March is National Sleep Awareness Month. I read this on a flyer posted on the bathroom stall at my workplace. What an apt topic for me given that my relationship with sleep has been on the rocks these days.
I remember my blissful days in high school where I would come home from school and sleep from 4-6pm daily. That’s right daily. As in EVERYDAY. Except of course days that I had to stay after school for club activities or dance practice (yes I did do semi-classical Indian dance like every other kid growing up in tri-state area). Now that I think about it I was following the traditional afternoon sietas that Spanish people are known for. During these two hours I was in such a deep sleep state that practically nothing would have woken me up. Unfortunately, I had to get up to do my homework. Womp Womp.
Sadly those days are long over for me. No more siestas, not even on the weekends. I lost my ability to nap in college mainly due to an increase in stress. Not only was there a lot of homework and assignments to complete in a short time, but the stakes were higher. The story was the same in business school with long days shuffling between classes, recruiting events, homework, social events. There was no time to nap. Although, I must say there were a handful of times that I napped like a champ! Now back to working full-time there is no nap time. Unless you work for one of those tech companies that have nap pods.
Now that you have a thorough background on my napping abilities or lack there of, I want to talk about how important getting enough sleep at night is. Getting good sleep should be one of your top priorities given that sleep impacts many aspects of our life. Lack of sleep will impact your mood, memory, energy levels, decision making abilities, which in turn will affect your performance (work and/or school), relationships, and health. The days after I don’t sleep well my low energy and physical pain ruins the day 🙁
In the digital age, its even more imperative that we get enough sleep because our multiple screens are very distracting. Not to mention what feels like 24/7 work demands in certain industries. I am guilty of unnecessarily spending time on LinkedIn or Instagram or even reading un-newsworthy stories on CNN and Yahoo right before bed. Instead of sleeping on time, I’ve easily wasted over 30 minutes absorbing information that my brain does not need and woken up groggy and wishing that I just put my phone away. I struggle with sleeping well through the night. I can fall asleep fairly easily but with my overthinking mind I wake up in the middle of the night and have trouble falling back asleep.
So how can you get enough sleep and wake up feeling refreshed. Here are a few tips:
- Go to bed around the same time each night. I aim for between 10:30-11pm so I can get my 7-7.5 hours of sleep.
- Set your alarm and then keep your hands off away from your phone. This is going to take me a lot of practice to stop myself from unnecessarily reading the news from my cell.
- Read a book before getting some shuteye.
- Write in your journal.
- Meditate. Headspace app has a great Sleeping pack.
- Exercise. Burning those calories and tiring out the body will enable you to sleep more soundly.
Let’s get some quality zzzzzzs.