The Randomness of Sleep
Have you ever thought about why sleep seems so random? For many of us, when we go to sleep, we "hope" to get a good night sleep. It's a process that seems completely out of our control, which of course it is.
Sleep is what's called an "Autonomic Function", and is just one of the many functions of our body that happen automatically and involuntarily. But as far as I can tell, it is the only autonomic function that for a significant portion of the population causes so many problems that we feel it just doesn't work for us.
For some people, our sleep is broken by regular awakenings, for others we only get short sleep. Some get not "enough" REM sleep, or not enough deep sleep. For a great many of us, when we wake up, we just don't feel rested, like we didn't have good sleep.
What other autonomic system behaves so haphazardly?
Can you imagine if your digestive system decided to vomit up 20% of your food, with no apparent reason? Or your heart-rate or breath-rate behaved erratically? You'd immediately visit your doctor, and they'd be on a search for a cure and solution as to how to get your body to operate with consistency and "properly".
Most people don't speak to their doctors about their sleep, and research suggests that even when they do, doctors are poorly equipped to help the patient.
Good sleep is much more than just being unconscious. Your mind must go through different stages of sleep for you to wake up feeling rested and ready for the day ahead. When I first started tracking my sleep with wearable devices, the apps would tell me that I didn't get enough REM sleep, or that I woke up too much during the night and was "restless".
I thought to myself ...great! now what can I do about that? How do I fix it?"
It was this realization that sleep tracking data itself did not add value, and that we needed to be able to interact with our stages of sleep, which led to the beginning of SoundMind. Neurologists had been experimenting with the effects of sound on the brain, and how sound could alter sleep states.
We've always had an innate understanding of using sound to alter our sleep.
Examining existing solutions to improve sleep, we find that they all approach sleep as a generalization of being unconscious. Sleeping pills put you to sleep, as does melatonin. Weighted blankets, meditation, warm baths, and the like are designed to calm your mind and prepare you for sleep.
Confronted with the data around needing more REM sleep, or more deep sleep, or restlessness and multiple wakings through the night, we knew that the solution needed to respond to what your mind is doing at each stage through the night.
Not only that, but we're all different. Just as there is no single diet that works for everyone, there are multiple ways to learn, no exercise regimen is right for everyone, so why do we think sleep is any different.
At SoundMind, we're working to use the latest in neuroscience to improve your Sleep Performance. We've all had those hyper-sleep experiences, where you wake up feeling amazing, often wondering where the time went. How can we re-create that experience every night. Can we make your sleep consistent, and remove the randomness of sleep?
We've seen some good results so far in our own testing and experiments, and will begin efficacy trials with our first early users in the coming weeks.
We're excited by the early results, and how the product and team are coming together.
If you're looking to improve your Sleep Performance, sign-up to the SoundMind waitlist, and be on the list to be the first to hear about our developments.
