Sleep

Sleep is one of the most powerful tools you can master. But how can you master something you don’t even know is happening in real-time? On this page, we’ll explain why sleep is so valuable - but not before we touch on common misconceptions, how to rewire your brain to respect deep sleep, and sleep’s impact on your health.

Mkz & Pr (Buildergroop Community)

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Misconceptions About Sleep; Fixing How we Interpret Rest

We, as humans, share many core needs biologically. Sleep is one of those needs, no matter who you are or what you do. You may tell yourself “I function well on just a few hours of sleep” or “It doesn’t affect me”; some people even flaunt their lack of sleep to demonstrate how ‘hard working’ they are. However, none of these are true. Sleep is productive, and something you shouldn’t miss. While you sleep, your brain cleanses itself from sticky toxic proteins, increasing your expected life span. Another common misconception is equating time in bed to time asleep. Let’s say you go to bed at 11pm and wake up at 7am (“I’ll get about 8 hours of sleep, perfect”). But it takes time for us to fall asleep. We often wake up or fall out of sleep through the night without even realizing it. If you don’t believe me, try using a sleep tracking app for a week and you’ll notice this (unless you are already a master sleeper). Generally, the rule is, If you want to sleep x amount of hours, you’ll need an extra 1-2 hours in bed on top of that to adjust for unexpected disturbances.

Misconceptions About Sleep; Fixing How we Interpret Rest

We, as humans, share many core needs biologically. Sleep is one of those needs, no matter who you are or what you do. You may tell yourself “I function well on just a few hours of sleep” or “It doesn’t affect me”; some people even flaunt their lack of sleep to demonstrate how ‘hard working’ they are. However, none of these are true. Sleep is productive, and something you shouldn't miss. While you sleep, your brain cleanses itself from sticky toxic proteins, increasing your expected life span. Another common misconception is equating time in bed to time asleep. Let’s say you go to bed at 11pm and wake up at 7am (“I’ll get about 8 hours of sleep, perfect”). But it takes time for us to fall asleep. We often wake up or fall out of sleep through the night without even realising it. If you don’t believe me, try using a sleep tracking app for a week and you’ll notice this (unless you are already a master sleeper). Generally, the rule is, If you want to sleep $x$ amount of hours, you’ll need an extra 1-2 hours in bed on top of that to adjust for unexpected disturbances.

Why Sleep is So Valuable

In this section we have four lists you can review that will give you a general sense of how important sleep is for everything we do in life.

Sleep for Preventing disease and health problems

• Brain cleanses itself from sticky toxic proteins, No seriously, Sleep is a shower for your brain. Source

• “Insufficient sleep is also associated with lower levels of leptin, a hormone that alerts the brain that it has enough food, as well as higher levels of ghrelin, a biochemical that stimulates appetite. As a result, poor sleep may result in food cravings even after we have eaten an adequate number of calories.” Source

• Heart attacks are more likely to occur when daylight savings happens, reverse for when we spring forward. (Less sleep, more Sleep.)

We all know that sleep is important for our health, but having a good understanding of why that is

Once you establish a good sleep routine you will notice how much better you feel in all aspects daily, especially if you haven’t been practising good sleep ‘hygiene’. We’ll talk about that in the next few sections.

Sleep optimization strategies

If you want to achieve better sleep tonight here are some great strategies:

• Avoid Blue light before going to bed: If you have a bad habit of using your phone before sleeping, it would be in your best interest to stop. Blue light, the kind of light that comes from our devices disrupts our natural circadian rhythm and melatonin release, a hormone that tells our body that it is time to shut down for the day. The experts say 1-2 hours, however I try and make sure I’m staying away from blue light 30 mins before sleeping and it works.

• Aim for regularity: To complement your circadian rhythm going to bed at the same time and waking up at the same time most days will set your body on a schedule, you will be tired when its time to sleep and ready to get up when it’s time to get up. This makes routine much easier.

• If you can’t sleep get out of bed: This may sound contrary to what has already been said but it’s true, especially if you’re adjusting to a new sleep schedule. You have to associate your bed with sleep, during the day try to not lie down on your bed, the only time you are in your bed is to sleep.

• Go to bed earlier

• Stretch before you sleep

• Make sure you are hydrated before you go to bed

• Look into melatonin supplements (not medical advice)

Conclusion

Sleep is the foundation for everything you do in life. We live in a strange time where people overlook their health because they think it gives them an advantage in their career or personal success, but this is simply untrue. Sleep is an asset and we need to learn how to utilize it to the fullest. I hope that this article was of use to you, and that you start getting better sleep tonight.

Sweet dreams,

Mkz#1770 + Pr#5446