Lack of Sleep is Affecting Your Stress More Than You Think
The world we live in now is full of distractions. We can blame technology for the increasing amount of things and services that take up our mental space on a daily basis. Email, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, Snapchat, YouTube, text messaging and every single other app and service on your phone will at some point take up time during your day. They are all great services and can be extremely useful in how they connect us to other people and ideas. However, with our instant access to these millions of great services comes a competition for our time. Our time is suddenly more valuable when more things start to compete for it. When this happens, we typically start to feel stressed out.
Now maybe some of these things can be avoided while others can’t. Either way, we have the power to decide what will affect us and what won’t. To deal with stress and other distractions, it’s ideal to be at a good emotional and physical level. This means getting an ideal amount of activity as well as a proper amount of sleep.
According to Everyday Health, a lack of sleep can elevate levels of cortisol, the stress hormone. This means when you find yourself in a stressful situation at work, if you haven’t had a good night’s sleep – you’re already in a bad position to deal with it.
Emotions Get the Better of Us
Do you ever seem to overreact to situations? Maybe cry a little more or get angry or depressed for no good reason? USA Today reported that a lack of sleep could send your emotions into overdrive. A 2007 study found that sleep-deprived brains were 60 percent more reactive to negative and disturbing images.
“It’s almost as though, without sleep, the brain had reverted back to more primitive patterns of activity, in that it was unable to put emotional experiences into context and produce controlled, appropriate responses,” Matthew Walker, senior author of the study, said in a statement.
A data study of over 5.6 million entries in 2015 by Jawbone stated that “people are twice as unhappy when they’ve lost 2 hours of sleep than they are happier gaining 2 hours of sleep.” It also stated that they found the ideal amount of time for sleep is between 8-9.5 hours.
The lesson to take away here? Sleep can be a vital component to emotional well-being. Stressful situations can be much less stressful if we are properly equipped to deal with them. All the distractions and stress we live with in the world can be mitigated if our bodies and minds are well rested.
And we all know what mattress and pillow gives you a better chance of getting more and better sleep, right? 🙂
