In April, I hit “rock bottom” of my sleep score trend (I wear an Oura Ring). I had been traveling for 4 months. While January, my first month of travel was technically my worst sleep month, I wasn’t really recovering in a meaningful way.

I wrote “Travel Sleep Hell” to outline where I was and what I was going to try to do to get back on track. Now, I’ve been home for a month and a half and am ready for my retrospective.

Take a look at what changed, and why. A little deeper look. 

Travel Sleep Hell (and Subsequent Healing) Deep Dive

Here’s a month by month breakdown of the first 6 months of the year. The good, bad, and hideous. Skip ahead if you just want to see how I managed to rebound while hanging out in Japan, halfway across the world. 

January – I kicked off my travel. First I was in Palm Springs at a crummy hotel with no gym, then I was in San Francisco in a crummy city in a crummy hotel with no gym (OR POOL). Once in San Fran, I could no longer even walk outside due to people following me, screaming in my face, or just scaring me senseless in myriad ways.

February – I was at our Florida place the whole month. Things were improving, but still way below par. There’s no sauna at the YMCA, it’s hella outdated and doesn’t have a lot of my equipment, and Whole Foods is 45 minutes away. 

March – Blended travel and house in Lakeland, Florida. We started with a speaking gig in Miami (which is the most disruptive thing that happened in all of my travel – it took over life entirely), then back to Lakeland, then spent the rest of the month in Hollywood. I’m more familiar with Hollywood than San Fran, so I trudged around a lot. Hollywood was definitely responsible for keeping March from being a big comeback. 

April – Now we’re out of the frying pan. Hollywood destroyed me. I did manage to get a membership at LA Fitness, where I did some regular strength training and sauna time. I think it kept me alive honestly. I also did make good on my threat to hike. That was very life giving.

Later in the month, I went to Singapore, which is essentially the other side of the world. Hard to get more off kilter when it comes to time zones. BUT I did pretty well time zone wise. By this time, my biggest problems were hotel beds, no strength training, and no way to make myself the food I like to eat. 

May – I needed to do something. I went home to Nashville for just about a month. I dropped right back into my routine with a few notable exclusions – I wasn’t on top of my meditation or journaling. That got knocked so far outside of my norm that it was pretty tough to resurrect. And things did begin to improve with the reintroduction of strength training, eating right, and my absolutely glorious bed. Good thing, because I only had a few short weeks to turn the ship before heading to Japan for 30 days.

June – I was in Japan! If that’s not disruptive to a western routine, I don’t know what the heck is. But check out my rebounding sleep score. I had begun to crack the code. My sleep was better in Japan than it was at home during the month of May. 

While I didn’t really follow through on my Travel Hell game plan while in Japan, I did make adjustments. And they helped a lot. 

My Japan Routine; Return to Sleep

Here’s what I was consistent with in Japan – leading my sleep scores back up to my baseline. Not my BEST sleep, but at least not below par. 

Journaling & Meditation

I wasn’t perfect, but I really wanted to capture my experience, so I did a pretty good job of not only gratitude journaling at night, but also taking a bit of extra time to just journal thoughts / observations / feelings (in a really great onion skin Japanese notebook). This essentially facilitated meditation. It was focused, reflective, and quiet. 

Regular Bedtime

I went to bed by 9PM like clock work. There were very few exceptions, and they were usually earlier rather than later. I got into a killer rhythm. 

Rest Days

We had some grueling days stomping around Tokyo. But we did a very good job of mixing in major down time. We specifically bounced to a couple different islands and beaches for 2 or 3 days at a time after tough weeks. We picked AirBNB’s and hotels with amenities that would facilitate recovery – like saunas and soaking tubs. 

No Sauna? No Problem

We didn’t typically have a sauna available. But we did make use of the cultural norm of the “onsen” experience. We didn’t go to any public onsens because we just couldn’t imagine being naked with a bunch of strangers. But lots of places we stayed had deep, super hot, soaking tubs. I made this part of my routine. Apart from accidentally burning my whole right arm below the elbow, this worked out great. 

Nature

Tokyo didn’t have a ton of nature, but we did make a point to take routes through parks or punctuate the afternoon in a big garden. Kyoto had plenty of nature. We went there for two separate stints during the month and took peaceful walks along the river and up at Philosopher’s Path. 

Biggest Remaining Obstacles

Intermittent stress

Being in a country where you don’t speak the language creates a lot of stressful situations. Usually minor, but still there. And there pretty much every day that you’re in the world trying to interact. 

Zero strength training

Apart from making sure occasionally that I could still do a couple pull ups, I did no strength training at all. It wasn’t easy to find, and I just wasn’t motivated to do my bodyweight and band workouts. It was HARD to be motivated because we frequently walked 10+ miles in a day. That really tired my body and joints out in a big way. 

My Game Plan for Future Travel

I think to be successful, I’m going to need to commit to a few things. Once I’ve got another opportunity to travel around, I’ll let you know how it goes. 

• Scope out on day one where and how I’m going to meditate and journal
• Scope out on day one where I can workout, sauna, and get a fix of nature
• Stay someplace with a mini kitchen, or at least fridge and microwave
• Regular bedtime
• Buy or bring my favorite pillow
• Commit to strength training – even if it’s a decreased volume