Secrets of Sleep and Waking up

SECRETS OF A GOOD NIGHT'S SLEEP

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Everybody loves sleeping....right? Its pure joy is only next to meditation. Sleep....It seems like one the most important necessities in life. It is in sleep that we get the required rest for mind. Sleeping well and waking up fresh can boost productivity and energy by more than 50%. Imagine when you get all things done and are happy and cheerful, the whole day. Besides good sleep reduces stress and aging. Remember that you didn’t sleep well one night and ...you ended up spending the next day like a zombie. If you don’t get good sleep, it will cause low Serotonin levels in the body, which can cause depression, grumpiness, etc.


It always intrigued me...how to sleep better and wakeup fresh? I will share some very useful tips that I found with you. So are u ready?


SECRETS OF GETTING SLEEP ON TIME

When you don’t get sleep, you tumble and toss in bed for hours, it is called insomnia. I am sure some of you have friends who don’t feel sleep fast. What causes insomnia? What is the secret of getting sleep? It is recommended that you have one hour of winding down time before sleep. You can’t come from a race-course or video-game and go to sleep in next 5 minutes...it takes atleast an hour.

1. Number 1 secret is a hormone ...called Melatonin. Melatonin makes you feel sleepy, your eyes sag...have u experienced this? Melatonin is produced in the body when our eyes are exposed to darkness/ dim light for extended periods of time. So if you are not getting sleep one tip is to reduce the light intensity at night by buying a low-wattage bulb and use it at night after say 8pm. Bedroom should have a very dim light. Preferably something like a table lamp with shades. As a rule...AVOID BRIGHT LIGHTS AT NIGHT. Use of artificial light has shifted our body clock away from natural sunlight-rhythm. This can cause harmful effects on body and mind !

2. Number 2 secret is arousal hormones called adrenaline and norepinephrine. When you do
exiting activities at night such as watching TV, internet, video-games, gambling etc these arousal hormones are secreted. They will spoil the sleep causing effect of melatonin.

3. Number 3 secret is food. Everybody eats food....but have you observed that different foods have different effects on your moods. Very spicy foods, coffee, Tea etc can make you sleep late. Eat calming foods and alkaline pH foods at night. Oatmeal is known to cause sleep, chamomile tea is recommended by some. MILK is the BEST sleep inducing food. You can drink it fat free if you are afraid of gaining weight. Soy milk, almond milk also does the job.

4. Number 5 secret is having a shower in the evening reduces body temperature and signals the body to sleep

5. Number 6 secret is not to do any heavy physical activity such as dance, exercise before sleep can make up not feel sleepy

6. Sudarshan kriya, a breathing excercize taught by Art of Living foundation is known to reduce stress and normalize sleeping patterns.


5. If all of these don’t work....You can try some melatonin tablets from drug stores, which are safe and non-addicting/ non-habbit forming.


HOW TO WAKE UP FRESH




















You can decide if you want to wake up like the cat in the picture above or like the good morning girl ;) We all want to wake up fresh, right? Some techniques can help in that. Not drinking lot of water before sleep is something you know. You can also do some breathing called as Ujjai breathing which calms the mind before sleep. Did you know that our mind is active even when we are sleeping? That’s why we get dreams. A five minute meditation before sleep can help your mind to a deep state of rest and wake up fresh. So the basic idea is you have to let go and RELAX before sleeping or else you will think-through the sleep. AVOID HEAVY FOOD at night..It can make up wakeup groggy.


HOW TO WAKE UP EARLY













---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Why would someone want to get up early? Why are the most successful people early risers? ?? eg: Golf world Champion Tiger Woods , Benjamin Franklin the founding father of USA, Innovative Genius Thomas Edison, Bharat Ratna Dr Abdul Kalam etc. Morning is the MOST PRODUCTIVE TIME of the day....This is because your mind had lot of rest and is FRESH, FOCUSED and the atmosphere is very QUIET. Later during the day, there is a lot of activity and your mind is DISTURBED. Not much work gets done when mind is disturbed.You can finish all your work in the morning and be free whole day.

I know may people who want to wakeup early and get things done. But they end up snoozing and waking up late. Then they blame themselves and call themselves "I am not a morning person". Well...there is a secret behind this, which if you understand you can wakeup early as you wish to. Ok...here is it. When we are hitting the snooze button, we are not fully conscious. We are half sleepy or this state is also called subconscious mind activity. We can train the subconscious mind to overcome this. This is explained in a blog (I have given link at the end) by Steve Pavlina. Basically you break the subconscious habit of snoozing. How you do this is...you set the alarm during the day, when you are still awake. Then you let the alarm ring. When the alarm rings, switch it off and don’t sleep again. Doing this several times (5 times or more) will help you break the sub-conscious habit. Also keep the alarm AWAY from your bed...may be in next room. So that you have to be on your legs to shut it down. Keeping multiple alarms also helps. However, if you have an very important thing such as a exam next day, you will get automatically since your subconcious mind is worrying about it.

You can give a try to the wake up call service to wake up early using snoozester.com
They have free calls as promotional. Also go through Dave Cheongs blog if you want to get up early consistently.

How early to wake up
Some people decide to become an early riser and suddenly try to wakeup at 4 am next day. They do it for a day and then what happens.....? After a week....You can still find them sleeping till 9am :D . Why....?You can only shift your body clock by ~30 minutes every day without feeling sleep deprived. So I wouldnt suggest trying to do something overnight...it will be unsustainable. Slowly start waking up 30 minutes early for one week, then add 30 more minutes next week (total 1 hour).

How to reset yout circadian rhythm.














circadian rhythm is the natural body's rhythm to wake up in the morning and sleep in the night. The rhythm is controlled by light. A easy way to reset the waking cycle is to expose yourself to light in the morning. For example, going for a walk in the morning is a great idea. It signals your body, what time to wake up.

You can read...how to wakeup early by Steve Pavlina here
http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2006/04/how-to-get-up-right-away-when-your-alarm-goes-off/

POEM: Let me Sleep!!!
















Let me sleep
Let me be in the world of joy
Where there is no tension
Let my eyes sag a little
And there I go again
To the world of soft joy
Unparalleled peace and relaxation
Let the sun not rise bright into my eyes
And the alarm not ring
Let me sleep in peace (please!)
In the world of dreams
Be with my loved ones
They say that you have to dream big.
So let me first sleep...zzz...
- Gautham

Harmones in this blog.
Harmones are chemical agents causing changes in the body
Melatonin: Causes sleep
Seratonin: Feel good and happiness harmone
adrenaline and norepinephrine: Arousal harmones
Oxytocin: Bonding harmone

How to stay focussed at work? Read this blog by Dave Cheong.