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Health & Fitness

The Importance of Sleep

Many high schoolers internationally struggle with sleep.  Some are able to get to bed early, but are too stressed to sleep, while others are unable to sleep at all due to their yearn to finish homework, and finish it well.  Although many battle with getting too little sleep, getting enough sleep directly affects one’s mentality, productivity, emotions, creativity, and physique.  

Sleep prepares one for the day to come, preparing the brain to reach its full potential during the day.  It is commonly known that sleep provides energy, however there are many myths regarding sleep.  For example, many people believe that your jet lag and other time adjustments can be easily fixed within one or two nights of good rest.  However, the body can only adjust by one to two hours a day at best.  In addition, those who travel far on uncomfortable airplanes where sleep is mostly limited have their biological clocks disrupted further.  One other popular myth is that the more sleep one gets, the more daytime fatigue one acquires.  But, this is false.  More sleep could result in excess daytime fatigue if one sleeps for a long time well.  But, if one sleeps poorly, more sleep would be better than less sleep.  The most frequented myth about sleep is probably that one could reimburse their sleep debt on the weekends.  Although this could aid in one’s lethargy, it ill never be as good as one who sleeps well every single day.  Also, sleeping in past one’s morning wake up time on the weekdays can affect the biological clock, and can rupture when a person would fall asleep the night before they have to get up early.

When people do get up “early,” that person usually only would have received approximately six to eight hours of sleep.  However, six hours of sleep is not enough to work efficiently.  A study was made at the University of California, San Francisco, which showed that 3% of the population has a gene that allows them to work well on solely six hours of sleep.  However, for the other 97% sleeping more than six hours is crucial.

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With sleep being so critical, many people ask how could they get better sleep?  The secret to bettering one’s sleep in most experiences of different people appear to be time management and self-control.  So, next time you are drowsy during the day, go home, get your work done fast and efficiently, and then force yourself to go to bed!  The next day will be filled with confidence that you will be able to do it again, happiness because you feel refreshed, and an overall efficiency that you may never have seen before!

~Kathryn Cross

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