It’s not a new thing to mention that sleep is the unbreakable part of our life. Whether it is anyone, we all require the proper amount of sleep in order to perform well in our daily activities, to make our motor skills function well and be more productive.
But, how many of us get that proper sleep every day? Hardly any person could be considered who take a proper amount of sleep in today’s fast-paced world. According to recent research, the average person spends approx 36 per cent of his life just sleeping.
This signifies how much sleep is important for humans and we even don’t bother about getting a proper amount of sleep. When talking about the purpose of getting proper sleep following are the reasons for it:
Restoration
Each night when you sleep, your brain gets cleaned, it gets refreshed by letting out the information it finds useless for it. Also during the sleep, the brain cells shrink by 60 per cent which allows the brain’s waste removal system called Glymphatic system to let out the trash out easily. Most probably this is the reason why you feel lighter after waking up from a sound sleep.
Memory consolidation
We all are familiar with the fact that good sleep helps retain your memory, this is also scientifically proven that a good amount of sleep helps in maintaining the strength of your long term memories.
Metabolic health
Another scientifically proven purpose of sleep is to maintain a proper metabolic health of your body; according to researches it was found that if you sleep approx 5.5 hours per night instead of sleeping 8.5 hours, then while doing any work a lower portion of your energy which you burn comes from fats, while more portion of energy you burn comes from carbs and proteins, this makes the fat gain of your body faster along with the significant muscle loss.
Also during an insufficient amount of sleep, in the long term, the body starts to suffer from insulin insensitivity and metabolic syndrome, which also give rise to diabetes and increases the risk of a heart attack.
How much sleep?
So now you know about what are the requirements of getting a sound sleep, but what is the sufficient amount of sleep required for a person?
According to research conducted by the University of Pennsylvania and Washington state university, a minimum of 8 hours of sound sleep is required for a person,
But here 8 hours is not the amount of sleep, its actually the quality of sleep, if you have a deep sleep then you can actually get the exact amount of quality sleep with just 4 hours of sleep, for which other person requires 8 hours to attain, so it basically depends from person to person.
Thus we need to remember that good sleep is as important as food. As Mahatma Gandhi said, “Each night, when I go to sleep, I die. And the next morning, when I wake up, I am reborn”.
