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3 Golden Rules to help you Sleep and Reduce Stress

By Johanna Leave a Comment

3 Rules for good SleepIn a survey conducted by the Huffington Post people were asked what their #1 stressor was. Lack of sleep was one thing that dominated the results.

Without a doubt, there is a direct correlation between how much sleep you get, how stressed you are and how well you function throughout the day.

People who don’t get enough sleep tend to be lethargic and experience energy slumps throughout the day. Lack of sleep also tends to cause irritability, which makes it hard to fall asleep later on. It’s a vicious cycle that can cause mental distress and even wreak havoc on your physical well-being.

The reverse is also true. When you experience an exorbitant amount of stress during the day, it causes you to lay awake thinking, which leads to more stress through the coming day.

Stress and lack of sleep combined can cause you to lose mental clarity and they can put more pressure on your body to perform at less than optimal rates.

So it’s vital that you learn how to implement stress relief measures that also work to lull you to sleep at night. Because when you wake up well rested and refreshed, you’ll be able to tackle the world and anything it throws at you!

 

Rule 1: Institute a Bedtime Technology Ban

Remove TVs, laptops, iPads, cell phones and any other digital devices from your bedroom. It sounds simple but for many of you this won’t be so easy to do.

If you want to toss and turn, have trouble getting to sleep or want to stay awake, just keep your cell phone or iPad right by your bed. For some of you, that won’t be a problem – but for many people, it’s become an addiction that disrupts their sleep routine and causes a lack of sleep.

Some people have their computer right beside the bed and the glow of it lights up the room at night. The same applies to notifications sent to your cell phone, sometimes with lights and sometimes with the inclusion of sounds.

The physical distraction of the computer glow tricks your body into thinking it’s time for you to be awake. Consequently your body won’t produce the melatonin it needs and help you get (and stay) asleep.

It’s not enough to remove technology from the bedroom – it needs to be shut down one to two hours before you go to bed. Your mind needs time to disconnect and wind down, and it can’t do that if you’re constantly feeding it information.

If you go to bed at 10 PM, try disconnecting around 8:30 PMM. Let your stress melt away and your mind relax. I know, this is not an easy habit to break, but you can implement it. Start with baby steps and experience for yourself  just how much better you’ll sleep.

 

Rule 2: Make Aromatherapy part of your Bedtime Routine

Aromatherapy soothes mind and body and scents are powerful elements in our lives. You can put aromatherapy to work and use it to help you feel more rested.

Start off by choosing calming scents helping you unwind, let go of anxiety the day brought and getting good sleep. You don’t want anything invigorating scents for bedtime – like peppermint. That’s a scent that’s perfect to help you start your day – not end it.

You want to look for scents that soothe and relax. Here are some possibilities:

* Bergamot

* Chamomile

* Jasmine

* Lavender

What’s the best way to use these to unwind and get better sleep? There are many choices, find one that works and helps you fall to sleep.

You can find scented bath products (if you enjoy a bath before bed). You can use candles, diffusers, wall plugins and more. Some people like to create or buy a special mist that they can spray on their pillows at night or put on their wrists.

Last but not least, create and follow a bed time routine.

Our bodies are built for routine. But if you constantly change things up, leading to a disruption in your sleep pattern, it may lead to insomnia or other sleep problems over time.

Follow your night time routine as closely as you can and you will be rewarded with better sleep.

 

Rule 3: Look at what you Eat and help yourself Sleep!

The food you eat affects everything you do … and sleep certainly is no exception!

Foods are one area where what you eat can benefit or damage both your sleep and stress levels. If you want to alleviate stress and get better sleep, limit or better yet eliminate alcohol and caffeine before going to bed.

While alcohol initially seems to relax, allowing you to distress, it can lead to signs of heat in the body. Heat causes most of us to feel irritated and agitated, hence disrupting our sleep.

So stay away from alcohol and caffeine late at night, just before bedtime.

Even though for many people alcohol may not cause any problems whatsoever, if you have a tendency to problems with sleep, alcohol consumption will make your problem worse.

What you want to do is eat foods that will help you with sleep and handling stress. That means eating good protein like turkey or lean chicken, salmon, avocadoes, nuts like almonds or walnuts, and apricots (which soothe your muscles). In general, choose and follow a well balanced diet.

In addition to quality foods, eating regular meals is important as well. You want your blood sugar levels stable so that you don’t have to deal with mood swings and energy highs and lows throughout the day.

And one more thing, don’t eat too late at night.

Depending on your schedule and daily routine, take your evening meal between 5 and 7PM, but no later than 8PM. Not only will you avoid the “bulge”, you’ll also avoid disruption in your sleep because your stomach is too full and you’re still digesting.

Have a good night!

Filed Under: Wiser Body Tagged With: Brain Health, Insomnia

How Are Your Money Management Skills?

By Johanna Leave a Comment

Your Money Management SkillsI hope you and I score far better than our government!

It’s common knowledge that the United States of America has an amazing amount of national debt – no surprise there. But do you realize just how much debt we as a nation have? Check out the website for one of the many debt clocks –  National Debt Clocks .

Frightened yet? I am! The dollar amounts listed on this page are staggering. Truth be told, I don’t even know how to count to these levels!

Will we ever be able to correct this situation? Will we ever be able to catch up with the overwhelming amounts of interest payments alone? Or will we simply leave this nightmare for our children and grand children?

The United States government, our government, has some serious problems with managing money, debt and credit! Could there be a correlation between the countless numbers of American citizens with credit problems and our government?

Obviously, both camps are overspending: too much money going out and not enough money coming in. When you think about it, it’s really a rather simple calculation!

Live within your means. Spend less than you earn, or, figure out how to increase your income so that you can spend all that you like. Either route will work – it’s entirely up to you!

 

Filed Under: Wiser Money Tagged With: Good to know, Money

What makes an Investment?

By Johanna Leave a Comment

Golden Egg InvestmentIt might seem a silly question, but let’s take a look anyway.

At the most basic level, an investment is anything you can put your money into and (hopefully) get a return or a profit back. Based on that definition, many things may qualify: a business, stocks, precious metals, raw land, real estate, bonds, futures, notes, etc. … and the list goes on.

There are many classes of investments and many categories of investments within these investment classes.

Let’s take real estate for example. There is residential real estate, commercial real estate, medical use, raw land, multifamily units, etc. Those are some of the different types of real estate investments you could put your hard earned dollars into!

One thing might cross your mind just about now:  the huge number of dollars it must take to get into some of those investments, right?

No question, it does take some money to get started, but it really depends on the type of investment as to how much you need to get going. Obviously, some investments are much more cash intense than others.

For example, it may take a lot more money to invest in an apartment building as compared to buying a single family home, a duplex or even investing in a few shares of stock.

So is investing in stock then be a bit more straightforward and takes less cash?

Well it’s a bit tricky to make this broad statement across the board. Depending on the type of stock and the value of each share, the amount of money it takes to get started would vary greatly.

There are literally 1000s of stocks to choose from. While there are many different types of stocks, they can be grouped into a few broad categories. These include income, growth, blue chips, small cap, mid cap, large cap and cyclical stocks (the most basic and general categories).

  • Income stocks are simply stocks that produce and distribute income to the investor. This income is typically distributed in the form of dividends and is taxable.
  • Growth stocks are those that have enjoyed a greater rate of growth compared to other companies in the category. Most of those companies produce broadly accepted and consumed products (Coca Cola is a classic growth stock). Companies in this category may or may not pay dividends.
  • Blue chip stocks represent the big players in the markets. These are well known companies with enormous market value. The Dow Jones Industrial, a major market index, tracks 30 of those large, blue chip stocks.
  • The term Cap refers primarily to the size of the underlying company or to a company’s market capitalization. In other words, the size of a company can be measured by taking the total number of stocks issued by that company and multiplying it by the share price. The resulting number will tell you if the company is a small cap (market capitalization less than $500 million), a mid cap ($500 to $1billion) or a large cap stock ($1billion +) company.
  •  Putting your dollars in small cap stock might be riskier than investing it in large cap stocks. And yes, there was a reason for talking about it all!
  • The last group, cyclical stocks, includes issues that can be expected to go up and down in value, in line with business cycles. These companies typically do great when the economy is growing and perform at a lesser rate, when the economy is contracting.

This was a very brief introduction to two commonly available investments; more to follow later!

The amount of money you need to get started with any kind of investment largely depends on the type of investment  considered, your tolerance for risk, your objectives and your overall financial situation.   I strongly believe that the more you learn and the more you know, the greater will be the investment choices open to you.

Filed Under: Wiser Money Tagged With: Investing, Money

How to pay less Interest on those Credit Cards

By Johanna Leave a Comment

Reduce Credit Card CostsHot of the Press! Yes, it is true, there is a way to get lower credit card interest, a way so stunningly simple, so startlingly brilliant, it’s no wonder the financial wizards didn’t think of it sooner.

So lean in close and listen up, because this stellar method for getting lower credit card interest will knock your socks off. Are you ready? Here it is: Ask! 

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Wiser Money Tagged With: Money

What To Do With All The Paper?

By Johanna Leave a Comment

Overwhelmed!Feeling overwhelmed at times by all the paper in your life? Loan documents, social security documents, health documents, mortgage documents, real estate purchase documents, bank statements, credit card statements, investment records, wills and power of attorney, purchase records, business records, birth certificates, passports, military records, marriage and/or divorce papers, and the list goes on. Oh yes, let us not forget all our tax documents!

The question remains what to do with all these documents: where to store them, how to organize them, and lastly how long to keep them. Well, here are a few suggestions.

First of all, gather all your documents and divide them into groups similar to those outlined below.

 

1. Originals that you must keep but rarely access.

This group might include military records, marriage/divorce certificate, older educational records, citizen ship documents, various legal documents, etc.

What goes into this group, of course, will vary from person to person. Important here is that you pull out all the documents your rarely need, nonetheless must keep forever, and put them into a safe place.  You might consider renting a safe deposit box at your bank or some other  institution.

 

2. Next are the documents you do access from time to time and must keep.

Hence you might want to keep them a bit closer at hand. Examples of documents in this group include medical directives, health documents, wills, power of attorney papers, etc. In all likeness you will keep most of those documents forever as well. Consider investing and storing those documents in a fire resistant home safe instead of a filing cabinet. This should greatly contribute to their safe keeping.

 

3. Documents you need to access and keep for a certain amount of time.

Investment and Retirement documents form the bulk of this group. Included are your standard 401k/IRA/Retirement documents, other investment account statements, insurance documents, loan documents, real estate related documents (purchase, improvements, sales, etc.). Storing these documents in a filing cabinet at home would be adequate, twice since you access many of those documents on a more frequent basis. The length of time you keep the above documents varies. Most real estate and investment document needs to be retained for at least 7 years after the investment or real property has been sold. When in doubt, check with your tax professional.

 

4. Documents you don’t need to access but need to keep for a certain amount of time – Tax Documents.

Now this can grow into a rather large group. Here we are talking about anything and all that is and has been used as supporting document with your tax returns. Make sure all documents in this group are properly organized and stored in a locking file cabinet.

Most tax documents need to be retained somewhere between three to seven years. But again, check with your tax professional! Retention requirements can vary depending on filing dates and a number of other special situations.

Having organized and stored your important papers in a safe place will ultimately make your life easier in addition to giving you peace of mind!

 

Filed Under: Wiser Living Tagged With: Good to know

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