5 Reasons Why You Should Get a Good Night's Sleep (and 3 Tips to Help You Get Zzz's)

Good day, everyone! Hopefully, y'all have been getting decent nights of beauty rest because for today's topic, we're going to talk all about the importance and benefits of getting a good night's sleep!

You're probably no stranger to the fact that getting 8 hours of sleep has an incredible impact on your body and on its repairing and rejuvenation stages. If you consistently lack sleep, you'll notice some negative side effects right away like grogginess, lack of focus, irritability, etc.

We'll also give you some tips and tricks that we use to make sure you can sleep, and stay asleep!

1.) Sleep improves immune function

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This is super important because if you don't get enough sleep, your immune system won't be able to properly protect your body from infection. Your immune system does a lot for you on a daily basis without you knowing. It is your shield against outside and inside elements to make sure your body can fight and ultimately win—keeping you healthy.

2.) Improvement in productivity and concentration

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Sleep is crucial to your cognition, productivity, performance, and concentration. These can all be negatively affected as a result of sleep deprivation. You will notice the effects of this right away when you wake up in the morning. Maybe not immediately as you wake, but as you go on about your morning, you will notice a lack of focus and concentration.

3.) Weight Control

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When you're asleep, you're not hungry. When you're well-rested, you're less hungry. Win-win. In an article published by the US National Library of Medicine, short sleep messes with your leptin and ghrelin hormones, which control your appetite, and a link has been made between having a shorter sleep duration and an increased body mass index. So, catch those Z's!!

4.) Helping the body to heal

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Now, the body can begin to repair different functions and heal itself during deep sleep. Sleep gives your body a break; it gives it some "me" time. Blood pressure drops, giving your heart a break and slowing down; it builds your immune functions, and during this time, your body can make more white blood cells that can attack viruses and bacteria which is something we do not lack this COVID season!

5.) Mood Boost

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When you hit that sweet spot of 7-8 hours of full rested sleep, hormone levels, energy levels, and stress levels have all been adjusted for a more positive start to the day. Your social interaction with the people around you is more positive and healthy. Being in a bad mood as a result of lack-of-sleep will certainly make you a bit more irritable and, therefore, may negatively affect your conversations. I know it has, for me.

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If you're like me, I have trouble sleeping on most nights. I can't "just sleep"; in fact, just laying in bed for minutes or hours hardly does anything for me, unless I'm really tired. There are remedies to help sleep and stay asleep, but I will be sharing my personal solutions.

a.) ASMR, Background noise, or music

I'm the type of person who overthinks too much at night. The silence just gives me the opportunity to think-think-think! Which is incredibly annoying when I'm trying to get some sleep. So, to eliminate the silence, I introduce sound. I listen to ASMR EVERY NIGHT, and I'm not exaggerating one bit. ASMR is the perfect recipe for me because it isn't too distracting where I focus my attention on, but it creates gentle noises enough for me not to think in my head. Gentle rainforest sounds or jazz music also help me sleep in case of a change!

b.) Melatonin

I personally don't take melatonin every night, nor do I want to, because I don't want to rely on it all the time. But, if I'm having a rough and sleepless night, I know this bad boy will knock me out in a couple of minutes, and I'm so happy to have it when I do need it.

c.) Diffusers/Essential Oils

Essential oils are a powerful way to help me relax and sleep better. I often accompany my sleep with some lavender essential oil in my diffuser at night. Different scents like blue chamomile flower, spruce needle and leaf are also great essential oils.

That's it for today's post, folks! I hope you found any of this information useful or at the very least, interesting. And I hope you will all continue to take care of yourselves and provide your body with some hard-earned rest.

Catch you later!

xx