Are you getting enough quality sleep? Zzz

Sleep has always been an interesting subject for me and indeed all the team at Loving Outdoors. Sleep, or a lack of it, has the ability to affect every aspect of your life. Now that doesn’t just include the first time you hear the alarm and instantly feel like you haven’t has enough. Common symptoms include feeling tired in the middle of the day, not feeling motivated or energised, snapping at people when really that is not your style or may even include a lack of control over your temptation to stick to your new healthy eating regime. Sleep affects everything!

The world seems to adhere to the conception that eight hours sleep is the norm but scientific research has confirmed that everybody is different and what is more important is the quality of your sleep and not quantity. When we go to bed the body enters the sleep cycle which typically consists of a series of stages from the initial feeling of drowsiness, to light sleep and then into a deep sleep which is actually when the body fully recovers. Another stage of sleep is REM or Rapid Eye Movement, which is generally the dream stage. What is interesting about this stage is that the brain is as active as when you are awake so is not necessarily a rejuvenating sleep stage.

So why is sleep such an interesting subject for me? Well, we spend half our lives planning for the future, dealing with tasks, bills, children, balancing a social life with work, being told what to do, to eat, when to exercise and so on. The other half is spent sleeping and other than closing our eyes we don’t really look into it that much…we just do it. But there is so much more to it than that and so many things that can be done to improve the quality of your sleep and therefore your productivity in the days to come.

In our opinion there are three areas that need attention to ensure that your sleep quality improves. Notice here we are not talking about how much sleep you need, no. Everyone is different; some people will operate perfectly on 7-8 hours whereas others like Margaret Thatcher and Gordon Ramsey survive on only 4 hours per night.

So what are the stages?

1) During the day

There are things you can do each day that will ready you for a restful night’s sleep and preferable one in as much of the deep cycle as possible. Caffeine is a big no and even one cup in the morning can affect your sleep that night. Indeed too many stimulants like caffeine, alcohol, sugar and processed foods will over stimulate your body and you will experience light sleep or REM sleep. Ever noticed that you have more dreams after a night consuming alcohol?

So what else can you do during the day? Well, ensure that your last meal for the day is ideally 2-3 hours before bed. This will ensure that you have digested your food. If you can avoid meat that will also assist you in getting a peaceful rest. Foods like meat take the body longer to break down and considering sleep is about your body shutting down, it is going to find that increasing difficult if it is trying to digest a t-bone steak!

2) Bedtime

It is now time to wind down for the day. Before going up to bed it is a good idea to put any worries and stresses on paper and plans for the next day so that you can rest without having anxieties on your mind. If that is not a good enough reason it has been proven that if you plan your day before bed that your subconscious mind will work on it overnight so that you start the day in your best state of mind!

Once you have done that it is time to begin a commitment to a wind down routine. This is an activity that triggers your mind into realising it is time for sleep. Hot milk, a warm bath or a good book (read outside the bedroom) will start the slowing down process. Then it is time for bed….

Make sure that your bedroom is used for sleep (and sex) only. That means no TV, no radio or reading. If the room is cool, dark and quiet you will also notice an improvement the following day. In the absence of silence or complete darkness invest in an eye mask and some ear plugs. Boots, Superdrug or your local pharmacy will stock these.  Then, time to count sheep!!

3) Good morning!!

Now you may think that all the hard work is over, you slept well and have started a good wind down routine but you would be forgetting the last stage; waking up. It is important that your body has a sleep routine which means going to bed and waking up at the same time. This is very much a grey area in sleep research and what has been widely reported is that trying to control both when you go to sleep and when you wake up could be the wrong approach. Think about it, you cannot quickly and automatically tell your body to sleep. Sometimes it can happen the minute your head touches the pillow while other times it can take longer. However, you have complete control over the time you wake up. So here is the theory which is supported by sleep institutions around the globe….

Go to bed when you feel tired. Tired is when you feel sleepy, drowsy and your eyes are ready to close. If you are not at this stage at your usual bedtime read a book, but whatever you do, do not stay in bed and try to force sleep to happen. Then set your alarm for the same time every morning and get up at that time no matter what. Over the course of 2-3 weeks your body will start to wake up naturally at your chosen time and you will start to feel tired at the same time each night because your body knows when it is getting up. By getting tired your body is optimising itself and subsequently telling you how much sleep it needs and not a magazine that tells you that you should have 8 hours.

Let’s look at this another way, how many times have you woken up and then decided to sleep in only to find that you actually felt worse after more sleep. Or have you ever woken up in the early morning before your alarm clock went off and felt really alive and awake. Everyone is different and this one method alone will improve your sleep and life tenfold. You may discover that you are not getting enough sleep or like me realise that you only need 6 hours sleep each night which is great because now I get up at 5:30am and have the full serene morning all to myself of pure productivity.

Remember sleep is a massively overlooked area and it is not given the time it deserves. Stop waiting for a good night’s sleep to happen and start making the changes now. Everyone has the capabilities of enforcing these simple principals and I can promise you that after 2-3 weeks of commitment you will not look back. Imagine waking up feeling energised every day, having insurmountable energy throughout the day and then sleeping like a log and you will only be halfway there….

By Scott Woodhead