Like a symphony, every cell in your body plays its part, chiming in at precisely the right moment to help you live, breathe, and thrive. You might say it all works like clockwork and you’d be right. Because, just as music is set to meter, your body—and nearly every organism—is set to its own internal 24-hour clock.
This isn’t merely conceptual. Scientists have actually pinpointed the cells in your brain that make up this master timekeeper. Known as the circadian clock, together they control the release of certain hormones that act as signals throughout your body. In this way, your tissues know to repair while you sleep, speed up your metabolism while you’re awake, and complete seemingly infinite intricate functions that maintain a healthy cycle of activity and replenishment.
Like any clock, in order to be useful, your circadian rhythm needs to be set to the right time. While many external factors contribute, one of the most important of these is light. As you take in the light around you, it triggers a cascade of responses that help create the conditions for optimum immunity and vitality. The most simple of these is that your body knows to wake up when the sun rises and that it’s time to sleep when it grows dark.
Right now you’re probably thinking, “But I’m up well into the night, and I definitely don’t spring out of bed at sunrise.” And that’s because, from bulbs to screens, we are being constantly bombarded with artificial light. Without the aid of nature’s light-dark cycle, our bodies understandably become confused. In the short term, this can mean tossing and turning in bed or wondering why you feel so fatigued, but over time an out-of-whack internal clock can increase your risk of chronic disease.
The good news is, you can do a lot to sync your circadian rhythm by simply getting more bright light exposure during the day and limiting it at night. That’s enough to signal to your cells exactly when to go to work. As a health and wellness company, this really got us thinking…
Enter our newest feature, Align Your Time, which allows you to adjust the tone and brightness on Glo to match the time of day. Ease into the morning with the warm colors, brighten up for daytime, rest your eyes with dark mode; or automatically cycle through all three. No longer does a late-night meditation have to mean exposing your eyes to sleep-disrupting bright light. It’s just one more way to stay present, aligned, and feeling your best.
Align Your Time is now available on desktop and mobile web. Set your theme at any time under Preferences in your Account Settings. There are four to choose from:
Radiate
Full brightness and cooler tones to match the energy of midday
Rise
Medium brightness and warm tones emulate the morning sun
Relax
Dark mode eclipses your screen, limiting blue light to help you prepare for sleep
Revolve
Automatically cycle through all three themes in rhythm with your time of day
