Optimize your Light Exposure to optimize health
Improve your LIGHT DIET and improve all aspects of health
A brief guide by Dr. Kat Lopez, MD (2022)
I have become influenced by Dr. Jack Kruse, MD’s literature and teachings over the past year, and I must speak out about this overlooked but extremely important aspect of optimal health.
For all of evolutionary history, humans have lived in rhythm with the sun. We now have detailed scientific understanding of how the sun affects our brain chemistry, all our organs, and is required for our bodies to create vital nutrients. Our eyes and skin have complex mechanisms of taking in light and utilizing it for a staggering array of functions. Now, as indoor creatures, we are suffering a host of symptoms often attributed to diet…but overlooking LIGHT, the MASTER regulator of our hormones and neurotransmitters! Researchers can induce diabetes and other problems in animals by disrupting sleep and exposing humans to blue light at night. It appears that excessive artificial light exposure indoors is causing a year-round version of Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) in the many. Read on.
From Harvard Medical School
(https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/blue-light-has-a-dark-side)
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What is blue light?
Not all colors of light have the same effect. Blue wavelengths—which are beneficial during daylight hours because they boost attention, reaction times, and mood—seem to be the most disruptive at night. And the proliferation of electronics with screens, as well as energy-efficient lighting, is increasing our exposure to blue wavelengths, especially after sundown.
Is nighttime light exposure bad?
Some studies suggest a link between exposure to light at night, such as working the night shift, to diabetes, heart disease, and obesity.
A Harvard study shed a little bit of light on the possible connection to diabetes and possibly obesity. The researchers put 10 people on a schedule that gradually shifted the timing of their circadian rhythms. Their blood sugar levels increased, throwing them into a prediabetic state, and levels of leptin, a hormone that leaves people feeling full after a meal, went down.
Exposure to light suppresses the secretion of melatonin, a hormone that influences circadian rhythms. Even dim light can interfere with a person's circadian rhythm and melatonin secretion. A mere eight lux—a level of brightness exceeded by most table lamps and about twice that of a night light—has an effect, notes Stephen Lockley, a Harvard sleep researcher. Light at night is part of the reason so many people don't get enough sleep, says Lockley, and researchers have linked short sleep to increased risk for depression, as well as diabetes and cardiovascular problems.
Effects of blue light and sleep
While light of any kind can suppress the secretion of melatonin, blue light at night does so more powerfully. Harvard researchers and their colleagues conducted an experiment comparing the effects of 6.5 hours of exposure to blue light to exposure to green light of comparable brightness. The blue light suppressed melatonin for about twice as long as the green light and shifted circadian rhythms by twice as much (3 hours vs. 1.5 hours).
In another study of blue light, researchers at the University of Toronto compared the melatonin levels of people exposed to bright indoor light who were wearing blue-light–blocking goggles to people exposed to regular dim light without wearing goggles. The fact that the levels of the hormone were about the same in the two groups strengthens the hypothesis that blue light is a potent suppressor of melatonin. It also suggests that shift workers and night owls could perhaps protect themselves if they wore eyewear that blocks blue light.
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Here is a brief summary of how to improve your light diet. You can expect to improve mood, sleep, metabolism, and energy levels.
GET MORE DAYLIGHT OUTDOORS
Windows block the frequencies that talk to your brain, so sun thru windows is nice but not effective for health. Watching the sun rise is the absolute master reset and can, in many people, RESOLVE depression and anxiety because their brain is getting the optimal wake/rest/sleep signals and functioning properly. Find sunny places to go for vacations, like your life depends on it.
Do NOT fear the sun.
All-cause mortality DEACREASES the more sunlight you are exposed to (pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24697969/)
Sun exposure improves survival in people with melanoma (pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15687362/)
Melanoma is more common in those who wear sunscreen (ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1070981/)
Melanoma have skyrocketed, as humans have spent ever more time indoors and avoided sun out of fear
Melanoma arises equally on areas of the body protected from sunlight (buttocks), as sun-exposed areas (face, arms) (pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15687362/)
PROTECT YOURSELF FROM SCREENS
Blue light from screens is toxic, especially now that we are exposed to more and more time starting at screens. It has been implicated in damaging the eyes (macular.org/about-macular-degeneration/risk-factors/ultra-violet-and-blue-light), melanoma, creates insulin resistance, and destroys melatonin (https://journals.physiology.org/doi/full/10.1152/japplphysiol.01413.2009). Sleep is the KEY to our bodies repair cycle. Our sleep quality and quantity is dramatically reduced by any exposure to blue light after sundown. Melatonin also scavenges cancer cells in the body. Looking at a screen or being under LED or fluorescent lights after dark is actively impairing your body’s ability sleep, to regular important body functions, and to fight cancer.
Read more online, here are 3 places to start:
(1) https://www.optimaldwellingspaces.com/blog
(2) https://jackkruse.com/getting-started/
(3) https://bengreenfieldfitness.com/article/biohacking-articles/best-lighting-home-office/
ACTION STEP 1. Wear dark orange colored “blue blocking” glasses after sundown, every day, forever. I got mine at optimaldwellingspaces.com because they are custom, so they can be prescription. Ben Greenfield recommends/sells RaOptics glasses (raoptics.com), which are non-prescription.
ACTION STEP 2. Change out ALL your fluorescent and LED lights. They produce dirty electricity, flicker imperceptibly causing headaches and even seizures, and are high in the blue/toxic spectrum. Go back to low-wattage incandescent, you will notice they are more relaxing.
ACTION STEP 3. Download Iris screen software on your computer (iristech.co/; reduces screen flicker and allows you to block blue light on the screen) and the Twilight app for your phone. Make ALL screens as red and dim as is comfortable for you – during the day you will need it brighter to see well, while at night you can make it dimmer and redder. Part of the reason that social media is so addictive and increases the incidence of depression and anxiety is due to blue light and intentionally excitatory pulsed frequencies emitted from screens, which Google hold creepy patents for (patents.google.com/patent/US6506148B2/en)… Reduce this detriment by installing proper apps on your devices.
PS… you might want to round out your knowledge by learning about the harms of wireless microwave radiation – i.e., WiFi and cell phone radiation (categorize decades ago - when MUCH weaker! – as a “possible human carcinogen” by the World Health Organization based on hundreds of damning studies worldwide).
Start here:
www.optimaldwellingspaces.com/post/is-wifi-going-to-kill-me
Melanoma. Shall we move away from the sun and focus more on embryogenesis, body weight and longevity?
VeroniqueBataille; Twin Research and Genetic Epidemiology Unit, St. Thomas Hospital, Kings College, London, UK
Available online 21 June 2013.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306987713002727
Sun exposure increases melanoma survival: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15687362/