Increase Productivity By Sleeping Better
Good sleep habits increase productivity. Recent research reveals good sleep is directly associated with psychological health as well as a healthy immune system. If you suffer from lack of energy during the day, you swing between emotional ups and downs and often get physically ill, perhaps suffer from anxiety and fears it may well be associated with the quality of your sleep. Here I am sharing the latest findings on improving sleep quality in a format you can implement starting from today.
Good sleep habits increase productivity. The sleep cycle starts as soon as we wake up. Getting sunshine for fifteen minutes within half an hour of waking up sets the rhythm for the next cycle.
Identify Your Sleep Cycle And Needs
The average sleep cycle of a person is around ninety minutes and we need five cycles a night to wake up refreshed. Every person has a different cycle and time of the day they feel best waking up. It is really important to know your body preferences and choose a profession and lifestyle that suits you if you want to increase productivity in your life.
Dr. Michael Breus has devoted his life to studying sleep in order to improve our overall quality of living. He suggests you calculate the best time to go to bed for yourself by checking your natural waking up times. In order to increase productivity (once you know your best going to bed time) you make your wake up time consistent. This is literally a habit for life not just for weekdays or working days but for weekends and for holidays too. Over time this practice allows you to benefit more from your sleep.
How To Improve Sleep Quality
The sleep cycle starts as soon as we wake up. Getting sunshine for fifteen minutes within half an hour of waking up sets the rhythm for the next cycle.
What we eat and what we do in our waking time determines our quality of sleep. For example coffee as a stimulant takes about eight hours to be out of our system, therefore we should not consume any in the afternoon.
Another example is drinking alcohol. Even though alcohol is used as an aid to sleep, it makes you pass out and prevents from going into deeper reparative, restful levels of the sleep cycle. One glass of alcoholic beverage takes an hour to be cleansed from your system in order not to interfere with your sleep.
Twenty minutes of exercise that increases your heart rate every day helps better and deeper sleep. However this should not be performed too close to bed time. You are advised to give yourselves at least four hours between exercise and bed time.
Blue light is like caffeine for your brain. Using blue blocker glasses when you use your smart phone or tablet protects you. There is also a software for blocking blue light from your computer screen.
Strategic Napping
Power naps are twenty five minutes sleep during the day that increases productivity. If you power nap in the morning at nine you enjoy better creativity and memory, the nap between one and three it increases alertness, power nap later in the day increases focus.
Sleep Habits To Adopt To Increase Productivity
A word of caution needs to be pointed out at this stage: Make sure you are free from sleep disorders.
Now we can summarise the habits that will increase productivity:
- Sleep and wake up at the right and same time for your body all year around.,
- Stop coffee after 2 p.m.
- Allow an hour of digestive time for each glass of alcohol before going to bed.
- Exercise minimum 20 minutes during the day time.
- Go out in the sun within thirty minutes of waking up.
- Use blue light filters for your gadgets and special lights for your bedroom.
- Share this infromation with your kids, get them filter glasses and special lights for their rooms.
Attribution 2.0 Generic (CC BY 2.0)image:Jake Przespo
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