When you’re young you don’t give much thought to the benefits of sleep. When I was attending university in my early years, I thought that getting by on 4 hours of sleep while working the night shift during the summers was enough. Or cramming for an exam late into the night was necessary to do well. I didn’t realize at the time the harm this was doing to me. I also didn’t know that my marks actually suffered from cram sessions. But when you’re young, you are resilient.
As you get older you start to realize how necessary sleep actually is. You know that air travel across time zones messes you up for days afterwards. You also know that staying up late into the night, a common thing to do when younger, turns you into a zombie the next day. Still, most of us don’t really know the true impact that poor or inconsistent sleep has on the body and mind. Let’s explore some of the benefits of sleep and why, as you get older, you need to pay greater attention to your sleep.
1. Sleep Sharpens Your Memory
One of the benefits of sleep is how you are better able to remember things when getting a sufficient quality and quantity of sleep. Ironically, pulling all nighters to cram for those exams was actually detrimental to your scholarly success. As you age, most realize how important maintaining good recall is.
When you sleep your brain is actively organizing and solidifying new information from the day. This allows for clearer thoughts, better memory and improved learning capability while awake. Of course the flip side of not getting consistent sleep is a forgetful, foggy brain that struggles with learning new things.
Here’s what you can do to keep your brain clear and memory sharp:
- Review important notes or concepts right before bed. This allows your brain to consolidate these memories during the night..
- Take a nap for about 20-minutes after learning something important to improve your ability to retain new information.
- Avoid abrupt alarms that impact your sleep cycles. Waking up gently helps avoid disrupting memory consolidation.
2. Sleep Helps Manage Your Emotions
Sleep is especially useful in processing stressful events you had during the day. It leaves you calmer and more balanced when you awake. Not getting enough sleep makes you more emotionally aware and sensitive to stressful events.
Try these strategies to support your emotional health:
- Keep a journal by your bed and record what worries or stresses you out. This helps clear your mind for a better sleep.
- Before bed try meditative breathing or follow your favorite NSDR recording to improve your ability to clear emotional stress from your mind and improve your ability to process stress while asleep.
- Make sure to get enough sleep (7 to 9 hours) in order to have enough REM cycles to process emotional stress from the day.
3. Rest Boosts Your Immune System
If you want to improve your immune system make sure you get a good nights rest. Sleep strengthens your immune system with an increased production of cytokines, a protein which helps identify threats to the immune system, and t-cells which help fight infection.
Want to improve your immune system with sleep? Here’s how:
- Get at least 7 hours of sleep to maximize immune cell activity..
- Take brief naps of about 20 to 30 minutes when you don’t feel well, which gives your immune system time to recover.
- Remove all distractions which prevent getting a full night’s sleep such as noise and uncomfortable bedding.
4. Sleep Cleans Your Brain
While you sleep your brain actively works to remove toxins and waste products through the glymphatic system, a waste removal symptom for the brain similar to the lymphatic system used by the body. This process is necessary for brain health and lowers the risk of cognitive decline and Alzheimer’s disease. This waste product removal process is thought to work through Deep, non-REM Sleep.
You can help this process by:
- Giving your brain sufficient time, especially near the start of the sleep cycle, to enter Deep sleep to help maximize toxin removal. This requires a full 7-8 hours of sleep and a well programmed circadian rhythm (regular established sleep times).
- Researchers suggest that sleeping on your side can improve the clearing of toxin and waste from your brain.
- Make sure to stay hydrated throughout the day to give the brain the ability to cleanse itself during sleep.
5. Sleep Increases Testosterone
Testosterone production increases during sleep as part of a natural cycle. A decrease in energy, muscle growth and libido occurs when your sleep suffers. Interestingly, a study of older men showed that sleeping up to 9.9 hours of sleep (and no more) increased testosterone levels.
If you want to boost testosterone naturally try these sleep tips:
- For older guys, sleeping up to 9.5 hours can boost testosterone. Testosterone production is known to increase more so during REM sleep, which occurs in the second half of the sleep cycle.
- Keep to a regular sleep schedule to optimize sleep and testosterone production while sleeping.
- Meditate before bed, focusing on breathing through your nose. This may, over time, improve sleep quality, minimizing breathing issues while sleeping.
6. Sleep Improves Creativity
If you depend on your ability to solve problems, as most of us do, getting sufficient REM sleep is necessary. It builds creativity by helping your brain make new connections. It does this by using different sets of information in memory to make novel connections and build creative solutions.
In order to boost your creativity you need sufficient REM sleep. Here’s how:
- Writing down problems you are working on (then meditating to clear your mind) before sleep encourages more productive dreaming.
- Make sure that you don’t wake up prior to your regularly scheduled time as REM sleep makes up a good part of the last half of your sleep cycle.
- Keep a journal by your bedside so that you can write down ideas from your dreams when you awake. Great ideas have come from dreams, including the model of the atom and the Rolling Stones song “Satisfaction”.
7. Rest Speeds Muscle Recovery
Sleep is a time of renewal and repair, similar to the charging of a battery. During sleep your body repairs muscle tissue damage, healing and accelerating recovery for better physical performance the next day.
You can help this recovery by:
- Trying to time your workouts or sports games earlier in the day to allow more time for your muscles to rest and recover.
- Consider massaging your muscle and using ice baths to aid in muscle tissue repair.
- Ensure you get a full night’s rest without distractions to maximize the healing process.
8. Sleep Controls Appetite
Getting a good night’s rest helps to regulate appetite by regulating hormones such as leptin and ghrelin that relate to hunger.
To help control your appetite while asleep:
- Make sure you are relaxed and calm by eliminating distractions and using meditation prior to sleep. This will lower cortisol, the stress hormone which can negatively impact you sleep quality and lead to increased appetite.
- Avoid bright lights and bluescreens (phones, etc) before bed as they disrupt your circadian rhythm, which can disrupt the hormones which control appetite.
- Make sure your diet and workout routine is constant as a deficit of calories can cause hunger pangs, which will impact sleep quality.
9. Sleep Prevents Chronic Diseases
Without regular and adequate sleep, you are at risk of chronic diseases. If your sleep is impacted it can disrupt your hormones which lead to insulin resistance. It can also cause high blood pressure and inflammation. This can lead to heart disease, obesity and diabetes.
To avoid chronic disease:
- Exercise regularly to naturally lower inflammation, insulin resistance and obesity.
- Focus on getting uninterrupted Deep sleep as this stage of sleep helps regulate insulin sensitivity and metabolism.
- Manage your stress levels through exercise and meditation to minimize inflammation and chronic heart disease..
10. Sleep Extends Your Life and Improves Longevity
One of the best ways to live longer and feel young each day is through quality sleep. When your body goes into Deep sleep it repairs cells, fights inflammation, and slows down the aging process. By not getting enough quality sleep, you impact your body on a cellular level, making you look and feel older.
Take these steps to positively impact your sleep habits and improve the healing process:
- Reinforce your body’s internal clock – your circadian rhythm – by setting consistent times for going to bed and waking up each day. By doing so this will strengthen your body’s internal clock and directly improve hormone balance, immune function, and overall health.
- Make sure to expose yourself directly (go outside) to sunlight first thing each morning to reinforce your internal clock and, in turn, hormone regulation. Just 10-15 minutes of morning sunlight improves your mood, energy, and sleep quality.
- Keep your bedroom cool (around 65°F/18°C), dark, and distraction free to ensure you maximize Deep sleep with its anti-aging repair mechanisms.
Conclusion:
Sleep has a direct impact on a number of health benefits. Getting a full 8 hours of sleep is a good start. Improving not only the quantity of sleep but also the quality of sleep can have an impact on your memory, focus, emotional balance, immune system, hormone levels as well as other health indicators. As you get older, the benefits of sleep can’t be more important. Gone are the days where you can pull an all-nighter without much noticeable impact. Try that in your 50s or 60s and you will pay dearly for this choice.
Now is the time to worry about sleep cycles, sleep hygiene, habits that impact sleep and ways to improve it. Better sleep can help you regain and keep your edge.
Check out Keep a Regular Sleep Routine: Reclaim Your Sleep Time.
References
Waking Up Lost and Confused, https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/mental-mishaps/201906/waking-lost-and-confused
Emotion, emotion regulation and sleep: An intimate relationship, https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7181893/
The Sleep-Immune Crosstalk in Health and Disease, https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6689741/#:~:text=Indeed%2C%20sleep%20affects%20various%20immune,immune-supporting%20effects%20of%20sleep.
The Sleeping Brain: Harnessing the Power of the Glymphatic System through Lifestyle Choices, https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7698404/
Sleep Duration and Disturbances Were Associated With Testosterone Level, Muscle Mass, and Muscle Strength–A Cross-Sectional Study in 1274 Older Men, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25959075/
REM, not incubation, improves creativity by priming associative networks, https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.0900271106
How does sleep help recovery from exercise-induced muscle injuries?, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34074604/
Sleep Deprivation and Central Appetite Regulation, https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9783730/
What Are Sleep Deprivation and Deficiency?, https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/sleep-deprivation
Sleep and longevity: How quality sleep impacts your life span, https://mcpress.mayoclinic.org/healthy-aging/how-quality-sleep-impacts-your-lifespan/#:~:text=According%20to%20recently%20published%20research,diabetes%2C%20among%20other%20health%20conditions
