How much sleep do you get? How many mornings do you wake up after not having enough rest, enough recovery from the previous day? Lack of sleep is one of the most prevalent problems in American health today. We live in a society that minimizes the value of sleep, shuns the practice. Yet getting enough sleep is as important as drinking enough water... the body requires proper rest to achieve full ability. How much do you get? How much do you need?
Do you know whether you're getting enough sleep? Most people I talk to claim they are, telling me they don't need as much as their friends, only five or six hours a night. While some of them may be right, most of them are not. The average adult needs about eight hours per night. Lack of enough sleep is hard to identify, though, as (just like with stress) the body and mind learn to cope if sleep is insufficient for short and medium-length periods of time. One of the most common symptoms of insufficient sleep is the inability to recognize just how tired you are. Let me repeat that: if you're not getting enough sleep, it's almost impossible for you yourself to be able to tell.
Physical symptoms, which begin to show immediately but are also easy to mask (especially for the chronically sleep-deprived), are exhaustion, fatigue, lack of energy; in other words, you feel tired. The immune system is also weakened. The mental symptoms of insufficient sleep include memory and cognitive impairment, as sleep is needed to refresh the frontal cortex. As a result, it becomes more difficult to control speech, access memory, and perform problem-solving tasks. In the emotional arena, the most insidious symptoms are found: pessimism, depression, sadness, stress, anger and rage, and increased stress in all relationships. If you are experiencing any of these symptoms, just getting more rest every night could be the solution. Over time, the symptoms are more serious: chronic sleep deprivation can lead to heart attack, stroke, high blood pressure, obesity, and serious psychiatric problems.
So why don't we sleep enough? Think about what keeps you awake at night: emotional stress, excitement, caffeine... we lead busy lives and can't seem to let go of everything at the end of the day. There always seems to be one more thing that needs to be done before we allow ourselves to relax. If you ever (and especially if you always) keep going until you can't keep your eyes open, you are already hours past the point where you should have gone to bed. Often just the habit of going to bed at a regular time can make the difference between getting enough sleep or not.
If you recognize the need to get more sleep but just can't seem to figure out how, there are several things you can do. First, as already suggested, keep a schedule. Figure out when you need to wake up and count backwards, try to be in bed before that time every night. The body quickly adapts to routine, so having a bedtime the same time every night will make it much easier to fall asleep than trying to maintain a varied schedule. Second, the bedroom should only be used for two things, and reading and watching TV are not on the list. When you go to bed, relax, close your eyes, and let yourself fall asleep. Getting enough exercise early in the day helps a great deal, as does eliminating the intake of caffeine, nicotine, and alcohol after the early afternoon. Eat your last meal long before bedtime, at least two to three hours before. Finally, if you climb in bed and can't sleep, get up and do something for fifteen or twenty minutes and try again; you don't want to develop the habit of lying in bed awake every night, as this will make falling asleep in the future more difficult.
If you are currently sleep deprived, getting a few consecutive days of excess sleep can quickly restore your physical, cognitive, and emotional levels to normal, so take a long weekend or a week vacation and just rest. It feels amazing! That doesn't mean you can plan your life around periods of sleep deprivation and the occasional chance to catch-up, but it does mean that right now you can quickly fix the problem and start to restore your overall state without too much inconvenience. Once you get caught up, it's important to stay that way.
Our culture trains us to sleep as little as possible, but this way of thinking leads to accidents, relationship problems, job problems, sadness and depression, and even serious bodily and emotional harm. Please: rest enough so that you can fully take advantage of the time you do spend awake. Come out of the haze and live a brighter life!
Resources:
- Sleep: More Important Than You Think [www.webmd.com]
- Sleep Deprivation Leads to Trouble Fast [www.webmd.com]
- Sleep Disorders: How Much Sleep Do You Need? [www.webmd.com]
- The Causes, Effects and Dangers of Sleep Deprivation [www.sleep-deprivation.com]
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From the editor
As many of you may recall, I decided a few months ago to run a marathon. I am in the final stages of training, and my marathon will be on April 15th in Canberra, Australia.
The last few weeks have included everything from 20 mile jogs to 3 mile fast runs to surfing (gotta cross-train somehow) to eating huge meals and drinking more than a gallon of water some days. It feels real now, on eight weeks away. The best part is, I can eat as much as I want of anything I want and it doesn't go to my gut. The downside is this is only temporary. Oh well.
Many people fund-raise as part of a marathon event, raising money for their cause and having friends, family, and businesses donate towards a charity. I am not going to do this, but I will ask that if there is a charity you like please consider a small donation to them in the near future. Desire to change the world is useless without action, and the one of the most effective actions you can take is to let your money talk for you. If you can donate your time, even better. Talk is cheap, action is what matters.
Let me know what causes matter to you and I'll be glad to offer some ideas in exchange for how to become more effective at promoting your cause. I look forward to hearing from you!
Healthy thoughts,
Jeff
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