Align with Your Body Clock to Reduce Inflammation + Boost Health

Introduction to Circadian Health 0:00

We are microbial beings living in an anti-microbial world. And that was such a mic drop statement to me, because I was like, you're right. Every airport I go to, every bathroom, it's anti-microbial soap, anti-microbial cleaners, all those things. And so you're right, you just highlighted something so important. We are circadian beings living in an anti-circadian world. The world is teaching us you should hustle. You should have your entire business day done in the morning. Who needs self-care? I keep seeing that message online now.

You should hustle all day and then pick up a second shift and then a third shift. If you're not hustling and building a side hustle, what are you even doing with yourself? You should be wanting this everlasting, never-ending success that you have the capacity to build. And whenever I see that, I'm like, yeah, and you're going to build chronic disease alongside, and then you're going to be stuck having to reverse that chronic disease. Hello, welcome back to the Integrative Health Podcast with Dr.

Jenn. Today we are going to talk about circadian rhythm. This will be so fun and such a good topic because we all are basically bad at it. Today we're going to be talking to Dr. Shivani Gupta. She's an aerobic practitioner and tumor researcher. She helps women reduce inflammation, balance hormones, and boost energy with elemental design, mental inflammation tools, and gut-forward routines. She has a new book, The Inflammation Code, and that is coming out in February of 2026. And this book offers a clear non-diet plan for cooling chronic inflammation.

She hosts the Fusionary Health podcast and created the Emmy nominated TV show, Vibrant Health with Dr. Shivani Gupta. And you can find more information at her website for that. So we're so excited to have you today and I love seeing you in person and now we get to do a fun Zoom podcast together. Love it. For sure. Thanks for having me. Yes, yes. So are you freaking out about your book coming out? Are you super excited about that? Or you're staying cool and collected? You know, I'm excited. It's finally here.

A book is something you work on for way longer than I realize. You write it. Then you kind of angst about it. You edit it. It goes back and forth. And so now that it's done and sealed and it's going to go out in the world, I'm simultaneously really nervous. I'm like, what if everyone thinks it's dumb? What if no one wants to read it? And then I'm like, no, this book is what we all need right now. We know as women, we need it right now. And so I'm just excited for everyone to either listen to it or read it and get to start applying Ayurvedic wisdom to their life.

Like that's my whole life dream is for us to all use this wisdom. Yeah, that's exciting. And I know how you feel. It's like, because you keep like tweaking out the books and you're just like, oh my goodness, just like you have to stop.

Why Circadian Rhythm Matters 2:53

You have to just be like, I can't look at this anymore. And I need to like get my audio book out there. And I'm like, do I really want to read through it? What if I don't like something that ended up in there? No, but I prayed about it. It's done. It's out there. So it's good. So as you read it, you want to edit it again. It's so crazy. And you can't. You're blocked. Nope. Nope. Done deal. So yeah, it's a lot easier to, I guess, create a reel on Instagram or even record a podcast. You can always delete it.

But it's also great because, you know, things can change as science changes and stuff. And we can always, you know, add things or update. But anyway, it's great. We all need more help with inflammation and we all have inflammation. That's what creates disease. So I'm really excited to talk about circadian living because if our circadian rhythm is off, we are going to have more inflammation. So why is circadian rhythm like important to you? So in ancient Ayurveda, in this incredible system of health, healing, and medicine from India, Ayurveda talked about how the circadian clock and our circadian rhythm is the key to having vibrant health.

And the goal of Ayurveda is to bring body, mind, and spirit into alignment so we can have those levels of joy and vibrant health that we all deserve to have. And so when I started to understand that what Ayurveda is trying to say is, we are meant to be in rhythm with nature. Nature has its own rhythm. And if we're going to swim upstream against the currents of life, we're always going to feel like we're battling with our health, with our body, with our mind, with everything. Versus, we could just flow downstream with the river of life.

Things are easier. There's less dis-ease. Life is just running more smoothly. There's more ease and flow. And so for all of us who are like, gosh, I'm struggling so hard, battling, I'm doing all the good things for my health, I'm pushing up the hill. What if instead we turned around and made it easier? And to me, circadian rhythm is that key that unlocks that code of health that we all deserve. And so to me, it's when do you sleep? When do you eat? What times of day are you eating? How are you eating?

There's a lot of different nuances there. And one thing that's really cool is in ancient Ayurveda, we talked about the elements and how we're all made up of the five elements. And so I took those five elements that we typically break up into air ether, fire water, and then earth and water that we historically called the Doshas. and I renamed it Elemental Design. And I took that idea of we are all elemental designs and then showed people how you can apply that to your circadian rhythm. So for example, I'm all fire.

That's my personality. That's my nature. I'm a fiery person, really passionate. When I'm passionate about something, I'm really into it. People think I'm nuts, but I'm like the turmeric girl and the inflammation girl and all these things. But when you take that fire and understand how to leverage it against your circadian clock, all of a sudden you can have a whole different outcome. I know what times of day I'm on fire and most productive. I also know what times of day I have to rest or sleep so I can win an inflammation.

So we can keep going, but there's a lot of depth into circadian that we can get into. Yeah, like how do we know we're misaligned in our circadian rhythm? Like how is that going to show up for someone? So a lot of times we're waking up in the morning and we're already tired. How many times have you woken up and you're exhausted, you're dreading waking up, you hit the snooze button five times, as you put your feet on the ground all of a sudden you're like I can't even put my weight on my feet. I'm stiff, I'm achy, I don't feel great.

That feeling is one big sign that you are misaligned with your circadian rhythm, because you're already waking up inflamed, you're already waking up behind the eight ball. And one big pillar out of circadian rhythm is sleep. And how we sleep and the quality of that sleep and is that sleep truly going to help us clear inflammation, clear the lymphatic system, help us win at rejuvenating and truly healing the body? When we sleep is when we heal.

Signs of Circadian Misalignment 7:03

And many of us are skipping sleep, disregarding sleep, bypassing sleep, even pushing sleep because we have to. Oftentimes there's work, there's kids, there's responsibilities, there's travel, there's life. But where can we make up for that sleep elsewhere and get that sleep? Or where can we build sleep hygiene habits to try to have really good habits? And so IRV that says 10 to 2 on the circadian clock is the most important time of day to get the sleep that heals the body. It's when we clear the glymphatic system.

It's when we clear the lymphatic system. And what's cool is modern science is proving all this to be true. Ayurveda said you must sleep by 10 because 10 to 2 is bit the time of day. It's when the fires come out to clear everything away for you. And so a simple habit would be get your bedtime as close to 10 as you can. Yeah, I think that's important because that 10 to 12 too is when we have release of growth hormone and there's a lot of things obviously that happen but yeah staying up late is not good for anyone.

I have started to be really intentional about going to bed like with my kids and I just don't watch any TV at all and I just try to get to bed and read in bed so this is important. It's also crazy I think how many women midlife they try to get their workout like fit in their workout before you know getting the kids ready for school and they're waking up at like four or five a.m. and I'm like I think that they shouldn't even have gym classes that early in the morning because that is just not that's they're getting up when it's still dark out so how how would that disrupt their circadian rhythm?

Yeah, I mean, I totally understand wanting to get the workout in. I used to do like a 6 a.m. workout some days because it felt like the only time I had available. The problem is when we're sacrificing sleep for anything, whether it's the workout or anything, we're going to end up more inflamed, more fatigued, the body didn't heal enough. That sleep quality and sleep length is very important for our brain health, for our energy, for our cellular health. So it's almost like you're going to wake up early, cut sleep to go wear and tear the body for your health, but the sleep was equally important.

And so that's where I find it tough sometimes if you are trying to sacrifice sleep. I have friends right now who said, yeah, I was waking up at five every day for the workout, but then I was so tired and then I was eating more all day because I was tired. And I said, do you see how this is not working? We have to sacrifice somewhere else. And so it's just about adjusting that day where you can. Now, you talk about three anchors of the day. Can you talk about those and how they can help our metabolism?

Absolutely. So when we talk about the circadian clock, it's all about breaking up our day into different pies and different slices of the day. In Ayurveda, in elemental design, we talk about vata, pitta, and kapha. And here in the West, you can pronounce that vata, pitta, and kapha. Those are three types of elemental forces. Vata is air ether, pitta is fire with some water, and kapha is earth water. But what it represents is what we're meant to do in those periods of the day. And so when we start the day, that first time slot, six to 10, is actually guffa time of day.

It's a slower time of day. It's earth energy. We're still rising. We're still starting up. And so in that time, it's actually a good time to work out between that six to 10 slot. Get your energy moving. Your focus is the best. You can really kind of sit and drill into what you need to get done. Then we teach that 10 to 2 is that fiery time of day. That's your time of day when, again, you're productive, you're focused, you can leverage it towards your work. But also, the biggest meal of the day should happen at that time.

And that's a big anchor point in Ayurveda. A lot of us have a huge dinner at the end of our day, and then that affects our sleep quality because our body, instead of clearing inflammation, is trying just to clear that last meal that we put in there. And so Ayurveda says instead have a bigger lunch, make that one nutrient dense. Don't just do this like salad and chicken idea. Really eat a meal that's hearty and has nutritional benefits because your digestive fire is going to support you to absorb that nutrition the best.

So that's a big tip out of Ayurveda. We also say don't pour ice water on the fire. So when you go to a restaurant, say no to the ice water, iced tea, all those ideas. It's going to turn off the digestive fire. Yeah, I always, I'm like, no, just no ice with water.

Three Daily Anchors for Metabolism 11:29

I mean, sometimes I do want ice in like my electrolytes and stuff, but for me, water, my kids don't like that. And I try to explain, I'm like, it affects digestion. And a lot of those ice machines at restaurants are like moldies. True. Which, oh, let's not bring up mold around you right now though, right? I'm thinking remediation today. I would like rip it all out. Let's go. Bless your heart. Because I mean, this is like, for those of you that don't know, and I think this is good to get personal with you.

Savani is having this whole mold issue at the home in the midst of the book launch. And like, yeah, so. It's a journey. It is. But think about what you're going through. Hey, it might be your next book, right? The mold code. There you go. It got a story. I don't want it mold. Yes. Oh, yes. I'm going to go to mold remediation class. Like I said, I'm a bit that when I get into a topic, I'm into it. I want to understand how to prevent this in all homes in America, here on out. Like this should not be something we all have to suffer from.

So once I suffer with something, I want to find the solution and then I want no one to ever have to pay that price. That's like my- It is devastating. It's so funny because my kids, they know how crazy I am about mold just because I see so many patients with mold, especially in Northwest Ohio. It was crazy because it used to be a swamp. And they're looking up at ceilings, they're like, oh, there's probably mold here. And I'm like, shh, tell me later, don't scream it. But it's funny, they'll go to a hotel room and they'll be like, there's mold in the bathroom.

I'm like, OK, when we go to a hotel, we know that there's probably going to be mold and we just have to deal with it. And sometimes I'll bring a little air scrubber with us. But when we're well, yes, it's totally backwards how we do things like we eat, you know, a large dinner and then we not only eat a large dinner, we eat a large dinner after the sun goes down. So that's another like anchor probably is sunset and what we do then. Exactly. So we got to 10 to 2 on the clock, biggest meal of the day, end of pretty much our most focused brain productivity.

Then when you enter 2 to 6, we're entering what we call the Vata or Vata time of day again, air and ether. So that's why you find yourself so unfocused. Like for me, I have lunch and at 2, all of a sudden my brain has checked out and I'm like, great, I have the rest of my workday, but zero focus. And so at that time, can you have a list of things to do that are easy, tasks that are easy to do to get finished? For me, I always have an alarm ring on my phone at 3.30 that says high tea and snacks. And that's my reminder to eat a snack that's grounding to support myself to have a smaller dinner.

I have that high tea. For me, my afternoon tea is like my sacred time to check in with myself. I teach Tea Time is Me time just to give ourselves an anchor point throughout the day where we pause and take a moment and check in with ourselves and even ask ourselves, how am I doing today? What do I need to change to make today better? What do I need to change this week to make this week better? And that one habit that I do is actually a circadian anchor point for me, because I'll have a cup of tea in the morning, I'll have a mid-morning, I'll have my high tea afternoon, an evening tea, and then a bedtime tea.

And each time I'm kind of checking in with where I am in the day, And what do I need to do to feel well? Because a lot of times we can just be running through the day, and by afternoon we're having headaches, we're dehydrated, we're exhausted, and it's almost too late. By then you're gonna be catching your tail, trying to figure out, did I not eat enough? Did I not hydrate? What did I do wrong here? And that's when I find everyone's like, oh, let me just pop a painkiller. And my point to everyone is we can't do that every day.

That's not a solution. We don't have a painkiller deficiency in this country. We have a self-care deficiency and we have a lack of understanding that we are circadian beings. Every cell in the body has the genes for our circadian clock. I think they call it the, I forgot, but it's in the book. It's like the gene. there is a specific gene that's in all of our cells. And that's so impressive that modern science is now going to be shifting towards circadian medicine, circadian biology, and understanding that even the timing of our food, meals, sleep, medicines that we take, all needs to shift according to the sun.

So that was two to six, and then finally six to 10. Six to 10 before bed is gaffa, earth energy time of day. As the sun sets, we are meant to set with our actions. And so many of us instead are, for me, I have soccer and different activities, so we're still ramped up into the evening until it's dark, or we're working. Sometimes if I'm in a busier season, I'll just use my evening, kids are doing homework in bed, and I'll work another big chunk of my day in before bed. And so Ayurveda said, can you instead walk after your meal?

Can you settle house and responsibilities? You make time for you, read a book, obviously don't watch TV and bring in more blue light that'll prevent your sleep so that you're teed up with your sleep hygiene habits and sleep rituals for that 10 o'clock to mean you're really gonna go to sleep and get that high quality, delicious sleep that's gonna impact your health in such a big way. Yeah that's great and really if everyone can just you know think about like do you have anchors already that you kind of do and you you know like for me it's waking up it's prayer reading the bible and then at night my anchor is putting on a red light to read usually more of like a book like usually it's I don't know, like RC scroll or something, but like usually I'm like reading to settle down too.

So I'm anchoring kind of there. But yes, for me, I'm so productive 10 to two or eight to two.

Living in an Anti-Circadian World 17:20

And I guess, you know, that's when you want to see like your doctor or whatever, you know, I guess functioning at their best. Don't get those afternoon appointments, right? But anyway, I think that's funny. But I think of my chickens. And I just love how they just know they go to their coop when it starts getting dark. Well, predators come out at sunset and all of that, but they know to go up there and roost. And they're just little happy little hens up there. And then we have two roosters. That's another story.

But their circadian clock is set where we, if we didn't have all these awful habits or I don't know what you think, but like society telling us, right? Like, oh, get an 8 p.m. dinner reservation and like it's fine, like eat or, you know, Vegas, right? I think it's funny that A4M, the Longevity Fest is in Vegas where people are like up all night. So how do we combat like this external, basically anti-circadian rhythm society we live in? You know, I had one of my mentors on my podcast, Kiran Krishnan, and he was talking about microbes and the gut.

And he said, we are microbial beings living in an anti-microbial world. And that was such a mic drop statement to me, because I was like, you're right. Every airport I go to, every bathroom, it's anti-microbial soap, anti-microbial cleaners, all those things. And so you're right, you just highlighted something so important. We are circadian beings living in an anti-circadian world. The world is teaching us you should hustle. You should have your entire business day done in the morning. Who needs self-care?

I keep seeing that message online now. You should hustle all day and then pick up a second shift and then a third shift. If you're not hustling and building a side hustle, what are you even doing with yourself? You should be wanting this everlasting, never-ending success that you have the capacity to build. And whenever I see that, I'm like, yeah, and you're going to build chronic disease alongside, and then you're going to be stuck having to reverse that chronic disease. And in my family history, I saw that for the entire last quarter of life.

They were dealing with heart disease, stroke, cancer, Parkinson's, amputation, heart attack. And I'm like, that's not how I want to spend the last quarter of my life. And that's why I studied this ancient wisdom and integrative medicine. That's why I'm a practitioner is I need to be reinforcing this message every day that yes, society is going to say a lot of crap that it thinks we should do. And it's going to sell us a lot of ideas. But those ideas in general are an inflammatory lifestyle and an anti circadian lifestyle.

And so we just have to really set those boundaries on our life. If Ayurveda's goal and most of our goals is to bring body, mind, and spirit into alignment so that we can have our spiritual journey, our journey with God, universe, these things that you really believe in, our own individual faith, that boundary I set is for my mental health, my physical health, and my emotional health. And so I really do look at it as guardrails. I wake up at six every day. That's my wake up time. I take my morning and I ease in because that's what's better for me.

I can't be ripped out of my sleep. I don't have a tolerance for it. So I ease into my day. I want a joyful morning with my children before I drop them to school. That really matters to me. Then I start my day. Hopefully I can fit in a workout if all the timing works right, or I go straight to work. And if I don't get a workout in, my team and I, we walk around the building for our morning meeting. I need a walk. I need that circadian walk in somehow. So I will get it first thing in the morning. Then we have lunch.

Then let's walk again. We know we need that support for our glucose spikes not to be too high. So we try to move. And if we're too lazy to go outside the building, we walk inside the building. Let's get our steps in. Then it's afternoon. We have snacks in my office. We both grab snacks and our tea, afternoon tea, before we both run to get our kids. And that's kind of an end cap. I think without children, I would probably have a much more loose schedule. They cause a lot of structure in the day. And then it's like, okay, well, which direction are we going?

Normally it's activities and things like that. So the afternoon and day kind of ends there from a business standpoint and shifts into family time. But I have set a lot of guardrails around sleep, where I'm like, everyone, I know you're teenagers now, and you think sleep doesn't matter. Sleep matters. I have to be asleep by 10. And so by eight, I'm winding down the house. By 6.30, I have finished my dinner, even if no one else has. Then I start winding down house sleep hygiene for better sleep. And to me, that's going to happen 90% of the time.

And then there's some 10% called Las Vegas conferences and friends and family in town that push dinner later. But we have the power to create habits in a really strong way. So even if someone has invited me out for dinner at 7.30, 8 o'clock, I will still have my protein at home and the majority of my meal. So when I go out, maybe I'm just going to have a light snack. I'm going to keep that much smaller, maybe a side dish that's cooked so that I can still support good sleep. I think it's just about intentional action.

Yeah I love that and like habits like you were saying as opposed to like you're always doing like late dinner and stuff just make those things exceptions you know like I'm flying out this weekend and like my flight's super early in the morning and and our flight back is super in the Merlin so we're gonna be waking up at like 4 a.m to go to the airport and I'm like well we're gonna go to bed a little earlier it's just a one-off you know, I'm gonna make sure I'm going to bed early while I'm traveling and all of that.

So don't, you know, be like so structured that you can't forgive yourself when you have, you know, struggles with this or like a kid is up at night sick or something, or if it's a new mom listening, like these are tough times. And then if sleep is out of whack, make sure you're eating well and doing all these other things. And you mentioned circadian walks. I love that idea because you're getting the natural light. And if you're doing it, anchoring it around meals, you're going to be helping that glucose shuttle into the muscle.

So can you tell us a little bit more about circadian walks? For sure. So for me, we know that we need to get sunlight in the morning. We need to kiss the sun, allow that sunlight to come into our eyes. That's going to start our sleep pressure for the day. That is our first circadian alignment to the clock. And many of us might wake up, get ready, jump in our car, jump into the next place and never actually experience the sunlight for more than a few seconds. And so for me, even if I take just five minutes because I've dropped the kids off or because I'm going to get to work, but my team hasn't shown up yet,

Circadian Walks and Natural Light 23:58

I'll start walking. I have my running shoes in my car and those walks help me align to the circadian clock. So five, 10, 15 minutes. If I can elongate it, I will. If I can make phone calls instead of Zoom calls and take that all as walking, I will. And then post dinner, I take a walk as well. I'll make sure, because I ate dinner first before everybody, because I'm so focused on that early dinner being three hours before bedtime. So once I'm done with that dinner, I'll take another 30 minute walk.

And that'll be anchoring into the evening hours. And it'll remind my body and my mind, okay, we're angling towards evening now. This is not when you rev up into a new business day. You're supposed to wind down into the evening. The sun is setting, so you are supposed to be setting with it too. And kind of aligns the whole brain and body towards that bedtime that's coming. Yeah, how would you deal with shifts like daylight savings time? You know, like right now, it gets dark at like 5pm. Like, how do you, do you have any tips for that?

I'm struggling in the winter right now. I'm like, oh, it's dark at 530. I know it's driving me crazy. I just got to soccer last night and it got cold in Florida and I was like, What is this? Why is it dark? It's five. It's so unmotivating. So I have to do something fun then to keep me outside, especially when it's cold. I had my warmest sweater on and I was listening to a podcast, which normally I can just do voice memos and chit chat with my friends and catch up. No, I had to like listen to something engaging or an audio book to keep me walking and moving because it's a whole different ball game.

It's much easier when it's bright and happy outside. Yeah. Well, I love like how you said you kind of multitask too, because I'll do that too. If the kids have outdoor soccer practice or a sport, I'll walk around and be able to see them while I'm moving my body or just sit outside and do work on a laptop or read a book or something. But at least you're outside and yeah, it's actually good. It's fine to be outside when it's cold. Just get a cute hat on and boots and bundle it up. Exactly. But Florida, you guys freak out when it gets below 60, right?

We do. Last time it was 60 and I thought I was going to die. I was like, oh my gosh, it's so cold. How are we going to survive this? I looked at the forecast for Florida because I have to pack in a day or two and I'm like, what is this? But now that we're in Tennessee, this is weird cold for Tennessee. You know, we were, we were out there working. I'm like, right after the kids, I picked them up. I'm like, we got to do some sort of structure for the cows because we don't have their structure built yet.

So we like made this tarped little cave for them to be in to hunker down because it was snowing yesterday in Tennessee. So, but it was, it's good to be outside, you know, do things with your hands. You know, I really enjoy right now, my routine is wake up, start getting the kids lunch ready. If it's a day that they go to their co-op, if we're homeschooling, it's a different, but I still, I get up and I deal with the cows and the chickens and let them out. And I just get that sunlight and it's, it's been really nice.

And I really enjoyed that, like getting up and. doing something physical, taking care of the animals. I could ask the kids to do it, but I enjoy doing it and it's getting back into that circadian rhythm. Now, you spoke a little bit about blue light. Could you explain why we should avoid blue light and how that disrupts circadian rhythm and this pattern we need to live in? For sure, if you think about it, back in the day, we used to live according to fire. So we used to have fire light, we'd sit around fires in the evenings and spend time together.

Nowadays we have blue light, which is great, but it means 24 seven, we think that it's daylight and it's not. So it doesn't support us in our ability to wind down in the evenings, wind down for bedtime and all of those things. So really blue light first thing in the morning revs the brain up into our beta, oopsie, Fireworks. Oh, if you guys are watching, there's, there's fireworks. You're talking about fire. Oh my gosh. I love that. You have some like bougie things going on. I know my pervert side likes to do that.

Um, I want to get that. Okay, well fire. We're talking about fire. So yeah, so I mean, basically, I think we know nowadays our blue light is an issue. We shouldn't be on blue light before bed. But a lot of times people still have habits around TV right up until bedtime, our laptops right up until bedtime, and our phones.

Blue Light, Sleep Hygiene, and Red Light 28:38

And then we might not connect the dots of what that is doing to our sleep. So a couple years ago when I started teaching about sleep, I realized that if I'm on my laptop past nine o'clock, direct impact on my sleep. And so I learned you have to leave your laptop downstairs. You cannot bring it into your bedroom. You cannot open it for that one more thing because it's such a large blue light amount of device coming at your face and your eyes. And it's telling your body it's wake up time. She's ready to go to work.

When in fact, I was trying to get ready for bed, but just handle one more bill or one more task. And so that's where I really encourage people to start having this real sleep hygiene plan in place, where you start to let go of some of those larger blue light devices. Maybe it's TV and laptop and you just downgrade into iPhone. And then once you have your phone, then it's like, can I read instead of being on Instagram or Facebook or any of those things where still it's a lot of video content flashing your face?

Now we have a lot of tools. Nowadays there's red light glasses, there's red light features on our phones, there's red light reading little lamps, there's red light you can have around your bed, there's red light bulbs you can put into your bathroom and room so all you see at night is red light. I think we're having this like incredible renaissance moment of like how to live better. And I'm excited for it. I think circadian homes and healthier circadian homes is coming very soon for us. And it's just about starting to pay attention and adopt those practices now in our existing homes.

Yeah, it's really easy. So the can lights, I have a tutorial on my YouTube to change out to a red ball. And if I can do it, You all can do it too. So the tub in our bathroom, so we have, you know, usually people have a couple different lights in their bathroom. So the can light above the bathtub, I put a red light in there. Another thing you can do is just simple lamps. You can get red light bulbs. So my husband's lamp is regular light because he doesn't really like to read. which honestly, he doesn't like to read books much.

But my light, it's a red light, so I turn that on. So you could put red lights, lamps throughout the house and really fix that. What is crazy to me, I don't know if you had this, I had a TV in my room growing up, right? And I would fall asleep with the TV on. Like, that's how I went to sleep. I'm like, that is terrible when I think about it. But we didn't really know, right, how detrimental it is. But, you know, if you have a TV in your bedroom, your kids have a TV in their bedroom, I would just say maybe just like get it out.

Just say, okay, we're trying something new. Bye. Yeah, I had a TV in my room when I had my kids because there were so many nights where you're up, you're breastfeeding through the night, all the things. And it was really nice to have a TV in my room. But after that, I made sure I never had one in a bedroom ever again because it's easy to really become so sedentary with watching TV in bed. It's comfortable. It's nice. But truly it's one of the worst things we can do for our sleep quality. And so when we're talking about inflammation, I mean, this whole book is about inflammation.

The goal was, can I show you how to improve that sleep quality with all these tiny little habits that stack up and thus you clear inflammation overnight? Because there's so many habits we can put in place, but sleep is one of the easiest. After that, I'm going to teach you, okay, let's move, let's eat. They're more action-based, but it's the one inactive one that we can win at just by changing all the habits around it. Yeah, nail that down. And our kids are listening. You know, my kids know that we don't do TV in bedrooms.

I talk about blue light, red light, you know, and they pick up on it. They might not follow it right away, but they're absorbing and they're watching what we're doing, too. It was funny. My daughter had a friend spend the night and they were just sitting in her bed on their phones. And I'm like, why don't you guys watch a movie or something? They're like, well, I don't want to be out on the couch. It's not as comfortable. And I get it. Your bedroom is super comfy to watch a movie. Well, maybe just put it on your laptop in special occasions and get cozy, but shut it off before 9 30. But, you know, I think it's teaching our kids just about it because sleep is so important.

If we're not sleeping, you know, kids are they're not going to grow right. They're going to be anxious. So really talk to kids about circadian rhythm. but more so show them so they're watching. So I think that's really important. Now, what metrics should women track for quick wins to know if they're doing things correctly or not? I love when I initially work with people to have them buy some sort of wearable to start tracking their sleep, whether it's the whoop or using your own Apple watch if you have one, or the Aura ring.

There's so many devices we have out like right now. You can even use a Fitbit. You can use a Garmin. There's lots of technology. I'm not a big fan of long-term use of that technology, so I do not wear my sleep wearables year-round. But every once in a while where I'm like, something's wrong, my sleep cycle has gotten off, I'll put it on just to start seeing what do I need to do to get that sleep back to excellent. But a lot of times when I have someone start sleep tracking, they can start to see how each action directly impacts their sleep quality.

And then it makes it that much easier to make those changes. And so that to me has been invaluable. I've had so many people come to me with really poor sleep, insomnia. And I'll say, you know, Ayurveda would have told you to walk three miles a day. Like that's the homework, is you gave up exercise. And that alone can fix their sleep. And then they'll see that sleep score go towards an A, A plus. And they're like, okay, I got you. Because then it's taking more of that feeling out of it. A lot of times we say, I sleep fine.

I feel fine. But we're not really measuring. So metrics come in and show you, okay, here's your HRV. Here's your sleep score. Here's how much deep sleep you got. Here's how much REM sleep you got. Like each metric kind of shows you that total sleep score. And I find that to be very valuable. Now, we talked a little bit about travel. Do you have any recommendations specific if someone is jumping time zones or traveling, little hacks that they can do to set that circadian rhythm once

Tracking Sleep and Traveling Well 34:48

they get there or make it easier when they get back home? For sure. So the tips for travel zones and time zones is when you get to your time zone, workout, move your body, or take a walk in sunlight. So your body connects to that circadian zone and starts to very quickly understand where it is. Another habit is use every sleep tool in your kit. So for me, I travel with my progesterone, magnesium, my sleep gummies that I created, my sleep tea that I created, and I make sure I'm holding on to that sleep hygiene ritual.

So just like when we have little kids, we have a sleep ritual for them. We turn on the essential oils to diffuse, we close the blinds, we give them a massage, a shower, milk. There's this whole song and dance you do for little babies. Why do we as adults assume that we can just slam our laptop shut, turn off our iPhone, plug it in next to our heads, and magically fall asleep? So instead, whatever tech bubble and sleep hygiene habits you have at home, bring those with you. So let's say it's cutting off tech at nine o'clock before bedtime.

Let's say it's reading a book before bed or a sleepy time tea before bed. Whatever those rituals are, maintain them when you travel. So you're also programming the mind, okay, Shwani's going to bed at 10. I know we're in California this week, but 10 o'clock means she wants to wake up at six. So that's the eight hours I'm going to give her. I'm not going to wake her up at three in the morning because it's six o'clock in Florida. which can happen, right? The sleep schedule can get really off. But I also travel with my own sleep gummies and things like that just so I can mitigate the issues and get enough sleep.

Yeah, I love those tubs. Now, what about night shifts? So, I remember I asked someone about night shift because I wish that there was something else to say other than get off night shift. But I know some people, that's my number one advice if you're working night shift, get off night shift. Do you have any other tips for someone on night shift? What I used to do personally was I would fast through night shift because I was just doing two or three a week. So I would eat before I went into work and then I would fast.

So I would go home and go to sleep, take some supplements, be in a dark room. And then right when I would wake up, I would work out and see the sunlight and all that. But I mean, we know that night shift is a carcinogen. But I would love to hear your tips because it's brutal like night shift is. It is brutal. It's part of circadian science is understanding not sleeping at night over a long period of time can cause death to the body. We're not built for that behavior. But we live in a global economy.

There's going to be people who are going to work all night so that we can fly on the planes first thing in the morning. And there's lots of businesses that work overnight, right? So, I mean, I think the first tip you gave, which was get out of the night shift is the best one, right, for our health. But if you can cycle in and out and do what you did, I think that's wonderful. really plan to fast for it, plan to work out and move in the morning. On all the days you can be circadian aligned, be that.

And then on all the days you can't, mitigate it in all the ways you can. So maybe if you're not getting to clear inflammation overnight, because you are working at night, then during the day be much more intentional with your food, with your soup or spices and herbs. Take everything you need to from a supplement standpoint to win at inflammation, hydration, like be so good in those other areas to make up for that. Yeah, and I think that's good tips because some of the nurses in the ER that I would work with, they were working three, so usually they work three 12s and the one was night shift, but she's just, she stays on night shift.

Even like her surrogate, she doesn't flip back and forth. And I'm like, oh, like I just, that's, we know that's not healthy. And I think that's tough. Like if they were only working three shifts a week, sure, flip back and forth, but when they're getting to five nights a week or something like that, or if it's an eight-hour shift, I mean, that's tough. And it's really tough. I mean, when they're working with me, these patients, I'm telling, I'm like, please just get off my shift. Like, figure out how to get off my shift.

But there's a lot of people, healthcare workers, police, factory workers. Yeah, it's tough. Airline, yeah, airline pilots and all of that. Like you said, it's, that's a tough one, right? I liked your tips though on just try to anchor it back as soon as you can. Exactly. Yeah, I took a red eye the other day. I mean, that pilot flew all night, right? So there's a lot of people who are doing these full-on night jobs. We know that if we don't sleep 10 to 2 on the circadian clock, we will not clear inflammation for that night.

So that's why I said anywhere outside of that, build in those healthier habits. And the whole point of this book when I wrote it was to show everyone we are inflamed in each and every day of our lives, whether we're sleeping on that clock or not. Circadian rhythm is one key pillar to winning at inflammation. And there are so many others. It is our diet. It is our stress levels. It is our toxin burden, whether from mycotoxins and mold or plastics, microplastics, air quality, water quality. And then it's also that gut health piece that's so important.

And so when we talk about those circadian genes in our body and how strong they are, my key message I want to drill home is you can build a circadian rhythm that is so anchored into your day that you feel so good on that circadian rhythm And whenever it goes off, because it can happen, it'll go off track, then you know exactly what to do to bring it back on track. So for me, for example, I have this rhythm and it's in my daily life. And when I travel, I work hard to keep about 80% of it where I can.

And I will do that sometimes by carrying tea around with me. Tea is a great tool for me to anchor in those times of day. I'll anchor my meal times in the best I can. So you can still anchor where you can, but you should also have a little bit of that resilience and give in the schedule.

Night Shift Strategies and Inflammation 40:48

So when you're traveling or whatever it is you're doing that throws you off, it throws you off. But you keep those anchor points in that build that resilience into your system in your daily life. Because that circadian clock is that key to having optimal health, vibrant health, and winning at that inflammation. I love that. So you have a one-week challenge for listeners for their circadian rhythm. I would love to hear about that. For sure. So anyone who buys the book, we have a seven day challenge ready for them.

And in that seven day challenge, I wanted to teach about all these different tools, how to build your circadian rhythm, how to sleep even better than you're sleeping right now, how to adjust diet in a way that really supports you to feel whole and nourished. A lot of times we're doing a lot for our diet, but it may not be satisfying and leaving us feeling whole. And then where we can reach for turmeric and these different spices and herbs and teas to help us with our health. So yeah, I mean, to me, I want to make Ayurveda and this ancient wisdom doable, approachable, simple, so we can build it into our lives in tiny slices.

I'm a mom. I'm busy. I've got all the responsibilities like so many of us have. So it has to be bite-sized or it's just not going to happen. Yeah, I agree with that. Just bite size habits and then they'll grow into bigger ones and habit stacking and all the good stuff. So I love that. Well, thank you so much for your time and all of your wisdom. And I'm sure like there's so many easy tips that people can just start today for their circadian rhythm health. Now, how do we find this new book of yours?

And you also just have some bonuses that go with your book also. For sure. So the book, The Inflammation Code, is at TheInflammationCode.com. That one's easy. My website for my name is ShivaniGupta.com, S-H-I-V-A-N-I-G-U-P-T-A. And then my sleepy time tea called Deep Sleep Tea and all my supplements are at FusionaryFormulas.com, F-U-S-I-O-N-A-R-Y. And then I made a special code for your audience. Dr. Jen will give them 15% off on their first order. Very nice. Thank you. And to wrap up, we're going to do a quick lightning round, okay?

So this is just a fun thing to wrap up. So if you weren't in your career now, what would you be doing? Oh, I love yoga. And I always wanted to teach yoga in the Himalayas and be a photographer there and just be a hippie. That's what I think I would have done. Have like the llamas around you and goats and stuff. Yeah, yeah. All right, what is your favorite habit that rescues a tough day? Ooh, for me, it's tea. I come home, I have a cup of unwind tea. It reduces cortisol. It has ashwagandha, which I need in my life.

And it just takes me down a couple notches. Sometimes I have two cups back to back just to like really calm down and ease from the day so that I don't reach for chocolate or something else to calm

Book, Challenge, and Lightning Round 43:48

myself down. Yes, yes, love that. What is one wellness rule that you happily break sometimes? I would say I do that with food. You know, I teach a lot about healthy eating, but if I'm super stressed, my favorite cheat food is nachos and I will eat nachos. I'm a Texas girl at heart. That's kind of my biggest tell to myself that I'm stressed is when that's what I'm reaching for as a food group. You could make them healthy, you know, some Mesa chips, like meat on top, like, I don't know, they're not all bad.

Like the good cheese. Yeah, like some grass-fed cheese, like, I don't know, like, I think nachos can be healthy sometimes. No, but I, okay. And then last one, and it's just one word. What is one word you would like our listeners to carry with them this week? Circadian. Yes. Love it. Circadian life. Yes. Yes, yes, yes. Love it. Okay. We'll grab the book and learn more. And thank you so much for all those tips. I know I need to get a little bit better at my circadian rhythm too. Awesome. Thank you so much for having me.

You're welcome.