Sleep: Mark Zhang of Manta Sleep On Why You Should Make Getting A Good Night’s Sleep A Major Priority In Your Life, And How You Can Make That Happen

Better performance at gym/sports. If this person works out, then they will notice that being consistently sleep deprived makes them more exhausted easily. This is because the ability of the body to cool itself during physical activities through sweating is impaired by sleep loss.

Getting a good night’s sleep has so many physical, emotional, and mental benefits. Yet with all of the distractions that demand our attention, going to sleep on time and getting enough rest has become extremely elusive to many of us. Why is sleep so important and how can we make it a priority?

In this interview series called “Sleep: Why You Should Make Getting A Good Night’s Sleep A Major Priority In Your Life, And How You Can Make That Happen” we are talking to medical and wellness professionals, sleep specialists, and business leaders who sell sleep accessories to share insights from their knowledge and experience about how to make getting a good night’s sleep a priority in your life.

As part of this interview series, we had the pleasure to interview (Mark Zhang).

Mark Zhang is the CEO & founder of Manta Sleep mask, the only mask designed, constructed, and optimized for deepest-possible sleep in any environment. A leader of the Pro-Nap Movement, Mark educates others on why an afternoon nap is crucial for unlocking one’s full potential, tips to improve sleep quality, why a great night’s sleep is vital for business leaders, and much more. www.mantasleep.com

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to ‘get to know you’. Can you tell us a bit about your background and your backstory?

Before Manta Sleep, I was working on a few other eCommerce brands. And before that, I was an accountant. When I was in school, the plan was always to get my accounting designation and go down the corporate career path. However, in my early twenties, a close childhood friend passed away from cancer, which obviously shook me. It made me realize that life is so precious and short, and that I shouldn’t wait to take risks and pursue my dreams. So I quit my job and started on the entrepreneurial journey.

Can you share a story with us about what brought you to this particular career path?

I’ve been a light sleeper for as long as I could remember, and I started using a sleep mask when I was 15 years old. The problem with generic sleep masks is that they are either uncomfortable, don’t block out the light, or fall apart after three months. And I always thought we could build a better product, so my business partner and I started Manta Sleep, launching our sleep mask by crowdfunding via Kickstarter and Indiegogo — we ended up raising $700,000+ to start the company!

Another part of the inspiration is… I’ve always felt that as a light sleeper, if somehow I was able to improve the quality of my sleep, I’d be the king of the world. I experienced a lot of frustration from not being able to sleep well and then waking up tired, and then not having enough energy and concentration to pursue my goals in life. So a central focus of Manta Sleep is to empower light sleepers to sleep better so they can do more in life. They will be able to pursue their goals and live a better life.

Can you share with our readers a bit about why you are an authority in the sleep and wellness fields? In your opinion, what is your unique contribution to the world of wellness?

I am the CEO & founder of Manta Sleep mask, the only mask designed, constructed, and optimized for deepest-possible sleep in any environment. Manta Sleep masks provide 100% blackout for maximized sleep quality — so users feel 100%, all the time. Just a pinprick of light can disrupt REM and deep sleep, leading to post-sleep tiredness. That’s why Manta perfectly covers and conforms to the eyes to block 100% of light, even in broad daylight — so users always get deep, uninterrupted sleep.

Manta Sleep Mask offers a personalized-for-your-face fit — your eye covers’ position, angle and strap tightness are infinitely adjustable for a fit so seamless, you barely feel your mask on your face. It’s like it was custom made for you. Every detail is engineered for unmatched comfort, in any position. Manta is designed for no-compromises comfort and constructed with super soft, breathable, durable materials that gently conform to your face without putting any pressure on your eyelids or lashes. So you snooze soundly whether you’re on your back, side or stomach.

A huge part of Manta Sleep’s mission is our Pro-Nap Movement, which is all about rejecting counterproductive, nap-shaming corporate BS — we want to create a community that incites empowerment and change in our corporations and communities. It’s about reclaiming what should have always been yours in the first place: your vitality. We believe that great sleep is the non-negotiable foundation you need to create your best life. It’s impossible to unlock your full potential if you’re not getting an afternoon nap every day.

Thus, everything we do at Manta Sleep is fueled by our drive to enable better lives through better sleep and regular naps. We believe that napping at work should be celebrated, not condemned. And we believe naps beat coffee, because our bodies are wired to nap. Naps give you energy, focus, strength and clarity that you don’t get when you grind through the afternoon. That said, daily naps have been baked into Manta Sleep’s culture since day one. We hope other business leaders follow our lead and take daily naps, as it will help them maximize their potential and bring their companies to new levels of success.

We are anti-hustle culture. Working long hours and ‘hustling’ is absolutely idiotic, because nobody can make great decisions working 12 hours a day. At that point, you’re just a walking zombie working on low-value tasks and pretending like you are actually doing something important. You are pretending like you are actually making it work and ‘succeeding’, when in fact, you’re just using mindless work as an excuse to make yourself feel better. In order to live a good life, a happy life, there are several pillars in our lives that we need to make sure to take care of: Health, Wealth, Family, and Friends. When these go out of sync, life sucks. You basically have to keep it balanced in order to live a good life.

Is there a particular book that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

I recommend reading A Guide to the Good Life, by William B. Irvine. It translates stoicism in a way that can be understood by the modern man. I’m a huge fan of stoicism, as it’s actionable and can be used to improve the quality of our lives in a short amount of time. At the end of the day, even if I were flipping burgers at McDonalds, the quality of my life (access to technology, medicine, food) is probably 100x better than the lives of kings and queens just 300 years ago. There is a lot to appreciate, and this book gives a framework on how to be happy.

Do you have a favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Do you have a story about how that was relevant in your life or your work?

My favorite quote is:

‘Success isn’t always about greatness. It’s about consistency. Consistent hard work leads to success. Greatness will come.’ — Dwayne Johnson

This quote continually inspires me to work hard to accomplish all of my projects that will help grow my business success.

Ok, thank you for all that. Now let’s move to the main focus of our interview. Let’s start with the basics. How much sleep should an adult get? Is there a difference between people who are young, middle-aged, or elderly?

It depends… adults typically need anywhere between 7–9 hours. Babies need about 11 to 14 hours of sleep. Teenagers need about 8 to 10 hours, and the ederly need about 7 to 8 hours of sleep.

But it all depends, because the quality of your sleep matters too in how well rested you feel. The best way to find out for yourself is to experiment during the weekend. Don’t drink any coffee after about noon and turn off your electronic devices before 8 p.m. Go to bed when you feel sleepy and see how long you sleep and wake up naturally.

Is the amount of hours the main criteria, or the time that you go to bed? For example, if there was a hypothetical choice between getting to bed at 10AM and getting up at 4AM, for a total of 6 hours, or going to bed at 2AM and getting up at 10AM for a total of 8 hours, is one a better choice for your health? Can you explain?

Again, it depends. The amount of time you sleep, the quality of your sleep, and the time you go to bed all will have an impact on how you feel the next day, depending on a couple of variables.

So, it’s not JUST based on the absolute duration of time you sleep (or try to, at least).

First, it’s your sleep chronotype, which basically is a fancy way of saying your ‘natural sleep type.’ For example, morning larks’ peak wakefulness is early in the day, and sleepiness comes early at night. So for these people, going to bed at 10 p.m. and waking up at 4 a.m. would be better.

On the other hand, night owls usually go to bed late and wake up late the next morning, so they would probably end up feeling better by sleeping at 2 a.m. and waking up at 10 a.m.

Another factor to consider is consistency. It’s better to always sleep around the same time, rather than jumping around. That’s why I always recommend going to bed around the same time, even during the weekends.

The reason is because your circadian rhythm, or your ‘internal body clock’, takes time to adjust. If you went to bed one night at 10 p.m. and another at 2 a.m., your clock gets confused and you’ll be sleeping poorly for several nights as your body tries to adapt.

One final factor to consider is natural light. We’re biologically wired to wake up with sunlight. For the person going to bed at 10 p.m. and waking up at 4 a.m., this is not really a problem. But if you’re going to bed at 2 a.m. and waking up at 10 a.m., make sure to have good blackout curtains and a sleep mask, because your sleep quality will nosedive if sunlight comes through your window around 7 a.m.

In that case, you’re really sleeping well for five hours, from 2 a.m. to 7 a.m. before the sun disrupts your sleep.

As an expert, this might be obvious to you, but I think it would be instructive to articulate this for our readers. Let’s imagine a hypothetical 35 year old adult who was not getting enough sleep. After working diligently at it for 6 months he or she began to sleep well and got the requisite hours of sleep. How will this person’s life improve? Can you help articulate some of the benefits this person will see after starting to get enough sleep? Can you explain?

1. Better performance at gym/sports. If this person works out, then they will notice that being consistently sleep deprived makes them more exhausted easily. This is because the ability of the body to cool itself during physical activities through sweating is impaired by sleep loss. Better sleep also helps accelerate physical recovery from inflammation, helps with muscle repair, and aids the restock of cellular energy in the form of glycogen and glucose.

2. Better problem-solving skills, focus, and creativity. Creativity and efficiency are just some of the things that suffer when you don’t get enough sleep. Sleep-deprived people often underestimate their degree of performance disability, which is why poor performance at work and drowsy driving accidents happen. When you get enough sleep, you will notice that you begin to think more clearly and see connections between things that you’ve never noticed before. This is because sleep (especially REM sleep) allows your brain to move beyond learning and truly grasp comprehension. REM sleep helps connect your different memories, experiences, and skills to create new insights.

3. Thinking more rationally. This person may also notice that they are able to think more rationally and less emotionally now that they are getting better sleep. Many emotional problems occur because of sleep deprivation. With sufficient sleep, our prefrontal cortex (which is associated with rational thought and decision making) is strongly coupled to our amygdala (which is involved in the experiencing of emotions). Without sleep, the strong connection between the amygdala and prefrontal cortex is lost, which makes us react more emotionally.

4. Improved immune system. Another thing is if you don’t get enough sleep, you will have an overactive sympathetic nervous system (responsible for our fight-or-flight state). This triggers an increase in our stress-hormone (cortisol) and this puts a strain on our body, which causes all types of health issues (imagine an overworked car engine). Our immune system needs sleep to fight off diseases and ward off infections. With enough sleep, you may notice that you feel more energized and you don’t get sick as often as when you’re not getting enough sleep.

Many things provide benefits but they aren’t necessarily a priority. Should we make getting a good night’s sleep a major priority in our life? Can you explain what you mean?

Yes, we absolutely should make it a major priority. I believe great sleep is the non-negotiable foundation you need to create your best life. For too long, western work culture has treated sleep as something that’s lazy, weak, and a waste of time. This could not be further from the truth. Great sleep powers everything else in life.

The truth is that most of us know that it’s important to get better sleep. But while we know it intellectually, it’s often difficult to put it into practice and make it a part of our daily habits. In your opinion what are the 3 main blockages that prevent us from taking the information that we all know, and integrating it into our lives? How should we remove those obstacles?

I would say the three main blockages are: culture, habits, and education.

Culture

In the West at least, prioritizing sleep, naps, and rest is often seen as something that’s lazy, weak, and a waste of time. ‘Hustling’ often gets taken out of context and gloried by famous figures like Elon Musk, who apparently only sleeps 4–5 hours a night. The truth is, hustle culture is idoitic and a form of laziness. When we are working non-stop, it gives us a nice little narrative we can tell ourselves when we don’t succeed. ‘Hey, at least I’m working hard and trying.’

But the reality is, we are only able to do truly great work when we are well rested. We are only able to produce work that actually matters when we take care of our health by getting enough sleep. A big part of Manta Sleep’s mission to spearhead the Pro-Nap Movement is to change this cultural view of sleep.

Habits

Once you get into a habit of great sleep hygiene, you tend to stick with it. The hard part is forming that new habit. I would recommend the book, The Power of Habit, by Charles Duhigg, as a starting point.

Education

When was the last time school taught sleep hygiene to kids? Never. In fact, schools are actively working against proper sleep. Teenagers are biologically wired to sleep late and wake up late compared to adults, but school starts quite early. Early start times result in chronic sleep deprivation in teenagers, but instead of changing the school hours like the sensible thing to do, we just tell kids ‘to sleep earlier’. It doesn’t work like that. We teach sex and physical education in schools, so why not offer sleep education too? Especially because it is the foundation of everything good that happens in life.

Do you think getting “good sleep” is more difficult today than it was in the past?

It is absolutely more difficult today, because of all the distractions we have. This includes the computer, TV, smartphones, and fluorescent lights.

These things not only keep us up longer, but also they emit blue light that disrupts melatonin production.

Ok. Here is the main question of our discussion. Can you please share “5 things you need to know to get the sleep you need and wake up refreshed and energized”? If you can, kindly share a story or example for each.

1. Start the day by getting sunlight exposure. This helps to set your circadian rhythm and helps you feel sleepy when night comes.

2. Don’t drink coffee after midday. Coffee has a half life of about five hours, so you want to give your body plenty of time to flush out the caffeine before bed time.

3. Get your room temperature to roughly 17–19 degrees Celsius. This is the ideal sleeping temperature. Having a hot room is one of the most common reasons why people don’t sleep well.

4. Don’t drink alcohol if you want amazing sleep quality. When you drink, it may help you fall asleep faster, but the quality of your sleep is severely impacted because alcohol creates an imbalance between slow-wave sleep and REM sleep.

5. Take a warm bath before going to bed. When you take a warm bath, your blood vessels open up, so once you get out of the shower, your core body temperature drops. This helps you to fall asleep faster.

What would you advise someone who wakes up in the middle of the night and can’t fall back to sleep?

Don’t force yourself to go back to sleep. If you can’t go back to sleep after lying in bed for 20 minutes, get up and do some relaxing activities (i.e. reading, light exercise, etc.) until you feel sleepy again. Forcing yourself to sleep when you’re not feeling it will just stress you out and the anxiety caused by not being able to go back to sleep will just make it harder for you to fall asleep again.

Also, make your room as clutter-free as possible. Remove all things that may cause your mind to overwork. For example, seeing the time on the clock may make you feel more stressed out, especially if you keep counting how many hours you have left before you need to wake up. TV/DVDs and abstract paintings may also cause your mind to wander and overthink.

What are your thoughts about taking a nap during the day? Is that a good idea, or can it affect the ability to sleep well at night?

At Manta Sleep, we believe you can’t unlock your full potential unless you take an afternoon nap every day after lunch. That’s how important napping is. We are hardwired to do it and a quick 30-minute power nap can increase alertness and creativity. It’s like having a second morning in the afternoon in terms of productivity. As long as you don’t take multiple pro-longed naps throughout the day, your ability to sleep well at night will not be affected.

Wonderful. We are nearly done. Is there a person in the world, or in the US, with whom you would like to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this, especially if we tag them. :-)

I’d like to have a private lunch with Tim Ferriss. I admire the man, and his book, The 4 Hour Work Week, was one of the inspirations for me to start a business early on in my twenties.

How can our readers further follow your work online?

You can find me at mantasleep.com and at the below social media channels:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/markxzhang

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mantasleep/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/mantasleep

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mantasleep/

Thank you!

This was very meaningful, thank you so much. We wish you only continued success on your great work!