“Laugh and the world laughs with you, snore and you sleep alone.” ― Anthony Burgess

I’ve been doing research on sleep over the past few years. Very interesting! From a great book by Matthew Walker, Why We Sleep:

• Whether you’re a night owl or morning person is genetically determined. Around 30% of the population are considered morning types, 30% are evening types and the rest of us sit in the middle or are a combination of the two.
• You can’t catch up on missed sleep. Getting a few extra hours at the weekend only goes a little way to reversing chronic sleep debt. To re-pay your sleep debt completely, try to reintroduce a steady sleep routine and follow it for at least two weeks.
• Dreaming is a kind of emotional first aid for the brain; it’s during dreaming that we provide ourselves a form of overnight therapy to deal with traumatic experiences. However it’s a myth that if you forget your dreams, you’ve had a bad night’s sleep. While we know that dream sleep (or Rapid Eye Movement [REM] sleep) is essential for life – studies have shown rats deprived of REM sleep can die almost as quickly as being deprived of food – being unable to remember your dreams upon waking doesn’t mean you haven’t dreamt, it just means when you wake up, your brain isn’t able to access this dream memory.
• Matthew Walker’s advice for everyone – and an iron rule of his own life – is to aim for eight or nine hours of sleep every night. Routinely getting less than seven hours will undermine health, harm the brain, demolish the immune system, disrupts the body’s blood sugar balance and damage coronary arteries.

“Even a soul submerged in sleep is hard at work and helps make something of the world.” ― Heraclitus

According to researchers from the University of Basel, consumers are sleeping more since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the majority of that sleep hasn’t been restful.

“The improved individual sleep-wake timing can presumably be attributed to an increased flexibility of social schedules, for instance due to more work being accomplished from home,” the researchers wrote. “However, this unprecedented situation also led to a significant increase in self-perceived burden, which was attendant to the decrease in sleep quality. These adverse effects may be alleviated by exposure to natural daylight as well as physical exercising.” 

During quarantine people are sleeping more hours, because they are stuck at home, but the quality of their sleep is diminished because of worries. Solution: get outside and exercise more (shut off the stupid screens!)

“Man is a genius when he is dreaming.” ― Akira Kurosawa

I try to convince my college students of the value of sleep, how it’s the easiest way to improve their learning and retention. I’m not sure how successful I’ve been.

• Each night of the week that college students have sleep problems was associated with a 0.02-point drop in their cumulative grade point average (GPA) and 10 percent higher odds that they would drop a course.
• For first year students, the impact of each additional day per week with sleep problems (less than 8 hours) had the same impact on GPA as binge drinking and drug use.
• Only learning disabilities and diagnosed depression or anxiety appeared to have a larger impact on academic success than lack of sleep.

Monica E. Hartmann and J. Roxanne Prichard. Sleep Health, Journal of the National Sleep Foundation. October 2018, Volume 4, Issue 5, Pages 463–471

What can you do to improve your sleep and thereby your overall health?

Russell Foster, Why Do We Sleep?

1. Stop using all technology 30 min before bed- no cell phone- no laptop- no tablet. The light blocks melatonin which can help you fall asleep. A 30 min wind down with relaxation and reading (a paper book) can make it easier to fall asleep. Apps to reduce blue light on your devices are helpful when you need to work late, but still harmful if you’re trying to sleep.No caffeine after 3 PM. If you are up late studying or just need a little more energy, try a small energy-boosting snack instead of a caffeinated beverage. If you feel that you have to have caffeinated coffee when you are up late studying, try to limit the amount.
2. Incorporate a small amount of time each day to be outside in daylight. Time spent outside during the day helps to preserve your body’s sleep and wake cycles.
3. Be physically active most days. Exercise can promote more regular sleep and wake patterns as well as reduce stress. Avoid exercise and other vigorous activities three-to-four hours before going to bed to avoid awakening the body even more.
4. Use the bed only for sleeping. Avoid doing other activities such as studying or watching TV. This ensures that your body will not associate the bed with these activating tasks, which can make it harder to fall asleep. If there are few options other than your bed for these activities, reduce the level of intensity of the reading material or TV programs you select.
5. Go to bed only when you are sleepy. If you can’t fall asleep after 20 minutes, get out of bed and do a relaxing activity somewhere else until you feel sleepy again. Try deep breathing or relaxation techniques if you’re having trouble falling asleep due to stress or anxiety.

What I’ve learned lately is that sleep is a big deal. When I dream I am storing away memories. As I age, memory becomes a problem. Dreaming helps me to keep my memory sharper. Sleeping, exercise, sunlight – sounds like simple things I can do when the world seems like it’s become so unpredictable.

“I wish you to know that you have been the last dream of my soul.” ― Charles Dickens