I love to sleep. I could do it for hours without getting tired! Lame jokes aside, there are very good reasons why quality sleep is something that we should all place great importance on.
Most of us dislike mornings for a simple reason: we have to wake up early. Try waking someone up before their alarm rings and you’ll see the most honest pissed off facial expression you can get. Sleep is crucial for us and getting enough helps lower stress, regulates your mood, and improves cognitive learning. If you don’t get enough sleep, not only will you feel irritable, your mental performance suffers which will affect your work or studies negatively.
Getting sufficient sleep also helps your body recover from physical exertions and regulates hormonal activity. This is why we often hear the advice to get a good night’s rest and we’ll feel better in the morning! On the other hand, a lack of sleep has also been linked with increased hunger, obesity, and increased heart disease and diabetes risk.
Adults are recommended to get 7-9 hours of sleep while kids and youths tend to need a couple hours more. You may think that getting enough sleep is just a matter of going to bed early and clocking the required hours but it’s not that simple. You may lie in bed for hours but can’t get to sleep, or fall into light sleep but wake up very often throughout the night and that means you’re not getting sufficient QUALITY sleep.
Tips to get quality sleep
Remove pre-bedtime distractions
A lot of us enjoy browsing the internet or play games using our mobile phones on our beds right before we go to sleep. However, that is actually not helpful for your body to get to sleep as the bright light from these devices are stopping your body from producing melatonin, which is a hormone that causes you to feel sleepy. Your body produces melatonin when it gets dark and using your phone when you’re getting ready for bed is actually counterproductive. A good tip is to stop the use of your computer or smartphones an hour before bed, and do some light reading till you feel sleepy enough.
Follow a consistent sleep schedule
If you try to stick to a similar bedtime and waking time, you’re more able to get quality sleep as your internal body clock is synced up. You’ll feel more sleepy closer to your bedtime and more rested when you wake up. Ideally, waking up without an alarm should be the norm. Side-note: You can’t replace lost sleep so try to hit your required hours!
Track your sleep patterns
Analysing your sleep patterns can be very helpful to know what to work on. For me, my Mi Band 2 Fitness Band‘s in-built sleep tracker breaks down your sleep into easy-to-understand metrics. Based on motion-tracking, the band measures durations of light and deep sleep, time when you fall asleep, time woken up, and amount of time spent awake in between sleep. While this by itself does nothing to help you sleep better, you can adjust your lifestyle based on the data and measure whether your results improve.
Supplement your sleep
If the above steps are not helping, you might need some extra help to get that quality sleep. Melatonin supplements are commonly used as sleep aids or to help reduce the effects of jetlag and could be helpful if you have trouble sleeping. Otherwise, you may also consider magnesium supplements such as PurePharma M3 which may assist in getting better sleep.