Today's topic is something i think is very important -- the importance of sleep. I have recently found out that many who are taking important exams are forcing to stay up late to maximise their time studying. You know who you are.
But is it worth it?
We all know that sleep is very important. It provides the brain time to organise what to be done the next day, and keeps us energised. But lack of sleep by voluntarily burning the midnight oil is not the best thing to do. So we are faced with a dilemma, to sleep or to stay up?
Here is the Golden Question: Is sleep productive?
According to several resources such as Encyclopaedia Britannica and Wikipedia, there are several functions of sleep:
1. Restoration
Sleep can improve and increase the rate of healing within the body. A study shows that wounds take longer to heal because there was insufficent sleep. This is the very reason why hospitals have a quiet atmosphere -- it encourages the person to sleep. Sleep can also cure headaches.
2. Acheiving a catabolic state
Sleep achieves the catabolic state where the body renourishes and rejuvenates our immune, skeletal, muscular and nervous systems vital for the growth of an organism.
3. Memory processing
Sleep is also when the brain processes all the memory. Whatever the brain (not you) feels unnecessary, it simply throws it away. This explains why you remember what you may be wearing five years ago but not where you put your keys. The same goes with stuff you studied for. After brain torture throughout the night, the brain shuts most of it off because it needs to process the more important things you experienced earlier in the day.
4. Preservation
Sleep is also when your body protects itself because the you do not to eat or drink 24 hours a day. As a method of survival, your body sleeps to protect itself from all sorts of danger. If you went to SuperTeens, you will see something similar when Ken makes a fat guy stand over a thin guy, only there, you achieve sleep in a conscient mind.
For those of you who really want to stay up, fret not, the way out is to do Nidra Yoga, an exercise where performed in 15 mins, you feel like you have slept an hour. Trust me -- it works. BUT-- Nidra Yoga should never substitute sleep.
FYI-- circadian sleep disorders are treatable. Those who do not get it treated can be like Mr. Thai Ngoc who has not slept for 33 years. Seriously. He couldn't sleep after he got a mysterious fever.
What are your views on sleep? Write them here!
(The reason for me writing this since last Friday is because I kepp falling asleep writing this article)
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