual?

(c) Design one specific detachment practice: something that creates a clear signal of the transition out of work mode. This could be a physical ritual (changing clothes, a short walk), a communicative ritual (telling a household member "I'm done for the day"), or a behavioral ritual (closing the laptop and writing the shutdown list, as in Chapter 29).

(d) After two weeks of the detachment practice: has your subjective recovery improved? Does the work feel less heavy in the morning?

Exercise 30.10 — Mastery Activity Design

Sonnentag's research finds that challenging non-work activities producing genuine competence experiences restore depleted resources more effectively than purely passive leisure.

(a) What challenging non-work activities do you currently have in your life? (Not relaxing activities — challenging ones requiring skill, learning, or genuine effort.)

(b) If the answer is "none" or "not many": this is a recovery design gap. What skill, hobby, or domain interests you enough that you would invest effortful attention in it outside work?

(c) Design a "mastery activity" for the next month: a challenging non-work pursuit that you will engage in deliberately, at least once per week, for genuine skill development and the competence experience it provides.

(d) After one month: did engaging in a challenging non-work activity improve your recovery from work demands? Did you arrive at work feeling more resourced than on weeks when you didn't engage in it?

Part 5: Napping

Exercise 30.11 — The Nap Experiment

(a) If you don't currently nap: identify whether your schedule permits a 10–20 minute nap during your ultradian trough (typically early afternoon for most people).

(b) For one week, take a 10–20 minute nap during your afternoon trough on days when it's possible. Use an alarm to prevent entering deep slow-wave sleep (which produces grogginess on waking).

(c) Compare afternoon cognitive performance and mood on nap days versus non-nap days.

(d) The chapter notes that naps longer than 30 minutes risk entering slow-wave sleep and producing sleep inertia. If you wake groggy from naps: the nap is too long. Reduce to 10–15 minutes.

(e) If your schedule doesn't permit napping: what would it take to make it possible? Is there a meeting that could be moved, a lunch hour that is currently not genuinely restorative?

Part 6: Sleep Problems

Exercise 30.12 — Insomnia Pattern Recognition

If you regularly experience difficulty falling asleep, staying asleep, or waking too early:

(a) Which type of insomnia do you primarily experience? - Sleep onset insomnia: difficulty falling asleep at the beginning of the night - Sleep maintenance insomnia: waking during the night and struggling to return to sleep - Early morning awakening: waking 1–2 hours before the desired time and unable to return to sleep

(b) For each type, the chapter points toward CBT-I as the evidence-based first-line treatment. The core CBT-I components most relevant to self-help application are:

Sleep restriction therapy: temporarily restricting time in bed to build sleep pressure, then gradually expanding. Counterintuitive but highly effective.

Stimulus control: using the bed only for sleep (and sex) — not for reading, phone use, TV, or lying awake worrying. When unable to sleep for more than 20 minutes, getting up and doing something calm until sleepy.

Cognitive restructuring: addressing the catastrophic thoughts about sleep ("if I don't sleep I'll be useless tomorrow") that paradoxically increase arousal and worsen insomnia.

(c) Have you tried any of these components? If not, which would you start with?

(d) If self-help approaches haven't been adequate: the chapter recommends seeking professional CBT-I. This is increasingly available through apps, digital programs, and therapists trained in CBT-I — not necessarily requiring in-person therapy.

Exercise 30.13 — The Sleep Apnea Risk Check

Obstructive sleep apnea is dramatically underdiagnosed and profoundly affects cognitive and emotional performance. Use this brief screen:

(a) Do you snore loudly or has anyone told you you stop breathing during sleep? (b) Do you wake feeling unrefreshed despite adequate hours? (c) Do you experience excessive daytime sleepiness that doesn't improve with more sleep? (d) Do you have a large neck circumference or are you overweight?

If you answered yes to two or more: discuss evaluation for sleep apnea with a physician. An overnight sleep study (polysomnography or home-based oximetry) can confirm the diagnosis. CPAP treatment for confirmed OSA substantially improves cognitive function, mood, cardiovascular risk, and daytime energy.

Part 7: The Long Game

Exercise 30.14 — The Weekly Energy Design

Design your ideal weekly energy management schedule:

(a) Map your week against your chronotype: when are your peak cognitive windows? When are your troughs?

(b) Schedule your most demanding work (analytical, strategic, high-stakes decisions) during peak windows.

(c) Schedule routine tasks, administrative work, and low-demand meetings during trough windows.

(d) Build in recovery: ultradian recovery intervals during the workday; genuine psychological detachment from work in the evenings; weekend activities that include both relaxation and mastery.

(e) Sleep scheduling: what consistent bedtime and wake time would be most aligned with your biology and constraints?

(f) Compare your designed ideal week to your actual current week. Where are the largest gaps? Which gaps are within your control?

Exercise 30.15 — The Six-Month Sleep Goal

(a) Given everything in this chapter: what is the single most impactful sleep or energy change you could make in the next six months?

(b) Write the goal as an implementation intention: "When [specific cue], I will [specific behavior] so that [desired outcome]."

(c) What are the two or three most likely obstacles to this change? For each obstacle, design a specific contingency: "If [obstacle], I will [response]."

(d) Set a six-month review date. At that review, assess: has the change been made? Has your sleep quality, daytime energy, or cognitive performance changed? What would you adjust?