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There are numerous sleep benefits that you need.
Sleeping is as important to health as are eating properly and getting proper exercise, There are many sleep benifits we will talk about here. It is actually damaging to your health to work too hard and not get enough rest. Yet that is what most people are doing on a regular basis.
Just as you need to breathe deeply (literally) from time to time to gain clarity, you also need to sleep to take care of the mind and body. It is how we are designed to recuperate from the activities of the day.
One way to facilitate good sleep is to sleep in the darkest setting you can tolerate. Light disturbs the rhythm of the pineal gland's production of serotonin and melatonin. If you need some light at night, it's a good idea to not have it evenly in your line of sight. And, along with diminishing the quality of your rest, it also can ruin your night vision.
Some sleep benefits are listed here:
Keeps Your Heart Healthy
Heart attacks and strokes are more common during the early morning hours. This fact may be explained by the way sleep interacts with the blood vessels. Lack of sleep has been associated with worsening of blood pressure and cholesterol, all risk factors for heart disease and stroke. One of many sleep benefits are that your heart will be healthier if you get between 7 and 9 hours of sleep each night.
May Prevent Cancer
People working the late shift have a higher risk for breast and colon cancer. Researchers believe this link is caused by differing levels of melatonin in people who are exposed to light at night. Light exposure reduces the level of melatonin, a hormone that both makes us sleepy and is thought to protect against cancer. Melatonin appears to suppress the growth of tumors. Be sure that your bedroom is dark to help your body produce the melatonin it needs. When I worked the graveyard shift, I got a Black plasic curtin from a local Photo lab to cover my windows... It was as dark as midnight in my room, even when I was sleeping at noon.
Reduces Stress
When your body is sleep deficient, it goes into a state of stress. The body's functions are put on high alert which causes an increase in blood pressure and a production of stress hormones. Higher blood pressure increases your risk for heart attacks and strokes. The stress hormones also, unfortunately, make it harder for you to sleep. You can learn meditation techniques to counter the effects of stress and help get better sleep.
Makes You More Alert
Of course, an obvious sleep benefit is that a good night's sleep makes you feel energized and alert the next day. Being engaged and active not only feels great, it increases your chances for another good night's sleep. When you wake up feeling refreshed, use that energy to get out into the daylight, do active things, and be engaged in your world. You'll sleep better the next night and increase your daily energy level.
Bolsters Your Memory
Researchers do not fully understand why we sleep and dream, but a process called memory consolidation occurs during sleep. While your body may be resting, your brain is busy processing your day, making connections between events, sensory input, feelings and memories. Your dreams and deep sleep are an important time for your brain to make memories and links. Getting more quality sleep will help you remember and process things better.
Sleep is very important for our memory. A study that allowed 40 men and women to sleep only 26 min per night over a 4 day period showed that there working memory dropped 38% in comparison to a control group that got normal nights sleep.
There has also been evidence os a correlation between REM Sleep and the acquiring of procedural knowledge. So when learning new skills it is very important to get a good nights sleep. If you are learning anything, this becomes a very necessary sleep benefit.
May Help You Lose Weight
Researchers have also found that people who sleep less than seven hours per night are more likely to be overweight or obese. It is thought that the lack of sleep impacts the balance of hormones in the body that affect appetite. The hormones ghrelin and leptin, important for the regulation of appetite, have been found to be disrupted by lack of sleep. So if you are interested in controlling or losing weight, don't forget to pay attention to getting a good night's sleep.
Research has also shown greater metabolic values with people who get proper sleep. Which is important to burn the calories and metabolize the food we take in. So a big sleep benefit is it can assist you in loosing weight.
Reduce Your Risk for Depression
Sleep impacts many of the chemicals in your body, including serotonin. People with a deficiency in serotonin are more likely to suffer from depression. So here an important sleep benefit is that you can help to prevent depression by making sure you are getting the right amount of sleep, between 7 and 9 hours each night. This is important in today's high stress world. After all there is too much sadness as it is without having it come from chemical imbalances.
Helps the Body Make Repairs
Sleep is a time for your body to repair damage caused by stress, ultraviolet rays and other harmful exposures. Your cells produce more protein while you are sleeping. These protein molecules form the building blocks for cells, allowing them to repair damage.
It has been proven in many studies that sleep assists the body in wound healing and a strong immune system. In fact one study showed that rats deprived of sleep for 24 hours had a 20% decrease in there white blood cell counts. As you know white blood cells are the keys of the immune system, and how the body protects itself.
To show a drastic example of how sleep is so important, an experiment was done with rats where rats kept awake indefinitely. When this was done, the rats develop skin lesions, hyperphagia, loss of body mass, hypothermia, and eventually septicemia and death.
Conclusion
In the past, sleep was often ignored by doctors and surrounded by myths, but now we are beginning to understand the importance of sleep to overall health and well-being. In fact, when people get less than 6 or 7 hours of sleep each night, their risk for developing diseases begins to increase, there memory decreases, mood becomes poor, the mind becomes unfocused, and the body cannot heal itself properly.
So get a good sleep, and if you feel like a nap, listen to your body and take one.
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