Importance of Being Sleepy - pt1

Sleep Tips and advice

When I deliver my 'Stress CPR' workshops or keynotes, sleep often comes up as an issue.  Ironically, it’s very valuable in terms of recharging our batteries, but it tends to be the first to go when those demands become excessive.

As it happens, I’ve researched the subject quite a bit and have actually done a lot of it in my time, so I thought it would be good to revisit the subject and provide some tips on improving sleep.  I also thought I would revisit my ‘sleep deprivation experiment’ as a prelude to the sleep tips, and tactics.

The Sleep Deprivation Experiment – pt1

Now I’ve been my own worst enemy at times when it comes to wearing myself out by ‘burning the candle at both ends’ and stuff.  I know from painful experience that I am human and that working long hours under high pressure, followed by equally long hours in a pub, followed by a few more hours in front of the telly with a kebab on me lap, is not the best recipe for feeling vibrant, healthy and de-stressed.

But, I’ve never seriously monitored how depriving myself of sleep for a long period, say 40 hours, will impact on me – my thinking, my body and my behaviour.

Why on earth would I do this and what’s it got to do with stress?

Well, it had nothing to do with a recent major diary malfunction (honest!).  I just want, to highlight the real benefits of sleep and reinforce its importance.

So, for those who have been following my @stressedguru tweets, you will know I conducted the experiment last wednesday-friday (11-13th May 2011), between 3pm Wed and 7am Friday.  I didn’t actually expect it to be 40 hours long.  I had only intended 30 hours, but it didn’t work out like that.  I’ll document the experiment over the next 2 or 3 blogs.

For now though, bear in mind the one golden rule of stress and sleep:

The more stress (physical and/ or psychological) you are under, the more rest and SLEEP you will require to restore the healthy balance.

I’ll provide some suggestions on how to improve sleep during the course of these blogs too.  In the meantime, however, if you are having significant problems with sleep, please do something about it.  Your GP is a good starting point, and don’t forget to check in and read the future blogs.

Check out part 2 and the rest of this series along with other sleep related blogs.

Keep an eye out for the next blog.

Dave Algeo

Motivational Speaker on resilience and men's mental health.
Want to improve your sleep?  Try my free seven day Facebook Sleep Improvement Messenger Course.
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