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How's Your Night Life?

Guest post by: Michael Hume

Article Overview: A slew of new research confims what we've known all along - you have to take care of your physical vitality if you expect to perform at your intellectual peak. In fact, several new studies talk about the importance of an often-neglected health habit: getting a good night's sleep....

How's Your Night Life?

Get The NEWSS: You'll Live Longer (And Better) With Sleep I'm not a tell-all writer, and I don't like to talk about my personal experiences unless I think it'll help my readers and clients... but, wow, did I have an awesome night life last night.

I must've slept, what, nine hours!

I've coached a number of clients - consultants, business owners, and leaders in all types of jobs - who are stressed-out. Some have been near the breaking point. They always want to talk about the "stressors" placed on them by their jobs, but before we have that discussion, I always ask about the client's health habits. And I often find they've been neglected. Many stressed-out people behave as though they expect themselves to be what a colleague calls "a brain on a stick," able to function well mentally without taking care of their bodies.

A slew of new research confims what we've known all along - you have to take care of your physical vitality if you expect to perform at your intellectual peak. In fact, several new studies talk about the importance of an often-neglected health habit: getting a good night's sleep.

Ever feel depressed? It might be sleep deprivation. This August's journal of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine reported that people who sleep 6-9 hours per night had higher self-reported scores for their quality of life, and lower scores for depression (and its severity) than those who didn't get at least six hours of sleep a night. (The report also says you can overdo it - the same scores were associated with those who averaged more than nine hours a night - though I wonder if depression caused some people to oversleep as opposed to the other way around.)

If you own a business or are running a high-performing organization, you don't want depression in your life. A report from BMC Medicine this past July noted that depression has definite effects on a person's ability to work (as well as form relationships and have a good quality of life). The report also said women are twice as likely to suffer depression as men, and that loss of a life partner (through separation or death) was a main contributing factor. But, perhaps surprisingly, the researchers found you're a little more likely to suffer depression in a high-income country (where fifteen percent of the population is likely to become depressed at some point) than in a low- or middle-income country (where that figure is eleven percent). Hard work and endurance of stress can build wealth, but can also take its toll on you if you don't protect yourself.

Finally, what about that "brain on a stick?" This July's proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences showed that you can't think at your best if you're not getting enough sleep. Interrupted sleep messes with your memory, according to the report; a minimum amount of continuous sleep is critical for memory consolidation. The Academy's researchers found that you don't need to be a "perfect sleeper" to keep your brain working well: memory was unaffected if the average duration of a person's sleep was maintained at a minimum of 62-73 percent of normal.

Sleep is one of the five key health habits I call The NEWSS: you need to exercise at least some minimal discipline in the areas of Nutrition (cut out the garbage, and eat fresh food), Exercise (get your heart rate up 3-6 times a week), Water (get your two liters every day), Sleep (get your eight hours, for all the reasons discussed here), and Supplements (take at least one good daily multi-nutrient to give your body what it can't otherwise get these days).

Don't try to be a brain on a stick. Your brain needs your attention to your health habits, and if you're not getting enough sleep, re-disciplining your "night life" might be the best place to start.

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Article Tags: health habits, health wealth and happiness, personal responsibility, successful entrepreneurs



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