Morning Sunlight to Feel Better

Sunlight Part 2 of 3

Humans have evolved to have light receptors in our eyes and skin and the mitochondria of our cells tuned to blue light. The blue light that is in our environment is telling our body what time it is. Example: When you wake up disoriented after a nap, and you don’t know what’s going on or what time it is. The first thing that you do with your conscious mind is try to figure out what time it is. Our bodies need to know what time it is because they have hundreds of thousands of tasks to do in every single cell. The SCN, or suprachiasmatic nucleus, is a part of the hypothalamus that receives light signals from the eyes, essentially acting as the body's internal clock, dictating functions like sleep-wake cycles by regulating hormone (serotonin and cortisol) releases based on day and night cues. Light is what is controlling the biochemistry of our body.

In the daytime our bodies are better at digesting food, solving problems. At night, we’re better at repairing, and autophagy.

Circadian rhythm is not only our sleep-wake cycle, but it is every cell that is synced to the Earth and its 24-hour cycle. Blue light or lack of blue light; our food and when we eat, are also giving our bodies signals. It's desirable to work with your body when it's working its best for specific tasks. For example, giving a work presentation at Noon rather than 5 am. Working with your natural rhythm makes your daily activities more effortless — it provides a foundation and framework on when to prioritize certain activities.

We have entrained our bodies to have the rhythm that it has based on when you are exposing yourself to blue light, and depriving it of blue light.

Not all light is created equal.

First part of the day

Daybreak is associated with infrared light - it makes up 49% the sun’s light. It gives life to all life on Earth.  When the sun crosses over the horizon is an optimal time to get sunlight (without glasses, contacts or window disrupting your view) into your cell receptors. Infrared is invisible to the naked eye. It is a deeply healing and soothing light. It is thought to be anti-inflammatory, support wound healing, anti-aging, builds collagen, helps detoxification, helps the immune system, supports mitochondria and helps them be more efficient and utilizing glucose — so it supports more balanced glucose levels — builds “charged water,” exclusion zone (EZ water), that is charged by the mitochondria that excludes heavy metals and toxins. You want a positive mindset and a negatively charged body. Infrared can help build the exclusion zone and can hydrate the cells intracellularly. Histamine is a cell danger response often times from cellular dehydration, so when you support your cells with infrared light it can be very beneficial.

It also builds sub-cellular melatonin, which we know is important for sleep, and it also aids in every single repair function in our body, such as inflammation, leaky gut, and joint pain. If we need to heal those tissues and repair them, we can do it with melatonin. 95% of our melatonin is made from from infrared light during the daytime! Building our melatonin is going to help our sleep, which is going to help our metabolic health. The sun is a free red light therapy panel. Just go outside and stand in the sunrise light — just after sunrise or within 2 hours of sunrise is most impactful.

After sun crosses the horizon, there is sufficient blue light that signals cortisol. It turns off melatonin release although it is still building melatonin for its antioxidant properties for repair and healing. There is speculation that it may even have anti-cancer benefits.

Blue light raises cortisol, blood sugar and insulin. But when paired with with the red and infrared light of sunlight, it is not going to raise it to that level — it is going to have a balancing effect. Blue light is always paired with red light and infrared. It’s still providing alertness and telling us it's daytime. This blue light is also signaling pregnenalone, a hormone released by the adrenal gland which is the precursor to many of our sex hormones, which is really important so that they can be released on schedule so that we can feel like ourselves.

In our modern environment we are being exposed to blue light without red and infrared light, such as the artificial blue light from phones, tv’s, screens, lightbulbs, etc. which never occurs in nature. So in the morning, if we begin the day by looking at our phones or flip on a light or open the fridge, we’re getting a blast of blue light without the red or infrared to balance it out. This can cause a raise in blood sugar because the blue light is turning on the blood sugar response. We want the exposure to be more gradual, like a sunrise. We don’t want to spike our cortisol from artificial blue light, we want to see a nice cortisol curve going from waking to alertness. Ideally, getting outside and getting sunlight in our eyes as the first light we see no matter the weather - whether it is cloudy, sunny, raining, foggy - we want to sky gaze East even if its by opening a window and looking through a screen. You don’t need to stare at the sun, just look toward the East.

If you wake up before sunrise, you’re going to want to put on some red or orange-lens blue light blocking glasses because we don’t want to artificially turn on our circadian rhythm before sunrise. If you do anything, start getting outside at sunrise and ideally, grounding to collect the negative electrons of the Earth which helps with the creation of ATP - the energy source for our cells. They create that EZ water to fight off toxins. The negative electrons attach to oxidized cells to repair and make them whole again - it’s anti-inflammatory, its healing and soothing.

It’s free. It is nature and how we evolved. Being out in nature is regulating and calm. This will help balance hormones, manage energy, glucose, cortisol, and so many other critical body functions. [This blog post was adapted from the Thyroid Fixxr podcast episode 451.]