You thought sleep is an easy thing to do? Well, you’re in for a shock once you knew that a lot of people find it hard to sleep and actually stay asleep for a number of hours. The ending to this scenario? Waking up feeling tired, feeling sluggish and generally in a dour mood.
People must understand the importance of sleeping in human lives as their performance for an entire day hugely depends on how well they slept the night before. An average adult needs about 7-9 hours of uninterrupted snooze time each night for them to function optimally, unfortunately, not many adults get to achieve this seemingly simple enough task.
So if you’re tired of waking up tired, here are a few tips on how you can get better sleep:
- Skip those sleep-disrupting foods and beverages.
Stay clear of spicy foods before bedtime and do not eat anything within two or three hours prior to your sleeping time. Drinks to stay away from after 2 pm include caffeine, alcohol and sugary drinks. However, you can indulge in licorice tea, chamomile, lavender tea, warm milk or coconut milk as these liquids are found to be very good sleep inducers.
2. Do not take your phone beside you when sleeping.
Phones now are essential parts of everyone’s lives, yes we get that, but come to think of it, looking every thirty seconds at your phone can be very disruptive, not to mention counter-productive. If you want to read in bed, make it an actual book or an e-reader that does not emit any blue light.
3. Check your bedroom temperature.
The ideal temperature for sleep is around 60-67 degrees F—simple enough explanation.
4. Use pajamas for sleeping.
Don’t use your pajamas for lounging around the house during the weekends nor use them for your workouts. It might send mixed messages to your brain—use nightdresses and pajamas, and sometimes T-shirts only for sleep.
5. Hit the shower before bed.
It can be sort of a transition habit. Warm baths can help in eliminating the day’s stress which in turn can provide you with better sleep quality.
6. Learn to meditate.
People find that meditation helps a lot in terms of getting finer sleep. Worries make the mind work overtime, and learning to let go and block all those thoughts is a great way to save the day.
7. Don’t be afraid to take short naps in the day.
People think that sneaking in a few minutes of nap during the day will rob them entirely of a fitful night’s sleep, but that is not exactly true. Day naps though should not go beyond 40 minutes otherwise you’ll risk falling into deep sleep which can ruin your sleep pattern at night. If you can’t risk napping and you’re feeling lousy, try doing some mild exercises, going out in the sunlight or breathing some fresh air. And lastly, do not slurp on those caffeine treats, again because it might disrupt your sleep later on.
8. Track your sleeping time.
When it comes to fitness, there’s FitBit and the Apple Watch to track your fitness progress, but did you know that there’s also a tracker for sleep? “Sense’ is like an alarm clock that keeps track of your room’s temperature, lights and sound levels and basically your sleep cycle via a chip that you can attach on your pillow, and it does tell you about the things that you need to change in order to get a better sleep.
