Sleep is essential. Extremely so. This post might go against everything your favourite motivational speaker has to say about hard work. It might even offend those who are big believers in the phrase “ I’ll sleep when I’m dead”. To everyone, I say sorry in advance 🙂
We’ll look at why sleep is important to your health and I’m sure that after you finish this post, you’ll start becoming more intentional about your sleeping habits!
Good sleep increases your productivity, concentration and creativity.
Adequate sleep has been shown to enhance your concentration, help you solve problems faster and even increase your creativity. This is why students are often encouraged to sleep well before exams. Meanwhile, poor sleep can actually impair your brain function in these aspects. In fact, some studies have shown that lack of sleep is almost as detrimental to the brain as being intoxicated with alcohol.
Sleep helps in weight loss and weight maintenance
Getting enough sleep aids your weight loss journey and even helps you maintain your weight. This means that you cannot be a member of ‘Team No-Sleep’ if you want to lose weight! This is because poor sleep can disrupt some hormones in the body. These hormones are mostly the ones that control your appetite. That translates to you having a bigger appetite and eating more calories. This will most definitely lead to weight gain. Another fact is that a lack of sleep is more likely to leave you tired and unwilling to exercise or go to the gym. Again, more weight gain.
Proper sleep helps to strengthen the immune system.
Do you find yourself falling sick often-perhaps with the flu or malaria- most of the time? You should examine your sleep habits and the quality of your sleep. Research has shown that even a small reduction in the normal sleep time can actually reduce your immune system function. This will make you more likely to fall sick.
Sleeping well lowers the risk of heart disease.
For some of us, this might be the reason why we sit up and take notice of our sleep habits. It’s true that sleeping at night allows the body to regulate blood pressure. It follows that well-regulated blood pressure is better for the heart and the body as a whole.
You’re not sleeping well if:
- You keep waking up at night.
- You don’t feel rested when you wake up in the morning.
Click here to see other signs of sleep deprivation.
At the end of the day, a poor sleep habit is dangerous. Apart from these effects on the body, not sleeping well can also lead to accidents. These accidents are inevitably caused by falling asleep while driving or operating heavy machinery. They could have fatal consequences on you as well as on the people around you.
So, do you want to know what to do to sleep better? Stay close to the blog because we will be discussing that very soon!
Till my next post,
Dr Omotola Oke
