I have never taken any exercise except sleeping and resting. Mark Twain
I have never taken any exercise except sleeping and resting.
Mark Twain
We talk a lot about the importance of recovery from exercise and how vital it is for our body transformation goals. Today we'll address the most important of these recovery modalities, sleep. Dreamland is where we make the most dramatic changes in our body's physiology. Those changes are directly related to what we do when we're awake but, if we don't take the precautions to ensure we get a good night's rest, our hard work can get sidetracked. So let's take a brief look at what happens to us when we sleep and how our daily lifestyle can improve this fitness process.
Approximately 70 million people in the U.S. suffer from sleep-related problems, according to the National Academy of Sleep. They also conclude that we lose around $100 billion annually in lost productivity and damages as a result of this. Lack of sleep affects concentration, memory, stress levels, alertness, and physical ability. It also affects our fitness results.
When we're awake, our body is constantly wearing down. During sleep, our body varies its behavior to rebuild itself even more efficiently. Among other things, we make more proteins and release hormones at different rates. So while we tend to think of sleep as a passive process, it's actually very active.
It all begins with our brain. Instead of shutting down for the night, our brain signals our body about what to do during the various stages of sleep. In short, neurotransmitters (one you've probably heard of is serotonin) signal the body that it's time to switch modes. Once this occurs, our body begins a five-stage rebuilding process that we call sleep.
We sleep in cycles wherein all five stages are completed in around one-and-a-half to two hours. As the cycles increase, we spend less time in deep sleep and more in stages 1, 2, and REM.
We tend to be more interested in studying our dreams and how they affect our psyche than in what else goes on during sleep. But all five stages of sleep are vital for maximum recovery. Furthermore, since each stage duration tends to vary during the night, subsequent cycles are also important. In each stage, some functions get shut down in order to funnel more resources to others. Since we can't do this while awake, sleep is the most efficient state of recovery.
The main things that affect our sleep are food, exercise, medications, chemicals, and temperature. The neurotransmitters that tell us to sleep are all influenced by these factors and can be misled. Some of the more obvious examples of things that affect our sleep are caffeine, which we often consume when we want to stay awake, and medications, which usually provide warnings on their labels. But what's also important to consider here is how some of these things affect our sleep cycles. Certainly "sleep aids," such as alcohol, make it easier to fall asleep but harder to get into deep sleep. Let's take a look at 10 ways we can improve our lifestyle to promote more thorough and restful sleep.
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It may seem like a strange question—does working out have anything to do with how smart you are? But more and more research is suggesting that the answer is a resounding "Yes." Exercising can do everything from slowing the aging process to helping children learn to read (for more, read "Diet, Exercise, and Your Kid's Grades"). So if you're having trouble motivating yourself to trim your tummy, maybe you can do it to build your brain.
A lot of the research on the subject has been done on children. After all, they're the ones we normally associate with learning. And getting them into fitness when they're young will help them learn to make exercise a part of their lives. Tony & the Kids! is an effective way to get children excited about exercising. That doesn't mean the brain benefits of working out only apply to children, however. Young to old, exercising can sharpen your wits while it slims your hips. Of course, all of these brain-boosting effects only occur with regular exercise, so Keep Pushing Play!
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