In the Alphabet Soup of Life – Are You Catching Enough ZZZs?
When you go to Wikipedia to look up what Sleep is, a number of different definitions and characteristics come up:
- Sleep is a naturally recurring state of mind and body
- It is characterized by altered consciousness and It implies relatively inhibited sensory activity
- Includes inhibition of nearly all voluntary muscles and reduced interactions with surroundings
The opposite of sleep as we know is wakefulness, and in a time where we are much more “On” and connected, where Life is described by 24/7 etc. Sleep is harder to come by.
Our bodies rest and restore themselves when we sleep, that includes restoring the immune, nervous, skeletal, and muscular systems; these are vital processes that maintain mood, memory, and cognitive performance, and play a large role in the function of the endocrine and immune systems. It is safe to say that our clients prefer us with well-functioning cognitive performance.
The internal circadian clock promotes sleep daily at night, but the advent of artificial light has substantially altered sleep timing in industrialized countries.
The potential negative impacts on our health as well as our life performance when we do not sleep enough are significant and get studied more, and we continue to learn.
There are plenty of resources we can access to help us all look into ways to improve our sleep quality:
- Make more time to sleep
- Maintain a regular sleep schedule
- Get a better mattress
- Eliminate distractions (yes smartphones and such)
Stoneridge Wellness Team looked suggested sites and resources:
- https://sleepfoundation.org/sleep-tools-tips/healthy-sleep-tips
- https://sleep.org/
- https://sleepfoundation.org/sleep-polls
*Heike Peters is a member of the Stoneridge Software Wellness Committee, committed to guiding and encouraging a healthy workplace culture for the body and mind.
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