How To Sleep More Productively
Most of us don’t get enough sleep, and that affects us way more than we may think…
This is also something I have personally struggled with for the past few years before I made the change to massively fix my sleep schedule. I used to think “well I’ll sleep when I’m dead, but there’s work to be done so I need to just keep on keeping on.” And that is generally the prevailing opinion in hustle culture which has become quite popular over the last few years as well. A lot of the hustle gurus, champion working 16hr days and if you don’t work your face off everyday 24/7 365 you cannot expect to be successful. So guilt tripped by others who tell us what it takes to be successful, we work long hours and sacrifice our sleep for the sake of productivity and our future goals. Deep inside however, we know this is not sustainable. We tend not to question it because if successful people have done it before us, why can’t we? There is more to success than working until absolute exhaustion, rinse and repeat, but that is a topic for a whole other blog post unto itself.
So the questions arise, how does sleep, or rather lack thereof affect your productivity? And what steps can we take to get better quality of sleep in order to boost our productivity…
What insufficient sleep does to your body:
It’s safe to say that most people know that not getting enough sleep affects their work performance to some degree. But we are often not aware of just how much a lack of sleep can affect us. Many studies have been conducted around sleep and what happens when we do not get enough of it. Several studies say that a lack of sleep can lead to compromised memory, lack of alertness, a decrease in our ability to make good decisions, and our problem solving skills are decreased as well. A lack of sleep can also make you moody, adding to stress and anxiety. You are more likely to be sleepy during the day which affects your waking hours productivity. It becomes much more challenging to focus, stay vigilant and keep attention on the tasks at hand. With decreased reaction times you are more likely to make mistakes at work. This then reduces any progress you may have made by working more hours, and instead you would have been more effective and productive if you worked less hours but slept enough.
This should tell us that working more, does not necessarily equate to making more progress. In fact it could very well have the opposite effect. We need to become less like dictators of ourselves and be kind to ourselves and listen to what our bodies need.
However a lot of people might try to combat sleepiness that they feel during the day with caffeine or something else to make them feel more awake. And you may be surprised how bad that actually is for you…
According to sleepeducation.org “Caffeine is a type of drug that promotes alertness. Whenever you have a drink of coffee you feel more awake usually. These drugs are called “stimulants.” Caffeine acts as an “adenosine receptor antagonist.” Adenosine is a substance in your body that promotes sleepiness. Caffeine blocks the adenosine receptor to keep you from feeling sleepy.” This then gives us those fluctuations of awareness followed by drowsiness when the caffeine leaves our body. Our bodies still need enough sleep to function, taking in more caffeine simply suppresses the feeling of drowsiness during the day not eliminating the need for sleep. Excessive use of caffeine can disrupt your sleeping patterns and mess with your REM sleep.
How much sleep do you need?:
So that may bring us to the next question well how much sleep do we need. It’s not a very complex question as most of us know that most adults need about between 7-9 hours of sleep a night. Some can do with a bit less and sleep 6 hour while some need more and need about 10 hours. You will need to judge that for yourself and see what amount of sleep you need. If you are unsure of wether or not you are getting enough sleep you can ask yourself these questions:
Do I rely of caffeine to get through the day?
Do I have a dedicated sleep schedule and stick to it regularly?
Do you feel very drowsy during the daytime.
Do you feel happy and healthy with your current sleep schedule?
Do you wake up in a bad or good mood?
Do you feel like your productivity is suffering?
If you are comfortable answering these questions and after that feel like you are getting enough sleep then your sleep schedule is fine for your body, if not, it may be a good time to relook at your sleep schedule and see how you can improve it.
How to fall asleep better and improve your quality of sleep:
So now that we have covered why sleep is important, and some of the negative side affects associated with not getting enough sleep; let us now look at how we can improve our quality of sleep and how we can fall asleep faster. This will then help us to become more productive and efficient in our waking hours, as well as a hole host of other health benefits associated with it. These health benefits are essentially the opposites of the negative side effects of not getting enough sleep.
So some things to note:
In order to have a better quality of sleep it is recommended that you should not have caffeine after 2pm as caffeine has a half life of about 5-7 hours and can if consumed later, mess with your REM sleep.
It is recommend that you do not use your phone an hour before you go to bed and not for the first 40 mins to 1 hour after you have just woken up, as the blue light from your smartphone screen messes with your bodies ability to prepare for sleep; as it blocks a hormone called melatonin which is produced in the brain when its dark and helps with sleep. While you can use a blue light filter to block out some of the effects, it is still recommended that you do not use your phone at these times.
Some things you can do to better prepare for; and go to sleep faster are to:
Create and set a sleep schedule and stick to it, so your body gets used to the schedule.
Reading a book before bed. A physical book or a kindle is best so you eliminate the blue light before bed.
Listening to soothing music or have some soothing music playing in the background. It will help you to destress and relax which makes it easier to fall asleep. You can if it works for you listen to ASMR, like waves or the sound of rain or nature sounds can work wonders for some.
Meditation before bed, where you relax your muscles and focus on breathing deeply can relax the body and prepare it for sleep.
Some light stretches before bed can also help relax your muscles and relieve your stress, making falling asleep much easier.
Those are just some ways to relax your body, decrease stress and increase your chances to fall sleep faster. If you are in bed already and find it hard to fall asleep, this is something I do and it works amazingly.
If I am laying in bed and I am aware that I am struggling to sleep I realise my face is scrunched up usually, so I relax the muscles in my face and focus on trying to relax each muscle in my face first. Once that is done, I slowly focus on relaxing each muscle in my body beginning from your feet and working your way up. Try to create the feeling of floating on water in your mind, or like you are laying in the sand. As you focus on relaxing your muscles you will generally fall asleep quite quickly. It may seem weird at first, but it’s because we will struggle to fall asleep if our muscles are tense, so focusing on relaxing it takes your mind off the fact that you are not asleep and focus more on relaxing the body.
Hopefully following these steps you will fall asleep much faster and have a much better quality of sleep as well.
Well guys that’s it for this blog post, I hope that it was helpful to you and that you will hopefully get a better night rest because of it and from that be able to live a more happy and fulfilling life.
Till next time guys,
Bye bye
