How to Increase Deep Sleep Naturally

Most people think eight hours in bed equals rest. Yet you can sleep long and still wake exhausted.

The reason lies not in quantity but in the depth of your sleep—the phases when your body repairs, your brain detoxifies, and your energy resets.

In this in‑depth guide from the Energy Science & Environmental Physiology Hub, discover how light, electricity, emotion, and environment shape deep sleep—and how small shifts can transform your nights from mechanical rest to genuine regeneration.

This guide reveals how to increase deep sleep naturally—without pills, devices, or medical interventions.

Let’s start by clarifying what “deep sleep” actually is—and why this often-overlooked stage forms the foundation for mental clarity, emotional steadiness, and physical vitality.

What Is Deep Sleep and Why Does It Matter

Deep sleep—the third and most regenerative stage of the sleep cycle—anchors the body’s recovery processes.

During Stage 3 slow-wave sleep, blood pressure drops, breathing slows, and the brain flushes out metabolic waste through the glymphatic system.

Growth hormone surges, rebuilding muscle and connective tissue. Mitochondria recharge through balanced oxygen flow and melatonin signaling.

Without adequate deep sleep, cellular repair falters. Brain fog, inflammation, and emotional instability become daily companions. Increasing deep sleep is an often-overlooked biological necessity.

Why Modern Life Suppresses Deep Sleep

Modern lighting, electromagnetic exposure, and constant stimulation reduce the depth and continuity of slow‑wave sleep.

Artificial blue light mimics daylight after dusk, suppressing melatonin release by more than 50 percent.

Excess EMF from routers and power lines creates subtle voltage noise that agitates the nervous system even when your eyes are closed. Late caffeine, disrupted temperature cycles, and emotional rumination all add to the mix.

An overstimulated cortex and energetic disharmony raise cortisol levels. Consequently, the body never receives a clear “night” signal. The outcome: Fragmented rest and shallow recovery.

Modern environments with silent electrical fields, chronic stimulation, and suppressed darkness all flatten the rhythms your body relies on to descend into genuine stillness. The result is a restless culture sleeping more but restoring less.

Can You Relearn Your Natural Sleep Rhythm?

Deep sleep is not a technique to be hacked, but a natural rhythm to be remembered.

The path back to it begins by removing interference—those signals that confuse your body’s sense of night and day—and rebuilding harmony with natural cycles that governed human physiology long before modern lighting existed.

Everything you’ll read here connects to the larger truth inside Energy Science & Environmental Physiology: the human organism is fundamentally electrical.

Light, magnetism, temperature, and emotion are not separate forces; they’re frequencies in one living field.

When they drift out of tune, your deepest stages of sleep vanish. When you restore them, rest becomes effortless again.

The Pineal Gland—The Body’s Timekeeper

The pineal gland, central to circadian regulation, interprets environmental signals—especially light and magnetism.

Pineal gland calcification and toxicity impair its function, leading to insomnia, anxiety, and hormonal imbalance.

Restoring its clarity through light exposure, mineral balance, and detox support redefines how deeply you can rest.

For a complete series on how to restore your pineal, start with: How to Decalcify Your Pineal Gland.

How Artificial Blue Light Reduces Deep Sleep and Melatonin Levels

All our modern devices—TVs, computer screens, smartphones, tablets, LED lighting, etc— emit artificial blue light.

This blue light disrupts numerous pineal gland functions and causes mitochondrial dysfunction.

Blue light exposure causes the mitochondria to become inefficient at converting nutrients into Adenosine triphosphate (ATP), leading to increased fatigue. Mitochondrial dysfunction is also considered to be a leading cause of many chronic conditions.

Melatonin Suppression and Circadian Delay

This blue light promotes wakefulness during the day, but when we get too much blue light exposure—especially in the evenings—it tricks the pineal gland into thinking it’s still daytime.

Consequently, this artificial blue light causes the pineal to suppress melatonin, an essential hormone for deep sleep (Gooley, J, et al, 2011).

Artificial blue light throws off our circadian rhythm and causes us to fall out of harmony with our natural environment.

How to Reduce Blue Light Exposure Before Bedtime

If you want to increase deep sleep, start by reducing blue light exposure.

Here are a few best practices you can implement right away:

• Stop using all screens two hours before bedtime.
• Wear blue light-blocking glasses after sundown.
• Replace LED and other “energy efficient lighting” bulbs with low wattage incandenscent or halogen bulbs.

Burkhart and Phelps (2009) found that wearing blue-light blocking glasses for three hours before sleep improves sleep quality.

LEDs have up to 5X more artificial blue light than regular bulbs. A 2011 review in the Journal of Environmental Management found that white light from LEDs suppresses melatonin production more than any other light.

These simple strategies will help you greatly assist your pineal gland in finding its natural rhythm to promote deep sleep.

For a more complete examination of how to address artificial light exposure, see How to Block Blue Light and Restore Your Natural Sleep Cycle.

How EMF and Dirty Electricity Disrupt Deep Sleep

The next modern barrier to increasing deep sleep is non-native electromagnetic frequency (nn-EMF) radiation.

We are bombarded with unnatural electromagnetic frequencies from our devices, routers, appliances, lighting, and the electricity charging through our walls and outlets.

Current EMF research shows that nn-EMF exposure damages the endocrine system, alters the heart’s rhythm, causes mitochondrial damage, and much more.

Simply put, EMF, although silent and outside of most people’s awareness, is causing dramatic increases in systemic stress, which fundamentally alters our ability to enter Stage 3 slow-wave sleep.

Not surprisingly, EMF also disrupts the amount of melatonin the pineal gland produces, providing a direct link between EMF and poor sleep (Halgamuge, 2013).

Consequently, reducing EMF exposure—especially in the bedroom—is essential for increasing deep sleep.

Dirty Electricity and Sleep Disturbance

In addition to EMF radiation, many homes also contend with dirty electricity.

Dirty electricity is “electrical noise” or voltage spikes that often travel through home wiring. These surges are caused by computers, LED lights, smart appliances, and even dimmer switches.

Dirty electricity further contributes to EMF exposure, causing more sleep disturbances, headaches, and long-term chronic health problems.

To reduce dirty electricity in the bedroom, you can get outlet filters from companies like Greenwave and Stetzerizer. Both devices are designed to reduce dirty electricity in your home.

Grounding and Shielding: Reducing Electromagnetic Pollution

One popular approach to the EMF problem is through electrical grounding principles. The idea is to send any excess electromagnetic discharge through a ground wire that connects with the Earth to restore bioelectrical balance.

One way to do this in the bedroom is to sleep on grounding sheets.

Grounding sheets contain a conductive material like silver or carbon with a wire that plugs into the grounding port in a nearby outlet. Theoretically, as long as your skin is touching a tested grounded sheet, any excess charge running through your body will go to ground.

If you live in an apartment building where you’re bombarded by EMF from other tenants, you can go a step further and use more powerful shielding materials. EMF-shielding paints and bed canopies offer stronger EMF protection for your sleeping environment.

Be sure to test your environment with an EMF meter before and after making any changes. Use a body voltage meter to determine how much current is running through you while you sleep.

Creating a Sleep Sanctuary Free from EMF Noise

If you’re serious about increasing deep sleep naturally, remove all electromagnetic pollution and the potential for dirty electricity. Any nn-EMF sends unnatural voltage through your body, disrupting your sleep cycle.

Be sure to keep your smartphone out of the bedroom—or, at least 10 feet away from your body and still on “Airplane mode.”

Unplug all devices from bedroom outlets, including alarm clocks on your nightstand. Removing all technology from the bedroom is both practical (less EMF) and symbolic: you are acknowledging that your sleeping environment is a sanctuary for rest, not constant stimulation.

Ultimately, if you truly want to experience deep sleep, go one step further: shut off the electricity running through the walls in your bedroom. While this might seem excessive to some readers, it is the single most powerful thing you can do to support deep sleep.

For detailed steps on how to create a bona fide sleeping sanctuary with virtually no EMF, see The Best EMF Protection for Your Home: A Practical Step‑by‑Step Guide.

The Role of Temperature, Darkness, and Sleep Environment in Deep Sleep

The next critical factors for deep sleep are ambient temperature, bedroom darkness, and scent.

The healthy body regulates its internal temperature within a specific range. However, if the body gets too cool or too hot, self-regulation fails, disrupting natural sleeping patterns.

Beyond the problems of artificial blue light, modern lighting in general tricks our biology when it comes to sleeping.

How Much Light Ruins Sleep?

Sleep researchers have found that a mere eight lux—about twice as much light as the average night light—affects the circadian rhythm and melatonin secretion (Gooley, J, et al, 2010).

Simply put, any light while we sleep (including candlelight) confuses the pineal gland as to what time of day it is.

Night-time light from something as simple as an alarm clock, a smoke detector, or an outside street lamp is a major factor in why many people don’t experience quality deep sleep.

So, in addition to reducing EMF, unplugging everything in the bedroom helps increase darkness. Consider using black electrical tape to cover anything you can’t remove.

If you can’t control the light coming in through the windows, and you’re committed to increasing deep sleep, invest in blackout shades.

The Best Bedroom Temperature for Deep Sleep

For most healthy adults in temperate climates, the general restorative temperature range for deep sleep is 63 to 68 degrees Fahrenheit (17 to 20 degrees Celsius). This range promotes slow‑wave brain dominance.

The body’s core temperature drops around 2 to 3 degrees F during the first sleep cycles. When the bedroom environment helps facilitate this cooling, it improves REM and deep sleep.

The ideal humidity for the bedroom is between 45 to 55% (but slightly moister in the winter when heating systems are in use).

Remove Toxic Chemicals and Stimulating Scents from Your Bedroom

The average conventional mattress is a cocktail of industrial chemicals—polyurethane foam infused with flame retardants, solvents, and other volatile organic compounds (VOCs).

These compounds continuously off‑gas into your bedroom air, lowering indoor air quality and interfering with melatonin production and restorative sleep cycles.

If possible, invest in a non‑toxic organic mattress made from natural latex, cotton, or wool. If that’s not yet feasible, a chemical‑free topper provides distance from the synthetic foam below.

Equally important are your scents. Artificial perfumes, plug‑ins, and “fresh‑linen” sprays trigger subtle nervous‑system arousal, working against deep rest.

Cultivate a fragrance‑free sleep environment—your brain reads natural air, cool temperature, and darkness as signals of safety, aligning perfectly with genuine sleep hygiene.

Remember: the nervous system interprets air chemistry as energy data. Clean air, cool darkness, and grounding signals tell the body it’s safe to descend into delta‑wave coherence.

Clean and Declutter Your Sleep Environment

Proper sleep hygiene requires clean air. Layers of dust (and mold) will negatively impact your respiration while you sleep.

Piles of clothing and other clutter by your bedside create disharmony that will inhibit your subconscious mind’s ability to relax.

A genuine sleep sanctuary for deep sleep is clean, uncluttered, and organized. Look around your bedroom: What doesn’t need to be there outside of your bed?

Nutritional and Supplemental Support for Deep Sleep

While nutrition and supplements can’t produce deep sleep on their own, they do help fine‑tune every phase of rest.

• Magnesium glycinate relaxes muscles and calms the mind.
• L‑theanine promotes alpha‑wave relaxation without sedation.
• Glycine lowers core temperature and encourages delta oscillations.
• Valerian root inhibits GABA level breakdown and promotes calmness and relaxation.

While synthetic melatonin supplements are popular, I do not recommend them. Instead, support your pineal gland naturally through light hygiene and mineral balance. Then, your pineal will regulate melatonin without any external support.

Also, keep in mind that supplementation, and especially over-supplementation, is not the answer to achieving restorative sleep. Deep sleep can’t be forced. Instead, we can only set the conditions for this natural process to unfold on its own.

Many sleep disorders are linked to vitamin D deficiency (Gominak & Stumpf, 2012).

Vitamin D from daylight exposure and whole‑food magnesium sources (cacao, leafy greens) enhance deep‑sleep cycles far more sustainably than pills alone.

Red & NIR Light Therapy and Natural Sunlight for Mitochondrial Health

While blue light exposure is harmful to a good night’s rest, red and near‑infrared light can be highly supportive. These higher wavelengths increase mitochondrial efficiency and reduce oxidative stress that can interrupt deep sleep.

A brief red‑light session after dusk mimics sunset frequencies, cueing natural melatonin production.

One Chinese study found that daily red light therapy (30-minute sessions) for two weeks improved sleep, melatonin levels, and endurance among female athletes.

Especially in the winter months, NIR light therapy can support restorative sleep cycles.

Perhaps more important than artificial light therapy is to spend more time outside and in the sun. Early morning or end-of-day sun gazing and general exposure to morning sunlight anchors circadian timing.

Natural sunlight exposure simultaneously helps reduce the harmful effects of artificial blue light and restore mitochondrial health.

Restoring the Body’s Energy Coherence

Small interferences can have outsized physiological effects on our sleep.

The mind often keeps the body awake. An overstimulated mind disrupts the body’s energy field, making it more difficult to drift off to sleep. An overactive mind ruminates, replaying scenarios, and perpetually plans.

Unprocessed emotion competes for neural bandwidth during sleep.

Reflective journaling, stretching, or breathing with attention quiet the cortical “rumination loop.”

Relaxation Response and Parasympathetic Activation

All the modern conditions we’ve discussed above tend to trigger the sympathetic nervous system responsible for the “fight or flight” response.

Basically, we’re living and sleeping in environments that trigger chronic stress and anxiety on a biological level 24/7. For most of us, this anxiety has become the “norm”; we may not even know how stressed the body is from moment to moment.

An essential ingredient in true sleep hygiene is to learn to toggle away from stress and trigger what Harvard physician Herbert Benson calls the Relaxation Response.

This physical state of deep rest leads to parasympathetic activation and radically alters our physical and emotional response to stress.

Capture Your Thoughts and Dreams

Capture all your ideas, concerns, and to-dos for the following day. These things will rotate in your mind until you capture them on paper. Often, doing this is sufficient to relax your mind.

Keep a journal or notepad and a pen by your bedside and add things as they come to mind.

Use the same journal to capture your dreams during the night and in the morning as well.

Psychiatrist Carl Jung saw our dreams as a communication medium between our conscious and unconscious minds. Essentially, dream journaling helps build a bridge between your mind (conscious) and your body (unconscious).

Whether or not you try to interpret your dreams for inner work, just paying attention to them has therapeutic benefits, including improved mindfulness, reduced stress, and emotional awareness (Weinstein, N, et al, 2017).

Stretch and Loosen Your Body

Stretch for five to ten minutes before going to bed. Why? Our physical tensions are directly related to our mental stress.

Stretching and relaxing your muscles and the fascia beneath them can help promote a more restful sleep. Be sure to relax your jaw.

If you know any qigong or yoga, try practicing it right before you get into bed. Practicing an ancient standing practice called Zhan Zhuang before bed helps you relax, settle the body’s energy, and prepare the mind to enter deep sleep.

Breathe Consciously and Correctly

Train yourself to breathe deeply, slowly, steadily, and quietly to trigger the relaxation response and neutralize any emotional charge.

Properly breathing activates the parasympathetic nervous system. This is key for deep sleep!

You can also experiment with the 4-7-8 breathing technique:

1. Inhale slowly and evenly for a count of four.
2. Hold your breath for an even count of seven.
3. Then, slowly and evenly exhale from your mouth for a count of eight.

Be sure not to push or force the air in or out as you exhale. Dr. Andrew Weil calls it a “natural tranquilizer.”

Use this breathing cycle three times before bed, and you’ll likely notice the results. It’s a powerful method to increase deep sleep.

Preserve Your Jing

In Taoism and Traditional Chinese Medicine, Jing is considered one’s vital or life essence.

When one’s jing is scattered or depleted, it disrupts the integrity of the body’s five-organ system. When the organ system is in disharmony, deep sleep is impossible.

So much of modern life disrupts Jing. Essentially, anything that’s stimulating, whether visually, mentally, auditorily, or biochemically, will cause jing leakage.

Obviously, drinking coffee or any form of caffeine is stimulating. (It’s best to avoid caffeine after noon if deep sleep is your goal.) But even watching television or scrolling on your phone disrupts Jing containment.

As such, to increase deep sleep, shift into a meditative and relaxing state several hours before bed. It’s not just about blue light exposure (which is also hyper-stimulating); it’s about Jing preservation.

Practicing meditation, Yoga, or Qigong in the late evening or right before bedtime can help consolidate your Jing.

The Regenerative Mindset: Allowing Rather than Forcing Sleep

The greatest barrier to genuine rest is effort itself—trying to sleep deeply.

Sleep is surrendered coherence—an act of allowing the body’s intelligence to recalibrate itself.

The Taoists use the principle of Wu Wei in their philosophical approach to life. Wu Wei is a kind of relaxed alertness and focus that arises from one’s Center.

Applying Wu Wei to sleeping, we begin to allow ourselves to enter into deeper and deeper restfulness and sleep. A consistent nightly sleep routine signals the nervous system to release control.

The body’s intelligence knows how to heal and restore itself. Our job is mainly to “get out of the way” and allow this natural process to unfold.

Summary: The Art of Deep Sleep

Sleep hygiene has both external and internal conditions.

Set up the external conditions that support internal restoration.

Combine light hygiene, environmental alignment, mindful release, and cellular nourishment to increase deep sleep naturally.

Darkness, grounding, and consistency become your nightly tools for your sleep routine.

When body and environment speak the same language, rest ceases to be an effort—it becomes the art of coherence.

Sleep well!

Frequently Asked Questions About Increasing Deep Sleep

How can I naturally increase deep sleep?

Shut off all LEDs and dim screen lights after sunset, remove electronics from your bedroom, and sleep in total darkness at a cool temperature (about 65 °F / 18 °C). Grounding, gentle evening breathwork, and a quiet mind signal safety to the nervous system, allowing delta‑wave sleep to emerge naturally.

What foods or nutrients help with deep sleep?

Mineral‑rich whole foods and calming amino acids support deeper rest. Magnesium (glycinate), L‑theanine, and glycine relax muscles, lower core temperature, and enhance slow‑wave activity, while sufficient sunlight and Vitamin D keep your pineal rhythm balanced.

What temperature is best for deep sleep?

Research and practical experience show that a bedroom kept between 63 and 68 degrees Fahrenheit (17–20 °C) optimizes melatonin production and promotes longer periods of restorative slow‑wave sleep.

Read Next

How to Ground Yourself: Earthing Outdoors & Indoors

Pineal Gland Detox: 12 Proven Foods and Supplements to Restore Clarity

Red and Near‑Infrared (NIR) Light Therapy: A Complete Guide

How to Block Blue Light and Restore Your Natural Sleep Cycle