I hear that people who get a good night's sleep are making a fortune

March 21, World Sleep Day. Let's talk to you about sleep. I used the corresponding app on my phone to connect to the smartwatch I wear and checked my sleep data last night. I started to fall asleep around 10:40 pm and after about 10 minutes, I fell into a deep sleep, which lasted about 3 hours.

Since Monday is a regular rest day, I didn't have to get up early to exercise. So I turned off all alarms and slept until I woke up naturally, at 6.50am. This puts my total sleep time at around 8 hours. Very good figures. When I wake up, I am very refreshed, not bed-obsessed and not chaotic. Basically, I am a person who does not stay up late, has a regular routine and sleeps very well. I definitely go to bed before 11pm every night, and I sleep an average of 3 hours of deep sleep and 7-8 hours of total sleep.

Even if I occasionally sleep late and don't get a good night's sleep, I will take a "lunchtime nap" at noon, and 15-20 minutes is enough to revive me. According to the China Sleep Study Report (2022), over the past 10 years, the sleep time of the Chinese people has been delayed by more than two hours, with the average length of sleep shrinking from 8.5 hours in 2012 to 7.06 hours in 2021. The survey also shows that only 35% of people get enough sleep for 8 hours. Others, such as students, new mothers and working professionals, generally get less than 8 hours and have serious sleep problems.

02 The consequences of a bad night's sleep are serious

One third of life is spent in sleep, and five days without sleep will kill a person, which shows that sleep is a biological need. Sleep is an important part of the body's recovery, integration and consolidation of memory, and is an indispensable part of health.

According to the World Health Organisation, women who sleep less than five hours a day have a 36% increased risk of colon cancer, while men who sleep less than 6.5 hours have a 112% increased risk of lung cancer. Matthew Walker, a professor of neuroscience and psychology at the University of California, Berkeley, has written a book, Why We Sleep.

An expert in the field of sleep research, he conducted an experiment in 2019 which showed that lack of sleep is likely to alter a person's genes. His subject, who slept only six hours for a week straight, had 711 of the 750 pieces of genetic information he was monitored for altered.

You may not think so, but what are genetic changes? Does it have anything to do with me? Well, to put it in layman's terms, genetic mutations are a major cause of cancer.

Wouldn't you get a shiver of fear? Would you be in awe of sleep?

Not to mention cancer, a person's chronic lack of sleep also increases the risk of cardiovascular disease, depression, diabetes and obesity. Here's the kicker: let's just remember one thing: a person who doesn't sleep well for a long time can really get old! Get fat! Become ugly! And shorten your life! Cherish your life and sleep well.

03 Why don't you sleep well?

When it comes to not sleeping well, one of the main phenomena is: lack of sleep due to staying up too late.

At the same time, going to bed too late is much less effective than a meal that is served only after you have been hungry.

Once you miss the golden hour of sleep, the quality of sleep is poor, it is difficult to achieve a deep sleep and you may seem to sleep until ninety o'clock and still have a hard time waking up.

Why do you still refuse to sleep late at night?

Excluding the 996 people who work overtime to catch up on work and those who suffer from insomnia due to physical and mental illness, the reason why others stay up late is procrastination + addiction to electronic products. The psychological reason behind procrastination is that you don't want to sleep, you have something more interesting to do than sleep.

Things like swiping through videos, reading novels, catching up on dramas, playing games - things that keep you hooked and overwhelmed.

Time flies by in this way, and by the time you're yawning, your eyes are sore and you're physically and mentally exhausted, it's 1 or 2am.

The excessive blue light and information stimulation makes your cerebral cortex as excited as boiling water, and you lie down at this point, but still find it difficult to fall asleep, with your mind full of movies, messy images and unsettled thoughts.

When you do fall asleep, you wake up very easily or dream a lot.

Even if you sleep until eight in the morning, you have barely slept for six hours.

Not to mention that working people have to get up early for work, so 6 hours is a luxury.

04 If you want to sleep well, these are the things you need to do

If you value your life, love your beauty, want to be thin, want to be smart, sleep is something you must take seriously.

A lot of popular science will tell you that to sleep well, you need to keep a regular routine, go to bed early and get up early.

Go to bed at 10pm at night and get up at 6am.

If you can't do this, try these little things.

1. Put your phone outside your bedroom before 11pm and get ready for bed.

2. Force yourself to get up at 6am the next morning, regardless of how well you slept the night before. This is a way to use getting up early to force an early night.

3. Keep exercising at least 4 days a week for up to 40 minutes a day (1 hour is better), 7 days a week. Jump rope, run, swim, aerobics, brisk walk, walk, whatever, pick one that you can stick to.

4. Have dinner 3 hours before bedtime, there's no need for a snack. Milk and warm water can be taken as a couple of sips.

5. If possible, soak your feet in hot water for 20 minutes every night.

6. Before you go to bed, stretch your back, relax and stretch your body, you will sleep better.

7. When you lie down, don't think about anything. Inhale deeply, exhale slowly and take a few deep breaths.

8. One hour before bedtime, read a book (in paper form) instead of looking at your mobile phone or electronics. Not only will you learn more from the book, reading it will also help you sleep more.

9. Illness or excessive psychological stress, which leads to chronic insomnia, should still be treated promptly and cured as soon as possible.