Habits of LeBron James. Part 1 — SLEEP
This is the first article in the series called “Habits of LeBron James”.
I must confess — I am on the Team LeBron.
I admire, I respect and look up to him. And I will always side with the King in LJ>MJ debate, no matter what you tell me.
Yes, I am LBJ’s fanboy.
So when I first saw on Twitter that Tim Ferriss will possibly have LBJ and his longtime athletic trainer and recovery coach Mike Mancias on his show, I was beyond excited.
Will I finally hear the insights into LeBron’s routines and habits directly from ? Will I finally know, what makes King James the King?
Well, I’ve just finished listening to the episode and even though it was not as deep as it normally is in Tim Ferriss interviews (partly because LJ and Mike couldn’t reveal all their secrets), there were still a lot of great insights shared.
And below is a summary of one of the most important topics mentioned - sleep.
How does a sleeping routine of LeBron James look like?
When Tim asked Mancias about his thoughts on sleep and it’s importance on recovery, LeBron interrupted the answer and said:
“By the way, Tim, Mike gets on me about my sleep every day, every single day asking ‘How much sleep did you get today? Was it 8 hours, 9 hours? How much?’. Every. Single. Time.”
So clearly, Mike Mancias puts a big emphasis on getting enough sleep as the most important factor in the recovery of the body.
This is what he was able to share about his approach:
Lebron’s bedtime routine
- Optimal room temperature of 68–70 degree Fahrenheit (20–21 Celcius)
- No electronics 30–45 mins before going to sleep.
- Dark as possible by shutting all the shutters, curtains and light sources.
- Sleep apps with nice soft music or nature sounds
Optimal room temperature
Why? A consistent temperature that is not too cool or not too warm helps to fall asleep and remain asleep. We all know that feeling when we wake up too cold or too hot on some nights and it’s a nice one. Thus if you have a thermostat in your room and want to sleep like the best player in the NBA — 68–70 F (20–21C) is the temperature you want to set it on.
No electronics
Why? Because most electronics we use at night have screens. And screens emit blue light. Blue light is a potent suppressor of melatonin, which is a hormone that influences circadian rhythms. So anything that messes with melatonin will mess with us feeling sleepy or not and falling asleep. We’ve all been there — feeling really sleepy and grabbing a phone “just for a few minutes, to check what’s up” and then ending up scrolling for a half hour and not feeling sleepy anymore. Thus scrolling your phone just before bed will have a huge effect on you falling asleep and also the quality of sleep.
Dark as possible
Why? For the same reasons why electronics are not allowed, making the room really dark is important because exposure to light suppresses the secretion of melatonin. I’ve tested it myself many times — whenever I sleep in a room with really thick curtains that let it no day or nightlight, I sleep much better.
Sleeping sounds
Why? Well, this one won’t work for everybody, but there are certain calming sounds that may relax you and your racing mind. This might make falling asleep easier and put you in that Deep and REM sleep stages more often and for longer periods. LeBron uses an app called Calm, which is the most popular meditation app on the Appstore (I use it too!). Besides meditation sessions, Calm has quite a strong collection of various relaxing sounds and sleep music.
Here is LeBron’s favorite sound:
What happens when LeBron gets enough sleep?
On 5th of December LeBron has tweeted this:
and got some funny reactions about it from his teammates:
But what happened the same day was the example of what LeBron can do after sleeping for 11 hours straight:
Thus if you ever catch yourself thinking — “I don’t have time for 8 hours of sleep, I have a business to build or to run” or “I’ll catch up on sleep on the weekend” — you got to realize that while in short-term you might be accomplishing more, but in the long-term, getting enough sleep and rest will make you much more productive.
Sleep is energy. Sleep is recovery. Sleep is what keeps our brains and bodies at the tip-top shape every day. And if you want to play at the highest level, whatever you do, make sure you are getting enough sleep. It pays off.
This is the 3rd article as a result of a daily writing habit I’m building. My 3rd week was a lot slower and I skipped 3 days this week. But after successfully building 6 habits into my daily routine, I know that skipping a few days while slows down my progress, it doesn’t eliminate the work I’ve already put it. I just get back to it as soon as possible.
