There are lots of aspects of the holidays that make the season
special, but stress around the holidays is often most notable as we try
to address the emotional and practical demands of our jobs and our families, busy social calendars, and holiday gift-giving. All while navigating around inconvenient nor’easters and holiday traffic.
When things get crazy like this, the last thing I am
thinking about is the quality of my sleep, but according to author Travis
Bradberry, Forbes Magazine Contributor, that‘s exactly what I should be focusing
on. Below are excerpts from his recent
blog post titled Sleep Deprivation is Killing
You and Your Career. Bradberry begins
by outlining the significant impact of not getting enough sleep. “The amount of
sleep you need is something that you can’t control, and scientists are
beginning to discover the genes that dictate it. The problem is, most people
sleep much less than they really need and are under-performing because they
think they’re getting enough. According
to statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a third of US
workers get less than 6 hours of sleep each night, and sleep deprivation costs
US businesses more than 63 billion annually in lost productivity.”
Why You Need Adequate Sleep to Perform
“We’ve always known that sleep is good for your brain, but
new research from the University of Rochester provides the first direct
evidence for why your brain cells need you to sleep (and sleep the right
way - more on that later). The study found that when you sleep, your brain removes
toxic proteins that are by-products of neural activity when you are awake, from its neurons. Unfortunately, your brain can remove them adequately only while
you’re asleep. So when you don’t get enough sleep, the toxic proteins remain in
your brain cells, wreaking havoc by impairing your ability to think—something
no amount of caffeine can fix.”
Skipping sleep impairs your brain function across the board.
It slows your ability to process information and problem solve, kills your
creativity, and catapults your stress levels and emotional reactivity.
Bradberry sites that beyond the obvious benefits of thinking
clearly and staying healthy, the ability to manage your emotions and remain
calm under pressure has a direct link to your performance.
In order to stay agile and resilient during challenging
times we need to improve what Bradberry calls our sleep hygiene. That means both the quantity and quality of
our sleep.
Here are a few of the
strategies he identifies for optimizing the benefits of your sleep time:
Stay Away from Sleeping Pills
As you sleep and your brain removes harmful toxins, it
cycles through an elaborate series of stages, at times shuffling through the
day’s memories and storing or discarding them (which causes dreams). Sedation
interferes with these cycles, altering the brain’s natural process. Whether
it’s alcohol, Nyquil, Benadryl, Valium, Ambien, or what have you, these
substances greatly disrupt your brain’s natural sleep process.
Stop Drinking Caffeine (at Least after Lunch)
You can sleep more and vastly improve the quality of the
sleep you get by reducing your caffeine intake. Caffeine is a powerful
stimulant that interferes with sleep by increasing adrenaline production and
blocking sleep-inducing chemicals in the brain. Caffeine has a 6-hour
half-life, which means it takes a full 24 hours to work its way out of your
system. Have a cup of joe at 8 a.m., and you’ll still have 25% of the caffeine
in your body at 8 p.m. Anything you drink after noon will still be near 50%
strength at bedtime. Any caffeine in your bloodstream—the negative effects
increasing with the dose - makes it harder to fall and stay asleep.
Avoid Blue Light
This is a big one—most people don’t even realize it impacts
their sleep. Short-wavelength blue light plays an important role in your mood,
energy level, and sleep quality. In the morning, sunlight contains high
concentrations of this “blue” light. When your eyes are exposed to it directly
(not through a window or while wearing sunglasses), the blue light halts
production of the sleep-inducing hormone melatonin and makes you feel more
alert. This is great, and exposure to a.m. sunlight can improve your mood and
energy levels.
The problem this creates for sleep is that most of our
favorite evening devices—laptops, tablets, televisions, and mobile phones—emit
short-wavelength blue light. And in the case of your laptop, tablet, and phone,
they do so brightly and right in your face. This exposure impairs melatonin
production and interferes with your ability to fall asleep as well as with the
quality of your sleep once you do nod off.
Wake up the Same Time Every Day
Consistency is key to a good night’s sleep, especially when
it comes to waking up. Waking up at the same time every day improves your mood
and sleep quality by regulating your circadian rhythm. When you have a
consistent wake-up time, your brain acclimates to this and moves through the
sleep cycle in preparation for you to feel rested and alert at your wake-up
time. Roughly an hour before you wake, hormone levels increase gradually (along
with your body temperature and blood pressure), causing you to become more
alert. This is why you’ll often find yourself waking up right before your alarm
goes off.
No Binge Sleeping (In) on the Weekend
Sleeping in on the weekend is a counterproductive way to
catch up on your sleep. It messes with your circadian rhythm by giving you an
inconsistent wake-up time. When you wake up at the same time during the workweek but sleep past this time on the weekend, you end up feeling groggy and
tired because your brain hasn’t prepared your body to be awake. This isn’t a
big deal on your day off, but it makes you less productive on Monday because it
throws your cycle off and makes it hard to get going again on your regular
schedule.
Stop Working
When you work in the evening, it puts you into a stimulated,
alert state when you should be winding down and relaxing in preparation for
sleep. Recent surveys show that roughly 60% of people monitor their smartphones
for work emails until they go to sleep. Staying off blue light-emitting devices
(discussed above) after a certain time each evening is also a great way to
avoid working so you can relax and prepare for sleep, but any type of work
before bed should be avoided if you want quality sleep.
Learn to Meditate
Many people who learn to meditate report that it improves
the quality of their sleep and that they can get the rest they need even if
they aren’t able to significantly increase the number of hours they sleep. At
the Stanford Medical Center, insomniacs participated in a 6-week mindfulness
meditation and cognitive-behavioral therapy course. At the end of the study,
participants’ average time to fall asleep was cut in half (from 40 to 20
minutes), and 60% of subjects no longer qualified as insomniacs. The subjects
retained these gains upon follow-up a full year later.
Arainna Huffington in her recent book Thrive also describes
the significant benefits of a good night’s sleep . “All the science now
demonstrates unequivocally that when we get enough sleep, everything is better:
our health; our mental capacity and clarity; our joy at life; and our ability
to live life without reacting to every bad thing that happens.”
Bradberry adds that Huffington isn’t the only one. Jeff
Bezos, Warren Buffett, and Sheryl Sandberg have all touted the virtues of
getting enough sleep. Even Bill Gates, an infamous night owl, has affirmed the
benefits of figuring out how much sleep you really need: “I like to get seven hours of sleep a night
because that’s what I need to stay sharp and creative and upbeat.” It’s time to
bite the bullet and start going to bed earlier until you find the magic number
that enables you to perform at your best.
So here’s to decaf and visions of sugarplums…
imagecredit: huffingtonpost.com
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