The Dr. Hyman Show
How Sleep Rewires Your Brain, Balances Your Hormones & Extends Your Life | Dr. Matthew Walker
Wed, 05 Feb 2025
We all know sleep is important, but most of us don’t realize just how much it shapes our health—from metabolism and heart function to emotional well-being and even social connections. In this episode of The Dr. Hyman Show, I sit down with world-renowned sleep expert Matthew Walker, PhD, to uncover the science behind why sleep is one of the most powerful (and overlooked) tools for longevity. In this fascinating conversation, we discuss: Why Dr. Walker sees sleep as the foundation of good health and how it enhances the benefits of diet and exercise. The dramatic effects of even mild sleep deprivation on cognitive function and emotional health. How poor sleep can disrupt blood sugar regulation and increase the risk of chronic disease. The science behind deep sleep and its role in memory, learning, and brain detoxification. Simple, science-backed strategies to improve your sleep quality starting tonight. If you’ve ever struggled with sleep—or just want to optimize your health—this is an episode you won’t want to miss. View Show Notes From This Episode Get Free Weekly Health Tips from Dr. Hyman Sign Up for Dr. Hyman’s Weekly Longevity Journal This episode is brought to you by Seed, PerfectAmino, Sunlighten, and AirDoctor. Seed is offering my community 25% off to try DS-01® for themselves. Visit seed.com/hyman and use code 25HYMAN for 25% off your first month of Seed’s DS-01® Daily Synbiotic. Get pure essential amino acids today. Go to bodyhealth.com and use HYMAN20 to get 20% off your first order. Visit sunlighten.com/ and save up to $1400 on your purchase with code HYMAN. Get cleaner air. Right now, you can get up to $300 off at airdoctorpro.com/drhyman.
Chapter 1: What are the effects of sleep deprivation on social behavior?
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Chapter 2: How does sleep impact our health and longevity?
Now, take what I say with a grain of salt. I'm wearing two Oura rings right now. I know, yeah, one is sort of a next gen, and the reason why is that I'm a scientific advisor to the company. So take anything I say with a grain of salt, absolutely. So complete, and they look very much similar. So complete disclosure, and that's important.
I would say, though, that for most people, tracking your sleep can be a very worthwhile thing. And it's simply because sleep in part is a non-conscious process. I can ask you, you know, Mark, in the past week, have you been eating well or not eating well? And you can tell me, have you been exercising consistently or not? Yes, you can.
But if I then said to you, how much deep sleep did you get last Tuesday night?
Four hours and 37 minutes and 22 seconds.
I have no idea. No one has any idea unless you have the historical record of your sleep. So I think it can be very helpful. Are they accurate? You know, I only know about aura and I think it's, it's probably, I know the algorithm, um, and I've helped with that algorithm. You know, it's going to be about close to 80, maybe more percent accurate at determining wake from sleep.
And then when you split it four ways, light non-REM, deep non-REM, REM sleep or wakefulness, which are really the four states that you can be in, which is a four class algorithm. then the accuracy is about maybe 75%. And that seems to be about best in class right now. Now you may say, well, hang on a second, that doesn't sound so impressive, 75%. Think about this though.
I have about $50,000 worth of a spaghetti monster at my sleep center to get 100% accurate gold standard sleep recording. And then you can come along and within the space of some development cycles of technology, you can boil it down to a ring this size for several hundreds of dollars, and you can get 75% of the way there? That's bloody remarkable, you know?
But they're different, like, I have a Garmin watch, and I have an Oura Ring, and I wake up, and they have widely different recordings.
Different algorithm, and unfortunately, different site of location. So I think the reason that Oura, and I wasn't with the company when they first made the choice to go with a Ring, By the way, the other reason I like the company and the ring itself is because of the form factor. We don't put wristwatches on when we go to sleep or headbands or chest straps. We take things off.
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Chapter 3: What are the common misconceptions about sleep?
No, but imagine spending that to guarantee sleep for the next years. It's a small cost to pay. For sure. So I would say grab a lux meter if you want to be nerdy about it, but just get dim light. Don't have to be too nerdy. Just turn down half the lights in your house. Next thing for timing, by the way, I should go back to it.
But the light thing, did you buy this whole red light thing?
Yeah, the data there is quite strong on melatonin. However- In terms of the blue light from our devices being the catastrophic force on sleep decline that we used to think it was is probably not true. So if you're on your phone at night or if you're on your computer... Blue light is not the villain that we thought.
So you shouldn't be buying those blue blocker glasses or...
There's been a great, there's been a guy in Australia, almost pioneered this, Michael Gradazar. He started to get skeptical of this whole blue light thing. And there's been a couple of powerful studies that, yes, it definitely blocks your melatonin. Yes, it can disrupt your sleep. But what he demonstrated is that it's not the blue light itself.
It's that these devices that we use that emit blue light.
That's what we're reading on them. Yeah.
They are attention capture devices. They are hugely activating. And their sole purpose now is to capture your attention economy. And they do it ruthlessly well.
And they stimulate dopamine.
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