Sleep Your Way to a Happier and More Productive Life
Posted on May 31, 2009
Filed Under Fitness |
I’ve battled with a tendency to resist sleep for years. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy sleeping, but I tend to fight it because it gets in the way of things I’d rather be doing. It interrupts my desire to study, read, work and even watch TV. But as my health deteriorated over the years due largely to poor sleep habits, I became a little less resistant and a little smarter about the very real importance of sleep relative to the merely perceived importance of all those other things.
Unfortunately, I’m hardly the only one who has set aside a few hours of sleep every night. In many cultures such as the US, the demands of our jobs practically require less sleep and more time at the office. Funny how, in the pursuit of more creature comforts we find ourselves sacrificing the greatest comfort of all. On occasion, that’s alright. As a matter of habit, it’s terrible. Aside from the direct impact to our health, poor sleep contributes to a chain reaction that can lead to a dramatically diminished quality of life.
The direct benefits of sleep are fairly obvious. Better concentration and productivity come immediately to mind. But did you know that healthy sleep habits contribute to better weight management?
Quality sleep (defined as more than just getting the right amount of sleep) means our bodies interpret our current circumstances as “ideal.” Food must be plentiful, the saber-toothed cats must not be out in force and all must be (pretty much) alright with the world. When external messages imply good circumstances, our bodies behave differently than they do when we are under stress. Poor sleep, on the other hand, implies tough times and our bodies react in strange ways. For example, our metabolism may slow to horde energy to get us through the “rough” times. Slow metabolism equates to weight gain.
Whether or not you agree with the popular science behind the association of sleep and weight management, what isn’t up for debate (it’s been well studied) is that there really is a relationship between them. “Why” isn’t as important as the simple acceptance that symptoms such as weight gain, depression, fatigue and mood swings are legitimately tied to our sleep habits and the message is clear. Sleep is important.
But accepting the consequences of lost sleep as valid doesn’t necessarily prepare us for the less obvious consequences. We might recognize that we’ll have trouble concentrating but won’t make the intuitive leap to realize how badly that could influence our lives. We then further fail to connect with the realization that those bad results could subsequently lead to more lost sleep. In a vicious circle that keeps coming back on itself, it isn’t all that hard to find ourselves in a repetitive and self-destructive rut from which there seems to be little escape.
Imagine, for example, a tough day at work following a few nights of poor sleep. As a result, you botch a very important proposal. Your boss isn’t the least bit happy. It’s all you can think of that night as you crawl back into bed and your head just won’t let you doze off. Your alarm goes off the next morning after hours of tossing and turning and you drag yourself to the office even more fatigued where, predictably, your performance continues to suffer. Your work doesn’t go unnoticed and when promotion time rolls around, you find yourself passed up after a demoralizing review in which your boss tells you that you’re not living up to his expectations.
And things don’t end there. Your growing depression, compounded by poor sleep and a dismal stretch at work comes home with you to the family. Inevitably, you aren’t the caring, sensitive spouse you once were. You find it difficult to take any interest in your partner’s work or concerns. Eventually, the inevitable arguments begin, further compounding an already unbearable situation. If only you could get a few nights of good sleep.
But it doesn’t happen. You can’t stop thinking about your job, your performance on that proposal and your escalating fights with your spouse. Your career is in shambles, your relationship is a mess and you keep mulling it all over every time you shut your eyes. All because of a few bad nights in which sleep was elusive.
Now if all of that sounds a bit contrived and unrealistic, think again. Those who suffer from depression or struggled through tough times can tell you it’s sometimes a razor thin line between surviving and feeling like your world has fallen apart. Poor sleep over a period of just a few days can wreak havoc on a person. Given that planes have crashed and highway accidents routinely occur due to fatigue, is it so difficult to believe that less immediate problems can arise and compound due to lost sleep?
Our bodies and minds are resilient but also potentially fragile things. Just like a machine, they require maintenance and general upkeep. Where food and water serve as our fuel, quality sleep serves to charge our battery. Without the chance to recharge, the machine begins to break down and fail on both an emotional and physical level.
When a caring parent asks their adult child, “how are you sleeping,” it isn’t because they want to know if their kid likes their mattress. The driving point behind that question is, “how is your life going?” Bad sleep leads to tougher lives. Tougher lives lead to bad sleep. Just knowing how somebody is sleeping can tell you a great deal about the circumstances in which they are living.
So when you find life or work depriving you of sleep as a matter of routine, ask yourself what you’re gaining. Granted, a few more hours in the day, but at what price? Are they quality hours? Would you be performing better if you were more rested? Are you depressed or struggling through your slightly longer day? Do you lose your temper more often? If the answers to those questions are anything other than what they should be, recognize the cause. You’ll gain much more quality out of life for being rested than you will from an extra hour or two in the day.
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