What did Mom always say growing up? Eat your fruits and vegetables. Look both ways before you cross the street. Don’t cross your eyes because they might stay that way. And get eight hours of sleep every night so that you can grow up big and strong.
No matter what stage of life you are in, people are always being reminded that getting adequate sleep is important. The problem is that with so much to do over a 24-hour day, it can be nearly impossible to prioritize laying on your laurels instead of working, playing, or helping loved ones with their problems.
Getting good sleep at night really will benefit you in a variety of ways. How can you avoid highway hypnosis? Get proper sleep. How can you avoid crankiness and enjoy your leisure time more? Get some rest. We’ll discuss all of the benefits of sleeping and answer some long-held questions about the topic.
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Getting Proper Sleep May Just Save Your Life
It may seem crazy, considering how vital it is to be alert when you are driving, but many people find themselves sleepy when they commute to and from their job. Experienced drivers who are going on the same roads every day are going to carve out such a routine that there is nothing to keep their attention when they just rolled out of bed.
Getting the right amount of sleep every night will help you stay focused on the road instead of nodding off behind the wheel. This doesn’t mean you need eight hours every night like the old assumption, but it does mean finding the right amount of sleep for your body.
As was already mentioned, taking the same routes every day will still make you fatigued and bored no matter how much rest you get. The body gets too acclimated to scheduled events. Think about switching up your routine. If you live in San Francisco, think about driving by some of the sites on the way to work instead of the same drab backdrop every day.
If you combine sleep with creative ways to travel, you stimulate your mind in a way that will prevent you from falling asleep behind the wheel. This is key to anything in life where you need to be alert. Sleep is not the only answer to the problem, but it will go a long way to start.
Sleep Helps Your Mental Health
A lot of the reasons doctors give you for needing sleep are related to physical health problems. Getting sleep will help you remain well instead of sick. It will help you recover after a long day of exercising at the gym. But what they don’t talk about as often is the role it plays in helping to maintain good mental health.
Getting less sleep will cause you to develop more severe forms of anxiety, depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), and more. Sleeping repairs the pathways in the brain so you can recover from the difficult thoughts that run through the mind on a daily basis.
Sleep also helps your brain retain the memories you want to cherish down the road and the little things that happened in your day. There is a lot that happens to you during your life, and getting less sleep hinders the brain’s ability to play back those events in your head.
You also will get to experience the joy (and often the confusion) of dreams. It is harder for your body to go into REM sleep when you only doze off for a few hours. Getting several sleep cycles in will enhance the ability to dream and experience a world you don’t go to while awake.
Consider keeping a sleep journal to record the dreams you have if you want to remember all of them clearly. Thinking about what happens in your sleep is illuminating for your awake hours, but don’t overthink those dreams. Talk to your doctor or a therapist if dreams stress you out.
Sleep Will Help Kids Grow
Your body produces human growth hormone while you are asleep. This means that old saying from Mom about sleep helping kids to grow more is absolutely merited. It’s not bad to be short, but growth is a sign your body is developing the way nature intended it to.
Sleep deprivation will take this opportunity away from children, but this tip doesn’t really motivate adults to get proper sleep. If your body is mature, think about physical benefits such as recovering from aches and pains quickly.
This will make you feel younger and encourage more activity. Feeling tired prevents a lot of older adults from getting the movement they need to be healthy. You can see the way good sleep produces a trickle effect on all of the other parts of your daily routine.
Sleep Will Help You Maintain Good Weight Control
Getting less sleep makes your body unable to process the food you eat and the hormones that control your appetite. You will be hungry more often and choose unhealthy foods to eat if you are sleep-deprived. This is typical because people who sleep less are up late at night. You aren’t going to eat good foods when you look in the pantry at 2 in the morning.
Getting at least seven hours of sleep will get your body on the routine of eating three meals a day. This is one of the best weight control methods you could possess and it will discourage you from eating junk food when you are bored.
And that’s another thing. Weight control is connected to mental health. We’ve already talked about how sleep prevents anxiety, and in turn, this will take away some of the eating you may choose to do when you are feeling depressed or anxious.
Life insurance for overweight individuals can also be expensive, so keeping your weight down can also help your financial situation.
If you can remember how getting adequate sleep impacts all areas of your life and they compound one another, you will be encouraged to go to bed early.
Shawn Laib writes and researches for the auto insurance comparison site, AutoInsurance.org. He wants to show people how lifestyle choices like sleep can impact good driving habits.
Featured Photo by Andrea Piacquadio: https://www.pexels.com/
